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WoW TBC on Mac Pro - Artefacts & Crashes

miniConvert said:
Still going fantastically for me, btw, with the fans turned up :) Must have played for a good 6-7 hour stint at the weekend without so much as a pixel out of place.
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Works fine for me also when the fans are turned up. I shouldn't have to manually turn up the fans though =/

I would take it in but I don't want to be without the whole computer =/
 
damado said:
Works fine for me also when the fans are turned up. I shouldn't have to manually turn up the fans though =/

I would take it in but I don't want to be without the whole computer =/
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Oh I totally agree. But repair just isn't an option for me, especially as they don't 'know' what the problem is (well, it's obvious what's happening, but there doesn't seem to be an actual fix... the fans shouldn't have to go so fast whether the OS increases the speed automatically or not).

smcFanControl is a damn handy application, though - and my oh my, those Mac Pro fans have a lot of unutilised speed on them! Crank them up and you'd be forgiven for thinking a tube train had just pulled up along side you.
 
I just wanted to report back on this thread. Since my X1900 was getting increasingly more sensitive to heat, I finally got Apple to replace it. They Next Day Aired me a new card and so far it's worked perfectly. I played over 2hrs last night running WoW at 2560x1600 and all settings set to max.

It's sooooo nice to be playing like that again.
 
I don't know how you all run at that high a resolution with ALL settings at max smoothly, are you including AA/AF? I get frame rate issues at 1920x1200 if I try having everything up, I have to turn some settings down, and I never use AA or AF :confused:
 
The problem is at Blizzard (Denied of Course)

I have exactly the same Mac Pro profile with an X1900 and the exact same problem that stareted with the pre TBC update in I think December.

I actually have contact through a friend with a guy who is a developer of believe it or not the video drivers for the game over at Blizzard. They know about the problem but blame it on fan speed controls. I think they have it wrong. I had no problems just like all of you until they did that big update that also screwed up all the Add-Ons for the game.

Unfortunately from what I have been made privy too there is such a giant bureaucracy for updates and stuff at Blizzard that the guys who make the driver might have sent the guys who handle updates good code only to have it screwed up with out their knowledge.

It is EXTREMELY frustrating to site here with an $8,000.00 system that cannot play a fairly simple game because no one will take responsibility. I am not sure why some people are saying they have no problems.

The guy who said he runs three instances at a time. Could you please give us a detailed profile on your system including memory and if you are all they way updated on Apples EFI updates for the Mac Pro.

I spent 2 hrs on the phone with Apples top level support for the Mac Pro adn they really tried to figure it out.

Hey Blizzard if you are listening you have a problem here! Please fix it!. If this were a card, Apple or fan speed control problem it would replicated when I did high end 3D rendering or I am playing other much more intensive games like Fear etc...

I am trying again to get the guy I have contact to at Blizzard to at least look a little harder but he tells be a couple of their own developers are having teh same problems on their Mac Pros. If that will not get it fixed I do not know what will. GO figure.

Until then I have to hook my 30" monitor up to my Mac Book Pro to Play WoW because my freaking Graphics Workstation pukes polygons on WoW.

GEEEZZZZZZZ!!!!!
 
I don't think this problem is just a WoW problem.

I'm having the exact same issues playing Medieval 2: Total War with bootcamp. It worked fine for a few months with all the settings maxed out, and now I can't play for five minutes without the screen turning into polygon city.

For those with problems playing games on XP, here are two tools used to control fan speed:

ATITool
ATI Tray Tool

Both of these should have a feature to control the fan speed to try and maintain a specific temperature.

If that doesn't work, I guess you're stuck trying to finagle AppleCare into giving you a replacement card.

This sucks for me because I don't play any games under OS X, so if I have to bring it in to a Apple Store I'm going to have to install WoW to prove that I'm getting these polygon glitches and that it's related to the GPU overheating.
 
After some testing, I discovered that the glitches start happening when the GPU gets to 75°C and get worse as the temp goes up. The max I saw while playing was like 89°C, and the fan wasn't even running at 50%.

I used to ATI Tray Tools to keep the fan running at 100%, and with my case cover off I was able to keep the GPU temp to 50°C - 60°C depending on how much was happening on the screen. The good news is that all the polygon glitches were gone. The bad news is that the fan noise is foud and luck, especially with the cover off.

So far I think I can deduce two things:

1. The default settings for fan speed and temp regulation are optimized with noise reduction in mind. It means the card will keep the GPU in the 80°C - 90°C range under significant load before really kicking the fan on.

2. Most people are saying they were able to play games fine for a few months before noticing these polygon glitches. The GPU was probably in the 80°C - 90°C this whole time. There's a possibility that being in this range for an extended period of time is making the card more sensitive to temp and more prone to the mathematical corruption that's causing these glitches.

I'm going to try and get a replacement card from Apple even if I have to hand my Mac Pro to an "Genius" to get it done. When I do, I'm going to hack the card to override the temp regulation settings and try to keep it in the 65°C - 75°C range. I'd recommend to people that have already gotten a replacement card to do the same.
 
It'd be good if we could control the ATI card fan under OS X. I still have to ramp up the system fans to prevent the corruption.

I'll give it a bit longer then try for a replacement card again - but I'm not taking my Mac Pro anywhere and certainly not having anyone collect it just to fit a new card.
 
I've had the problem now for 2 months. I haven't taken it in because that would only be a temporary solution. My friend replaced his X1900XT back at the end of Jan and is starting to get glitches yet again. Getting a new card will just give you another couple of months of play.

Mine lasted a bit longer b/c I had the accelero X2 on it which kept my temps down.

I think most people believe this is WoW related due to the timing, but many if not most, will have the same problem with other 3D games. I'm wondering if the apple versions are just defective or if it's the case cooling in which case any card you put in there will eventually end up fried. I'm planning on upgrading to the R600 when that comes out but I'm a bit leary because I dont' want to damage it.

I wonder if it might be because the card is lying down on that pad and doesn't get cooling on that side. In all the PCs that I've had the card always has air on both sides.
 
damado said:
I wonder if it might be because the card is lying down on that pad and doesn't get cooling on that side. In all the PCs that I've had the card always has air on both sides.
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Heat building up under the card... that's quite a nice theory.
Transeau said:
all Better for me!
Todays update fixed it!!
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Really? Can you give us some more before/after details? Also, what update was it - I don't remember installing any updates last week.
 
I had a thread a couple of months ago on this subject.. I went ahead and let it die because of all the embarrising misinformation I gave regarding my x1900xt card and wow glitching gameplay.

I went from thinking it was blizzards fault, to my fault, to the Accelero X2 fan's fault, back to my fault then back to blizzards fault. I currently believe it's Blizzards fault again.

I am still having this problem, even though I thought for about 30 min, last weeks wow patch may have fixed the issue (it mentioned something about OpenGL) fixes. Sadly it is still happening as bad as ever. The only way I've been able to play (on my mac pro 2.66, with 30" cinema, 4 GB RAM) is by playing at a horrible resolution and cranking up smcFanControl. And even that's shaky.
 
mactree said:
I had a thread a couple of months ago on this subject.. I went ahead and let it die because of all the embarrising misinformation I gave regarding my x1900xt card and wow glitching gameplay.

I went from thinking it was blizzards fault, to my fault, to the Accelero X2 fan's fault, back to my fault then back to blizzards fault. I currently believe it's Blizzards fault again.

I am still having this problem, even though I thought for about 30 min, last weeks wow patch may have fixed the issue (it mentioned something about OpenGL) fixes. Sadly it is still happening as bad as ever. The only way I've been able to play (on my mac pro 2.66, with 30" cinema, 4 GB RAM) is by playing at a horrible resolution and cranking up smcFanControl. And even that's shaky.
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Yeah, not sure if it's blizzard. I think most problems seem to come from there because the game is so huge and it's one that all the mac users can play. I stopped playing WoW after I got my mac pro and played mostly EQ2 and I started getting the same problems like everyone else.

Right now I bought a 7300 GT off ebay just to play eve online with until apple becomes more aware of the problem so that I can get a more intelligent fix. I honestly don't think any card will last unless I can put it in the slot above the bottom one....but for that I need apple to change the firmware to allow 16x speed on it. Right now I have the 7300 on the slot above the bottom but it's at 8x.

I'm curious to see what eventually happens to those that put an 8800 in. I wonder if those cards will last longer than 4 months.
 
damado said:
Yeah, not sure if it's blizzard. I think most problems seem to come from there because the game is so huge and it's one that all the mac users can play. I stopped playing WoW after I got my mac pro and played mostly EQ2 and I started getting the same problems like everyone else.

Right now I bought a 7300 GT off ebay just to play eve online with until apple becomes more aware of the problem so that I can get a more intelligent fix. I honestly don't think any card will last unless I can put it in the slot above the bottom one....but for that I need apple to change the firmware to allow 16x speed on it. Right now I have the 7300 on the slot above the bottom but it's at 8x.

I'm curious to see what eventually happens to those that put an 8800 in. I wonder if those cards will last longer than 4 months.
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I agree, I definitely shouldn't point any more fingers as to where the blame lies.. I'll just acknowledge that the problem exists and has been a pain in my side.
 
miniConvert said:
Heat building up under the card... that's quite a nice theory.

Really? Can you give us some more before/after details? Also, what update was it - I don't remember installing any updates last week.
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Two things.. The 2.0.10 update cleared up many of my "glitches". However, I feel that what truly "cured" me was a ThermalTake replacement heatsink / fan.

I think it's very possible that with the added use pf Apple's Multi-Threaded OpenGL working the card harder, WoW new use of it (by no means perfectly stable yet), and the stock cooler not quite keeping up with the load on the card... They all have added to this problem.

Now that WoW is making better use of the new OpenGL (more stable and efficient use), this has helped out a lot, taking some of the load off of the GPU and putting it on the least used CPU(s), this has helped to keep the GPU at a more reasonable temp. But still too high for the stock cooler, which is tweaked to be nice and quiet. Replacing the stock cooler has dropped my GPU temps by 15c and my PCIe "ambient" temps by almost 10c. I do feel that this has helped the overall stability of the GPU and video memory.

what I can NOT tell you is if *MY* glitches were a result of the GPU or the video memory being too hot. I would guess it's the memory, as video memory doesn't typically cause a video lockup, but I know it DOES cause distortions. a GPU overheating will typically cause a full video lockup.

just my $0.02 :)
 
Thing is I changed my cooler to the accelero X2 almost right from the start and pretty much only played EQ2 for 4 months straight. I didn't play WoW until I started having problems and went to WoW to test "lesser" graphics than EQ2 to see if I would have the same problem. My GPU temps were always good, at least 10 degrees lower than with stock cooling. I think what's getting damaged isn't the GPU but something on the back side of the card.
 
Sadly I lay complete blame on ATI for making such a lousy GPU. I have friends who bought the PC version of the x1900 and have and nothing but problems with them, including overheating and artifacting while playing WoW under Windows.

The sad part is this is still the only choice offered by Apple as a gamer's video card which is pathetic considering there are far better choices from nVidia. Consider for instance my buddy and I bought bought our video cards at the same time. They were both brand new models around xmas time. He bought the x1900 and I bought the nVidia 7900GS. After 4 hours of WoW, his x1900 is running at 64c and my nVidia was a stable 29c. And the kicker is I benchmark slightly higher than he does and his card cost $50 more.

His only solution to stop the crashing and artifacting in WoW was to apply a serious fan and heatsink to it.

http://www.zalman.co.kr/eng/product/view.asp?idx=192&code=013

No idea if this will work on Apple's x1900 card though.

I just BTO'd a Mac Pro this Saturday, so I should have it in a few days.. unfortunately I ordered it with the ATI just because the 7300 is an antique now. I hope to gawd they solved this problem because I play ALOT of WoW.
 
I do my work on my Mac and play WoW on my Windoze box.

Wasn't Windoze designed as a game platform in the first place? :)
 
Transeau said:
The 2.0.10 update cleared up many of my "glitches".
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I still haven't tried this (might get chance to this weekend, usually too busy working on the thing in the week) so hopefully it'll improve matters. I actually had to raise my fan temps with smcFanControl further recently after distortion started to creep back in :(

I desperately want Apple to release a new high end card that I can slot in, preferably nVidia after this debacle :D
 
*ding ding ding*

AppleCare are replacing my card. I knew somebody would in the end. They're dispatching a new one with packaging to return the old one (previously they had only offered to collect my entire machine... madness).

I'm going by the logic that my old card is actually damaged (or at least over-sensitised) by prolongued playing while obviously overheated. Hopefully a new card, given the improvements Blizzard and Apple have made recently, will last at least a few months until I can buy something better.

Now, do I go to the trouble of trying to fit an aftermarket cooler of some sort? To be honest I wouldn't know where to start.

Edit: New card has arrived, less than 24 hours later! Also received a shipping label to get the old one back to them. :D Now I just hope it's alive and kicking, I'll give it a try later.
 
miniConvert said:
*ding ding ding*

AppleCare are replacing my card. I knew somebody would in the end. They're dispatching a new one with packaging to return the old one (previously they had only offered to collect my entire machine... madness).

I'm going by the logic that my old card is actually damaged (or at least over-sensitised) by prolongued playing while obviously overheated. Hopefully a new card, given the improvements Blizzard and Apple have made recently, will last at least a few months until I can buy something better.

Now, do I go to the trouble of trying to fit an aftermarket cooler of some sort? To be honest I wouldn't know where to start.

Edit: New card has arrived, less than 24 hours later! Also received a shipping label to get the old one back to them. :D Now I just hope it's alive and kicking, I'll give it a try later.
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What did you tell them to get them to send you a new card instead of having to take in your whole machine? I might finally just go through the red tape to get a new one and put it at 8x on the slot above.
 
damado said:
What did you tell them to get them to send you a new card instead of having to take in your whole machine? I might finally just go through the red tape to get a new one and put it at 8x on the slot above.
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Nothing special, it's all about who you speak to. The less the person knows, the more likely you are to get your replacement ;)

I just said that I was having a problem with my graphics card when I play games, that it was overheating and causing screen distortions and eventually hanging the machine. I said I'd checked the apple support site and found that other people were experiencing the same problem and had their cards replaced. Then I asked if they could send me out a new card.

I've put it in the same slot as before for now, will just raise the fan speeds a bit to give it extra airflow and hopefully prolong its life. The fit to the RAM riser cover is very, very tight, though, so I could understand a heat buildup under the cards being an issue. That said, there's some sort of pad that it sits on - I'm not sure what that's all about.

Monster card, heavier than I'd expected too.
 
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