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New iMac and WOW.

P

pcorajr

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Jun 6, 2007
310
0
Well there is only one game I would be playing on my new iMac (If i get one) and that is WOW. Anybody out there with the new iMac can shed some light on how it is preforming on wow. Mainly the 20" with the 2600 Pro.

Im not going to sit here and complain about what Apple should of done / included. The fact is that I am a nvidia fan and I could care less about ATI. But I do not have an option so if I want OSX I will have to compromise.

My Current setup is as follow:

Sony Vaio with ATI 700 PRO (Replacement card I got for free after my PSU and 6800 GT blew out)
P4 3GZ HT
1.5 Gig Of ram
Windows Vista Ultimate

The Pro models are out of the question I cannot afford them. So if anybody could please post some reviews / FPS on wow I will greatly appreciate it. I will be buying my iMac tomorrow afternoon Hopefully by then Barefeats or other sites have some initial benchmarks.
 
ezekielrage_99

ezekielrage_99

macrumors 68040
Oct 12, 2005
3,336
19
Littleodie914 said:
Believe me, WOW is not nearly as system-taxing as many people make it out to be. It will run totally flawlessly on your new mac. Enjoy! :)
Click to expand...

It runs very well on my 20" iMac with 1GB of RAM and it's still very playable on my Macbook with 2GB of RAM.

WoW really needs memory and a decent net connection to notice a huge difference.
 
P

pcorajr

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Jun 6, 2007
310
0
ezekielrage_99 said:
It runs very well on my 20" iMac with 1GB of RAM and it's still very playable on my Macbook with 2GB of RAM.

WoW really needs memory and a decent net connection to notice a huge difference.
Click to expand...

Well that is great news, I hope it weally work well. The heart breaker is the fact that i was very close to purchasing the old 24" with the 7600 in it. It's a matter of personal taste. But im hoping that the awesomeness of OSX + iLife will make up for it. :D
 
J

joeconvert

macrumors 6502
Nov 18, 2003
299
0
TX
pcorajr said:
The fact is that I am a nvidia fan and I could care less about ATI. But I do not have an option so if I want OSX I will have to compromise.
Click to expand...

that's couldn't care less about ATI.


On Topic: From what I have actually seen, WOW should run just fine. I'll be out now before someone comes in and requests a link to benchmarks that will tell you when you max out the settings you won't be able to do code crunching for the NSA in the background in the background b/c the video card is lame.
 
Chaszmyr

Chaszmyr

macrumors 601
Aug 9, 2002
4,267
86
Gamers are quick to point out that the video cards in the iMac are pretty low-end cards. This is true. Here are some things they don't bother pointing out:
1. Getting 80 frames per second instead of 40 doesn't really matter.
2. Higher end cards are overkill for any currently existing game. Even Crysis, when it comes out, should run on the iMac (under BootCamp) without a hitch.

Would I like to see a higher end card in the iMac? Absolutely. If I was in the market for an iMac would the video card in it be a deterrent? No way.

The iMac will run WoW wonderfully, even with pretty high settings.
 
grundgedanke

grundgedanke

macrumors member
Jul 17, 2007
52
23
Germany
Chaszmyr said:
Gamers are quick to point out that the video cards in the iMac are pretty low-end cards. This is true. Here are some things they don't bother pointing out:
1. Getting 80 frames per second instead of 40 doesn't really matter.
2. Higher end cards are overkill for any currently existing game. Even Crysis, when it comes out, should run on the iMac (under BootCamp) without a hitch.

Would I like to see a higher end card in the iMac? Absolutely. If I was in the market for an iMac would the video card in it be a deterrent? No way.

The iMac will run WoW wonderfully, even with pretty high settings.
Click to expand...

I am pretty sure Crysis won't run on an IMac. Maybe it crawls! And we are not talking about having 80 or 40 frames. If you have a look at the benchmarks for the ati cards you'll find you self surprised that even with some games you can buy for month now you get frame rates UNDER 25.
 
Barham

Barham

macrumors regular
Feb 5, 2004
166
37
What people constantly fail to notice is that when someone asks for how a particular machine will run WoW, they are not talking to a casual player. I play on a MBP with the x1600. It does run quite well, but I would never EVER call it 'flawless'. Let's define that term first. Flawless gameplay: Highest settings (period, not almost, all settings max), 70fps (at all times, not indoors, all the time), I say 70fps because regardless of machine, there will always be extra taxing moments (like the AoE groups in Kara for instance) that cause the framerate to drop. The additional frames allow it to always remain above the level of detection.

Ok, so now that 'flawless' is out of the way, my guess would be that WoW would run very well on this machine, even at the maximum settings (though some things, like full screen glow, seem to really push the Mac client). My MBP is what I would call an enjoyable performance level (meaning that performance doesn't get in the way of my play experience often). I would guess that the new iMac will be in the Exceptional performance level (meaning the kind of performance that would be good enough to use for recording raid footage for video posting, even at very high quality settings).

If you want a machine that plays flawlessly, you'll need to build a gaming box. But, if you want great performance in a great package with OS X, you're not going to do much better.
 
Chaszmyr

Chaszmyr

macrumors 601
Aug 9, 2002
4,267
86
grundgedanke said:
I am pretty sure Crysis won't run on an IMac. Maybe it crawls! And we are not talking about having 80 or 40 frames. If you have a look at the benchmarks for the ati cards you'll find you self surprised that even with some games you can buy for month now you get frame rates UNDER 25.
Click to expand...

CPU: Athlon 64 3000+/Intel 2.8ghz
Graphics: Nvidia 6600 or ATI X1600 - Shader Model 2.0
RAM: 1GB
HDD: 6GB

Those are the minimum specs for Crysis. While the minimum specs are seldom really good enough, the iMac's specs surpass those.
 
cluthz

cluthz

macrumors 68040
Jun 15, 2004
3,118
4
Norway
Barham said:
Well the latest MPB and the latest iMac hold more power than the best gaming box u could get when WoW was introduced.

Wow runs on a G3 500+ with nvidia geforce 2mx/radeon 7500 or higher (although not usable), and the new iMac is like 25 times faster.

I've been in naxx on a G4/400 with geforce 4 and 768 mb ram once ;p
Click to expand...
 
C

cubist

macrumors 68020
Jul 4, 2002
2,075
0
Muncie, Indiana
Barham said:
... Flawless gameplay: Highest settings (period, not almost, all settings max), 70fps (at all times, not indoors, all the time), ...
Click to expand...

I've never seen an FPS higher than 59 on WoW, on any hardware; I think it's being constrained by the servers I play on and Blizzard's less-than-flawless internet connectivity. I'd call anything above 30 or so "unobtrusive". On my G4 I was down below 10 in Shattrath, and this caused me to have difficulty moving around, but out of the city I was up to around 20. Is it "playable"? Depends on the player.

WoW works very well on Macs. Blizzard's done a great job on their Mac version. Any of the Intel-based iMacs should be "playable" for most players.
 
cluthz

cluthz

macrumors 68040
Jun 15, 2004
3,118
4
Norway
cubist said:
I've never seen an FPS higher than 59 on WoW, on any hardware; I think it's being constrained by the servers I play on and Blizzard's less-than-flawless internet connectivity. I'd call anything above 30 or so "unobtrusive". On my G4 I was down below 10 in Shattrath, and this caused me to have difficulty moving around, but out of the city I was up to around 20. Is it "playable"? Depends on the player.

WoW works very well on Macs. Blizzard's done a great job on their Mac version. Any of the Intel-based iMacs should be "playable" for most players.
Click to expand...

Turn of vsync and you will see more. I have 130+ in "old wow"
 
Barham

Barham

macrumors regular
Feb 5, 2004
166
37
cubist said:
I've never seen an FPS higher than 59 on WoW, on any hardware; I think it's being constrained by the servers I play on and Blizzard's less-than-flawless internet connectivity. I'd call anything above 30 or so "unobtrusive". On my G4 I was down below 10 in Shattrath, and this caused me to have difficulty moving around, but out of the city I was up to around 20. Is it "playable"? Depends on the player.

WoW works very well on Macs. Blizzard's done a great job on their Mac version. Any of the Intel-based iMacs should be "playable" for most players.
Click to expand...

I didn't say playable. I was defining "flawless" because people on this forum constantly throw that term around. I also agree that anything above 30 is unobtrusive, but that's if 30 is in the most taxing situation. To me, if the game goes below 15 we' re no longer talking about "good" performance.

I don't know if you're trying to start flames, but coming in here and suggesting that a g4 has acceptable performance is laughable.
 
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