I know someone will be more helpful, but to be honest? I'm done with the Mac client. Mine crashes once per hour even on performance settings.
I have a top end 2011 iMac 27' and play at 2560x1440 at almost max ultra settings and I can play for 12 hours without crashing if I want. The same way I played on performance for hours and hours on my old mac mini core duo with intel gfx, and my fps never dropped even on rikti raids.
Hoe did I manage that? I run CoX on windows 7 via Bootcamp. The Mac client is garbage.
(Although since Mac OS X - the system - is so damn memory hungry, you might want to use the max RAM you can in your system - Everymac says your mac can handle up to 6gb although Apple officialy says 4)
Hi Tago,
I have a simliar vintage MacBook Pro. Do you have 2 graphics cards? I usually run COH on the better of the 2. I find I can run for hours without worrying about crashing, with one caveat --> /reloadgfx. I have it bound to the tilde key and hit it everyonce in a while. Macs use memory differently than PCs, so it just fills and fills till it dumps.
Also, I don't have Lion, so I don't know if it's causing problems.
Oh, and if you read the issues section for PCs, there are people over there having problems with crashes and freezes, particularily in the graphics intensive moments. So I get the feeling it's not something special to Macs.
Quote:
His model only has the 8600GT card.|
Originally Posted by Tawny
Hi Tago,
I have a simliar vintage MacBook Pro. Do you have 2 graphics cards? I usually run COH on the better of the 2. I find I can run for hours without worrying about crashing, with one caveat --> /reloadgfx. I have it bound to the tilde key and hit it everyonce in a while. Macs use memory differently than PCs, so it just fills and fills till it dumps. |
If I'm not mistaken the dual card Macbook pros started in the mid-2009 models (most of the 2011 ones also have two but instead of two nvidias they have an intel HD for normal use and an ATI for gaming and the like).
And sure, Windows users have issues too, but if you see the forums half of the systems there are with outdated drivers or just aren quite old even for CoH - not the OP system's case - the game always ran smoothly on my old mac mini which had a crappy intel gma card (on winXP, there was no mac client back then so I can't say if it would be bad).
But when you see the person who makes the Mac guides and is the most understandable member here about the CoX Mac client saying 'my game is better, crashing once every two hours'... You know something is fishy about the client. Not that it's exclusive to CoX, there are plenty of games that are converted using emulation tech and aren't exactly stable on Mac - Fallout 3 and Dragon Age Mac versions have notoriously bad reputations while the WoW client doesn't, although I haven't played these games, just saw a ton of complaints about the first two.
Addressing as much as I can quickly:
Low fps in crowds: Check your Energy Saver settings (in System Preferences) and make sure the check-box at the top that says something like "Use high-performance graphics" is checked. If it says "Automatic Graphics Switching" instead you don't have to worry about it. After you change this option you'll have to reboot so it sticks permanently - just logging out like it says will re-set the option at next reboot. Also make sure Geometry Buffers in-game is turned off.
Running out of memory: More RAM will help, but not because of the Mac memory allocation scheme. It's because Cider does not free memory properly - it just keeps taking more and more. Having more RAM is basically slapping a band-aid on this problem by giving it more expansion room before it runs out of memory and crashes.
Why some crash a lot: I still don't know why some Mac users crash and others don't in identical circumstances. There is one user of this forum who has exactly the same Mac I do configured the same way I do and can't even play for 10 minutes, yet I can play for hours without interruption. I did not do anything in particular to create that difference, or my ability to play longer between crashes. Cider has such a quantity and complexity of settings, even I still don't know where they all are or what they all do. Sometimes I think even Transgaming doesn't really knows how it works.
Why do I write the guide and try to help out? I knew from the first beta that Cider is not the ideal solution, but because I don't work for Paragon or NCSoft I don't really have a say in it. And it wouldn't matter if I did now (I don't), because the money is already spent. But I do want a working Mac client for CoH, so I do what I can to make sure it works; and then share my experiences via the Mac Guide.
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Hi,
I run COH on the following system
MacBook Pro 15" Early 2008
Processor 2.5 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo
Memory 4 GB 667 MHz DDR2 SDRAM
Graphics NVIDIA GeForce 8600M GT 512 MB
Mac OS X Lion 10.7.2
I play on an external 20" Apple Cinema Display at a resolution of 1680 x 1050.
Graphics settings are on Performance.
The game runs usually decently, around 35 fps normally, above 40-45 if I'm not doing much and am not in a crowded area.
However I see an horrendous drops on instances with a lot of players. On a full 8 people team it can drop to 12-13, and while doing the Winter Event it dropped to 6-7 fps.
Is this normal for my system ? Anything I can do about that ?
Thanks.