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GAMING on Parallels??

i-unit123

i-unit123

macrumors member
Original poster
May 26, 2006
78
0
Hello,

I was wondering how good running windows games on Parallels is. I know its supposedly almost native speeds, but realitically how well would it work. I have a fully loaded 17" Macbook Pro ,and is it possible to just allocate a huge portion of my computer's resources to Paralles if i wanted good gaming performance? Im not a super hardcore gamer but I really would like to be able to play games like bf2 etc on reasonably high settings. I know bootcamp is probably better for gaming, but somehow i feel less dirty using windows while in osx, then fully using windows:eek: . thanks
 
:( :eek: :( :eek:

Why can't it play 3D games yet? Do you think this will be added as a feature later on?
 
i-unit123 said:
:( :eek: :( :eek:

Why can't it play 3D games yet? Do you think this will be added as a feature later on?
Click to expand...

Because its(paralles) running IN OSX, its VERY DIFFICULT(I wouldn't say impossible, but I'm not an expert programmer) to make hardware calls from inside parallels without making OSX throw a fit. If you arent heavy into computers that might not make too much sense but just believe me on this one.

Another way to think about is this. In OSX, people have to write specific code to access the 3d card and cpu through OSX(which controls the hardware).

Program/Game ->OSX->Hardware

If you are very very very good, you make this happen(but it takes a bit of work)

Game/program -> Hardware

So Parallels is written to make calls/request to OSX to the hardware to make it run. Thats not the easiest thing in the world. Congrats to Parallels.

Parallels -> OSX-> Hardware(primarily cpu and graphics just to output)

which allows for:
MS Project(or any app) -> WinXP->Parallels->OSX->Hardware

With this setup, you are still getting a bit of 'delay' because well, a lot of converting is taking place and that takes up time and cpu and this is with just 2d graphics which aren't THAT complex.

What you want is

3d Game/App ->Windows XP->Parallells->OSX->Hardware

The amount of cpu/gpu required just for the 3d game and app to work in windows is crazy(assuming a moderately new game). The cpu being used by parallels to run windows is nothing to sneeze at either.(keep activity monitor up while you do things in a parallels window and you'll see.) Now you are asking that the processor and programs be able to run a game at a respectable rate with highly complex 3d instructions converted approximately 4 times for everything it does instead of its usual 1 or 2.(My numbers might be off by 1 but the idea is accurate). In theory if you had an unlimited amount of cpu and ram, this could work very well. But at the moment, he bottleneck is too small or what you are asking to happen is too big depending on your perspective. Hope this helps you understand why a bit.
 
Well thats not really right. The reason why you can't game has nothing to do with the fact that OS X is also running (although that dosent help...) The reason is that in Parallels it dosent recognize the GPU yet, so it just says its a generic 8MB video card which can't really run anything at all... but this could be fixed when the final version comes out because it is still in beta. If that gets fixed you could allocate a lot of your system to parallels and then just play BF2 on med-low settings and it should run fairly well I would imagine, but as the other people said, boot camp is your best option as of now.
 
kingcrowing said:
Well thats not really right. The reason why you can't game has nothing to do with the fact that OS X is also running (although that dosent help...) The reason is that in Parallels it dosent recognize the GPU yet, so it just says its a generic 8MB video card which can't really run anything at all... but this could be fixed when the final version comes out because it is still in beta. If that gets fixed you could allocate a lot of your system to parallels and then just play BF2 on med-low settings and it should run fairly well I would imagine, but as the other people said, boot camp is your best option as of now.
Click to expand...

It is no longer in Beta it has been finalized for an official release, just a few days ago
 
any word when the final version will be released? what are the chances of 3d acceleration being added as a feature?
 
i-unit123 said:
any word when the final version will be released? what are the chances of 3d acceleration being added as a feature?
Click to expand...

As noted above the final version is out. I'd say the chances of 3D acceleration are very low (as it's not there)! This is not something that virtualisation software really does on ANY platform. There is talk that next generation GPUs may support GPU virtualisation in the same way as current CPUs support it.
 
Well, the most important reason is that the GPUs in the MB and MBP do not support virtualization (unlike the Intel CPUS in the MB and MBP). So, Parallels cannot easily virtualize a fully functioning GPU for the hosted Windows on a par with the real GPU provided to OS X.

EDIT: Yup, as robbieduncan said, pretty much.
 
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