iMac option: Radeon HD 4850.... mobility?

[avihappy]

Uhm, i wonder if the performance of Age of Empires III The War Chiefs and The Asian Dynasties will be fine by this video card. Because i want to buy a new iMac and don't want to get disappointed

Those games aren't very intense at all. Go ahead and buy it if that was what was holding you back. The Radeon 4850 (mobility or not) should run that game wonderfully. From what I am reading you should be set to run at Max or near Max visual quality. I do have a feeling the Windows version of the game is faster though (all Mac games I have played are slower than their Win counterparts for some reason, so I game in Boot Camp).

 

[Tesseract]

That's one of the myths of power use. Graphics cards don't draw that much power. They give those requirements in order to avoid being sued by someone frying their computer because their PSU wasn't up to par. Using a quality PSU and knowing how much a system actually draws is whats important.

For example, my old PC had an 8800GTX in there. It said it required 500W. In truth, it ran just fine with my Antec 380W PSU and I still had room to spare. My Kill-A-Watt read my entire system at 220W at load at the wall, so take in an 80% efficiency on the system and I was running a grand total of 176W from the system components.

Just because a system can spare that much power doesn't mean it uses that much! My 1000W PSU I use in my enthusiat desktop doesn't use 1000W all the time - it just has the headroom to supply 1000W if I ever need it. And yet, despite a 4870X2 saying it requires 700W PSU.... even with two water cooling loops, an OC'd Extreme Quad core, OC'd RAM, 3 hard drives, etc., my system as a whole pulls less than 500W frrom the wall at load.

What he said. Anyways, I can't seem to get a straight answer out of Apple either. In my own opinion, I think its very likely that even if the 4850 isn't the mobility version, Apple could have underclocked it. Which would be a lot better news than it being the mobility version. On the same note, even when Apple does put the mobility cards in their iMacs, they usually underclock those to slower speeds.

Not to try to get any of your hopes down, but I'd be pretty surprised if it -was- the non-mobility 4850. As far as I know, the mobility 4850 is quite a bit smaller, less power-hungry, and generates less heat than its full-fledged counterpart. Those are all things Apple prides itself on in the iMac line, and its been an ongoing trend for a while. Then again, since its a purely optional upgrade, maybe they've been listening to all their customers who have been saying they wanted more GPU power that the iMac is capable of handling.

P.S. Sorry if this post doesn't make any sense. I'm writing it at a very sleep-deprived 2:30 a.m.

 

[Kerem72]

Ati Mobility Radeon 4850

Those games aren't very intense at all. Go ahead and buy it if that was what was holding you back. The Radeon 4850 (mobility or not) should run that game wonderfully. From what I am reading you should be set to run at Max or near Max visual quality. I do have a feeling the Windows version of the game is faster though (all Mac games I have played are slower than their Win counterparts for some reason, so I game in Boot Camp).

Well, what i meant was 1920x1200 resolution. But, you're right, i'd like to play those games at maximum quality. Of course, there's not going to be Physx support .

 

[avihappy]

Well, what i meant was 1920x1200 resolution. But, you're right, i'd like to play those games at maximum quality. Of course, there's not going to be Physx support .

Well, here is a list compiled by AOE3 fans ranking the cards. From all the data we have so far, the 4850 will probably fit somewhere in either "Ultra-High End" and "Flagship High-End" depending on if it is the Mobility or the Desktop version Apple has fit into it.

http://forum.agecommunity.com/forums/1/250383/ShowThread.aspx

However, that is at a very high resolution you intend to run it at, which (when running games) brings a lot of cards to their needs.

Also, AFIAK Age of Empires uses the Havok physics engine, not Physx. So even if the card supported PhysX it would not be used in AOE3.

 

[daveman1010220]

Hey, all. I know this thread is older than my oldest child, but old threads never die.. If anyone knows the answer to what I am about to ask, I'd be very grateful, whatever that's worth to you. If you still have one of these old Macs that Apple has long since abandoned, what are you doing with it? I couldn't update the OS. Found a site that details a hack to update the OS to something recent and secure, but it's not a great solution. I've been trying to get Linux running on the box and have ran into a hard wall with some obscure video/display bug that leaves me with a black screen. In the hopes that I'm not the only human on a planet of seven billion people that has tried to get the Radeon driver working on a 2009 iMac, has anyone here figured out the magic? I think it has something to do with the binary EDID file that I am missing for this display... Much thanks to anyone willing to share a working solution to the woes of a 2009 iMac 24".

 

[sab2el]

Hey, all. I know this thread is older than my oldest child, but old threads never die.. If anyone knows the answer to what I am about to ask, I'd be very grateful, whatever that's worth to you. If you still have one of these old Macs that Apple has long since abandoned, what are you doing with it? I couldn't update the OS. Found a site that details a hack to update the OS to something recent and secure, but it's not a great solution. I've been trying to get Linux running on the box and have ran into a hard wall with some obscure video/display bug that leaves me with a black screen. In the hopes that I'm not the only human on a planet of seven billion people that has tried to get the Radeon driver working on a 2009 iMac, has anyone here figured out the magic? I think it has something to do with the binary EDID file that I am missing for this display... Much thanks to anyone willing to share a working solution to the woes of a 2009 iMac 24".

I have the exact same spec. It supports El Capitan and it still gets security updates. I suggest you stick to it. Upgrade the RAM max 8gb and get a good ssd. I know this doesn’t answer your question....just shared my opinion cheers