Resolved Minecraft on the latest entry level Mac Mini?

[Jerome2232]

Hi guys, I am new to this thread, and I just bought my first mac. It's the latest 2011 entry level Mac Mini (2GB i5 dual core) and I have been trying to play Minecraft on it, but it is failing miserably. Extreme lag and insanely low frame rates. I have looked up a few methods, (starting the game with specific java commands and such) but still it runs slow. No other apps are open, and the computer is brand new. I ordered 4GB of RAM for it, and I haven't installed/tested it yet. I was wondering if it had to do with the graphics card inside the Mac Mini, given what it is, I assumed it wouldn't play any major games, but I feel like minecraft, since it's run on Java, shouldn't be an issue.

I have never really interacted with Macs before. I have been working with PCs since I was a child, and never really got along with Macs. I bought this Mac mini after I accidentally fried the CPU in my PC, so I got this for my girlfriend and myself as a temp PC... So my point is, I'm a total noob with Macs.



Anyone have any thoughts?

Thanks in advance!

 

[philipma1957]

Hi guys, I am new to this thread, and I just bought my first mac. It's the latest 2011 entry level Mac Mini (2GB i5 dual core) and I have been trying to play Minecraft on it, but it is failing miserably. Extreme lag and insanely low frame rates. I have looked up a few methods, (starting the game with specific java commands and such) but still it runs slow. No other apps are open, and the computer is brand new. I ordered 4GB of RAM for it, and I haven't installed/tested it yet. I was wondering if it had to do with the graphics card inside the Mac Mini, given what it is, I assumed it wouldn't play any major games, but I feel like minecraft, since it's run on Java, shouldn't be an issue.

I have never really interacted with Macs before. I have been working with PCs since I was a child, and never really got along with Macs. I bought this Mac mini after I accidentally fried the CPU in my PC, so I got this for my girlfriend and myself as a temp PC... So my point is, I'm a total noob with Macs.



Anyone have any thoughts?

Thanks in advance!

4gb ram should be cancelled you need 8gb. my reasoning is simple . 2gb is a joke and should have never been sold by apple. lion uses 1.5gb just to breath. your mini uses the 2gb ram as its video ram.

it pulls 256mb away from a 2gb install.
it pulls 384mb from a 4gb install.
it pulls 512mb from a 8gb install.


your best shot at getting any decent games is to max the video ram and that means adding 8gb ram not 4gb ram. right now 8gb ram is about 40 bucks on newegg cancel your order for 4gb ram and get 8gb ram.






I put this in 2 minis works well

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820220545

18 a stick I used these in 4 minis

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231341



Ask if anyone had good minecraft with 8gb ram.


NO ONE!!!!! has a good fast 2011 mini with 2gb ram. This was a bad move by apple. Look at 8gb ram for under 40 dollars Apple should have sold the minis with 1 4gb stick. letting you get the second one for 75 dollars. tons of people would have ordered the minis with 8gb ram and they would clean up.

 

[Vermifuge]

Minecraft gets pretty unstable when you assign more than 2 GB of ram to JAVA. So 4Gb is probably plenty

That said I have a dual core i7 mini and mine craft plays exceptionally well. I can't speak for the base minis but i can't imagine the performance would be noticeably slower in minecraft

 

[philipma1957]

Minecraft gets pretty unstable when you assign more than 2 GB of ram to JAVA. So 4Gb is probably plenty

That said I have a dual core i7 mini and mine craft plays exceptionally well. I can't speak for the base minis but i can't imagine the performance would be noticeably slower in minecraft

buying 4gb of ram is really pennywise and pound foolish with the current prices of 8gb ram. Just one mans opinion

 

[Vermifuge]

buying 4gb of ram is really pennywise and pound foolish with the current prices of 8gb ram. Just one mans opinion

I was only give a direct answer to his question. while i agree with your comments, 4GB will get what he needs done. It's hard to argue against getting 8GB when the prices are in the sub $50 range.

 

[philipma1957]

I was only give a direct answer to his question. while i agree with your comments, 4GB will get what he needs done. It's hard to argue against getting 8GB when the prices are in the sub $50 range.

Sorry sometimes I can put to little into an answer and it comes off wrong.

I think that you know much more about minecraft then I do.

I sometimes speak too quickly on forums. I just wanted the guy to be happy with his system. I figured using past 4gb on a 2011 mini with lion happens easy or at least some of the time and using past 8gb just does not happen often at all. I also figured 36 bucks for 8gb is really cheap. I wonder if he paid that for 4gb ram. I should take the time to fully write an answer.

 

[Jerome2232]

Sorry sometimes I can put to little into an answer and it comes off wrong.

I think that you know much more about minecraft then I do.

I sometimes speak too quickly on forums. I just wanted the guy to be happy with his system. I figured using past 4gb on a 2011 mini with lion happens easy or at least some of the time and using past 8gb just does not happen often at all. I also figured 36 bucks for 8gb is really cheap. I wonder if he paid that for 4gb ram. I should take the time to fully write an answer.

Thanks for the super quick response everyone. I got 4gb because Im a little tight for cash. I have a beautiful 1.5 year old daughter who eats almost as much as I do lol. So I got 4gb. Also, as I said the mac is kind of a place holder until I get my main computer operational again. I was relived to hear that 4gb might be enough because the 4gb arrived today x.x - I just haven't installed it yet. I don't want to use my mac for anything other than minecraft. My girlfriend wants it for photo editing mainly and music which it did well enough to make her happy before the 4gb. I just needed opinions to know if I could expect to play minecraft on this thing at all. Or if my hopes were misguided.

 

[fluffyroo]

Base i5 Mini and Minecraft

Well, I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but Minecraft really lags behind on anything less than dedicated graphics. I have a 2010 13" Macbook Pro with 8GB of RAM and it plays, but has constant jitters and issues. Even though it has an nvidia 320 hybrid chipset, it still shares with the main memory which is where the bottleneck for textures and renders comes from. I'm assuming the same is true for the base mini with the Intel HD 3000 chipset, if not more-so affected. Your best bet would be to try and upgrade to the mini with AMD graphics, as it has 256MB of dedicated video RAM.

Just for another comparison I use a 2007 15" Macbook Pro with the Nvidia 256MB card at work and playing Minecraft on even that outdated a machine, runs like butter. Looks to me like it's all in the VRAM.

 

[Jerome2232]

Well, I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but Minecraft really lags behind on anything less than dedicated graphics. I have a 2010 13" Macbook Pro with 8GB of RAM and it plays, but has constant jitters and issues. Even though it has an nvidia 320 hybrid chipset, it still shares with the main memory which is where the bottleneck for textures and renders comes from. I'm assuming the same is true for the base mini with the Intel HD 3000 chipset, if not more-so affected. Your best bet would be to try and upgrade to the mini with AMD graphics, as it has 256MB of dedicated video RAM.

Just for another comparison I use a 2007 15" Macbook Pro with the Nvidia 256MB card at work and playing Minecraft on even that outdated a machine, runs like butter. Looks to me like it's all in the VRAM.

Well the latest mac mini to my understanding comes with the intel i5 sandybridge dual core as well as the hd 5000 chipset. I may be wrong. But I know it has sandybridge. Which itself should logically be able to handle minecraft with the assistance of more ram plus the graphics accelerator. Tell me if I'm wrong. But if my hp pos laptop (made 2005) can run it almost seamlessly with 4gb ddr2, not even ddr3 I feel like the 2011 mac mini should be able to just fine.

 

[Vermifuge]

Well, I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but Minecraft really lags behind on anything less than dedicated graphics. I have a 2010 13" Macbook Pro with 8GB of RAM and it plays, but has constant jitters and issues. Even though it has an nvidia 320 hybrid chipset, it still shares with the main memory which is where the bottleneck for textures and renders comes from. I'm assuming the same is true for the base mini with the Intel HD 3000 chipset, if not more-so affected. Your best bet would be to try and upgrade to the mini with AMD graphics, as it has 256MB of dedicated video RAM.

Just for another comparison I use a 2007 15" Macbook Pro with the Nvidia 256MB card at work and playing Minecraft on even that outdated a machine, runs like butter. Looks to me like it's all in the VRAM.

This is odd. I have a 2010 Mac mini Server with 320M and mine craft played just fine on that system

 

[Dhelsdon]

Another hint, try turning off open GL. But as it's been stated.. Your going to need more Ram. I run a minecraft server off 8gb ram 3.2 quad core i5 pc and it handles about 4 or 5 players.

 

[Dhelsdon]

Just thinking about it, I recall the minimum requirements of minecraft are like under 1Gb so it doesn't make sense.

Try doing a boot camp install and see if that runs any better. If you use Parallels, you can modify the amount of memory on the fly before booting up your VM.

I was running minecraft on my 2006 MacBook pro, 2.16 ghz core duo with 2gb ram. It runs pretty smoothly, not it just doesn't add up...

 

[Vermifuge]

Just thinking about it, I recall the minimum requirements of minecraft are like under 1Gb so it doesn't make sense.

Try doing a boot camp install and see if that runs any better. If you use Parallels, you can modify the amount of memory on the fly before booting up your VM.

I was running minecraft on my 2006 MacBook pro, 2.16 ghz core duo with 2gb ram. It runs pretty smoothly, not it just doesn't add up...

I believe the HD 3000 is not properly supported by Lion yet. Sure it works but it's not without some issues. I believe 4 GB will give it a serious boost but it may not be up to the task. At least under OSX Lion. Your theory may be correct. Running it under windows my provide for a better experience

 

[Jerome2232]

I believe the HD 3000 is not properly supported by Lion yet. Sure it works but it's not without some issues. I believe 4 GB will give it a serious boost but it may not be up to the task. At least under OSX Lion. Your theory may be correct. Running it under windows my provide for a better experience

So I lied. Apparently I ordered 8gb not 4. I'm happy. Lol

 

[fluffyroo]

Well the latest mac mini to my understanding comes with the intel i5 sandybridge dual core as well as the hd 5000 chipset. I may be wrong. But I know it has sandybridge. Which itself should logically be able to handle minecraft with the assistance of more ram plus the graphics accelerator. Tell me if I'm wrong. But if my hp pos laptop (made 2005) can run it almost seamlessly with 4gb ddr2, not even ddr3 I feel like the 2011 mac mini should be able to just fine.

That is correct, but you are comparing OpenGL performance to DirectX performance on that HP running Windows. I definitely agree that the i5 Mac mini should be able to handle it with pure processing power, but my only experience with SandyBridge is my new 27" iMac which has AMD dedicated graphics. I'm interested in purchasing a base model Mini right now for my home theater, which I'll be playing some occasional Minecraft, and am interested in performance results between the base model and AMD graphics model.

 

[MadDragon1846]

So I lied. Apparently I ordered 8gb not 4. I'm happy. Lol

XD I guess thats better than thinking you ordered 8 and then only 4 turns up hehe

 

[Mr.C]

Well the latest mac mini to my understanding comes with the intel i5 sandybridge dual core as well as the hd 5000 chipset. I may be wrong. But I know it has sandybridge. Which itself should logically be able to handle minecraft with the assistance of more ram plus the graphics accelerator. Tell me if I'm wrong. But if my hp pos laptop (made 2005) can run it almost seamlessly with 4gb ddr2, not even ddr3 I feel like the 2011 mac mini should be able to just fine.

I think you might be mistaking RAM for VRAM. The HD3000 uses shared memory from the main memory whilst the AMD Radeon in the higher end Minis uses dedicated VRAM. The VRAM in the AMD apart from being onboard the GPU and dedicated is also faster I beleive then the main RAM. I suspect Minecraft runs better with dedicated VRAM on the AMD Radeon then on the Intell HD3000 that uses slower shared main memory which is not even directly on the GPU.

 

[QuantumLo0p]

NO ONE!!!!! has a good fast 2011 mini with 2gb ram. This was a bad move by apple. Look at 8gb ram for under 40 dollars Apple should have sold the minis with 1 4gb stick. letting you get the second one for 75 dollars. tons of people would have ordered the minis with 8gb ram and they would clean up.

I disagree. A base Mini will run quite fast if you start from a fresh boot, login and then run absolutely nothing. Quite fast at doing it too. If someone is feeling a bit daring they can fire up Activity Monitor so they can watch how much ram they don't have.


Sorry guys, just had to throw that in. Looks like there were a bunch of serious, helpful suggestions for the OP.

Peace.

 

[Jerome2232]

I disagree. A base Mini will run quite fast if you start from a fresh boot, login and then run absolutely nothing. Quite fast at doing it too. If someone is feeling a bit daring they can fire up Activity Monitor so they can watch how much ram they don't have.


Sorry guys, just had to throw that in. Looks like there were a bunch of serious, helpful suggestions for the OP.

Peace.

Yeah everyone was amazing. I confirmed that 8 gigs is the right amount. Loaded it up, minecraft runs seamlessly. THANK YOU EVERYONE!!!

 

[philipma1957]

I disagree. A base Mini will run quite fast if you start from a fresh boot, login and then run absolutely nothing. Quite fast at doing it too. If someone is feeling a bit daring they can fire up Activity Monitor so they can watch how much ram they don't have.


Sorry guys, just had to throw that in. Looks like there were a bunch of serious, helpful suggestions for the OP.

Peace.

thats a good one. once you put the activity monitor on it uses 1.5gb of the 2gb. add safari your at 1.8gb used . but you are right running nothing is fast. lol

 

[Jerome2232]

Just thinking about it, I recall the minimum requirements of minecraft are like under 1Gb so it doesn't make sense.

Try doing a boot camp install and see if that runs any better. If you use Parallels, you can modify the amount of memory on the fly before booting up your VM.

I was running minecraft on my 2006 MacBook pro, 2.16 ghz core duo with 2gb ram. It runs pretty smoothly, not it just doesn't add up...

I dont mean to sound like a noob - which I totally am on a mac, but how do I install boot camp? I am running the mini without an optical drive and therefor it came with no disk, which google seems to think I need for it. I went to the Mac website and found nothing useful. Can someone provide a link? Also, please tell me how to disable open GL. Google only gives me links on how to do it in PhotoShop...