real world imac graphics

[Ryanb1281]

Does anyone have an 2.8 ghz Alu iMac with the ATI 2600 PRO card? If so, what has been your experience with the graphics capabilities of the system?

I've read stories about how the benchmarks for the card are pretty bad, but I wanted to know how it performs in real world situations. Do you play games on it? Do you use boot camp with Vista? How does it hold up in those situations?

 

[xpisnotforme]

Does anyone have an 2.8 ghz Alu iMac with the ATI 2600 PRO card? If so, what has been your experience with the graphics capabilities of the system?

I've read stories about how the benchmarks for the card are pretty bad, but I wanted to know how it performs in real world situations. Do you play games on it? Do you use boot camp with Vista? How does it hold up in those situations?

I have a 2.4 but since the graphics card handles the graphics I can safely say that the graphics are ok to choppy. definitely not crisp or quick. Still a great machine.....

 

[flopticalcube]

I have the 2.4 machine (2 actually) and using the latest XP drivers from ATI (Catalyst 8.2) under bootcamp the graphics are very good indeed. Most games run on full res with med-full settings (no AA/AF) at good framerates (20-40 or more). Its no 8800GTX SLi but its not too shabby. Orginal bootcamp drivers are crap.

 

[shearp7e]

Ive been playing Half Life 2 with no real issues. Downloaded the latest catalyst drivers and the card works quite well. Obviously you cant pull the grpahics up on everything as it goes choppy but the game goes great at medium-good settings. Its a shame that Apple dont get the good end of the graphics cards, id probably play more on my iMac but i guess its what i got an xbox 360 for....other than crashing!!


And ofcourse Football Manager 2008 plays wil no problem at all

My life is perfect.

 

[autumn]

I have a 2.8 C2E iMac. I just upgrade the latest XP drivers from ATI (Catalyst 8.2) under bootcamp.

Now playing Half-life 2 with everything maxed out 1600x1200, I get anywhere between 80-160ish FPS. I've got nothing to complain about.

Before I upgrade the driver, just using the stocked driver from Leopard DVD, the game still runs great with everything maxed out but every once a while, it gets a slight jerk for a split sec or so. Most people might not even notice it.
I still gets between 60-135 FPS then.

I didn't get the iMac for gaming and you shouldn't expect to use it just for gaming either. But you'd be surprise how well it runs games.

If you have the $$ and willing, Mac Pro has a better card in NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GT with 512MB of GDDR3. Personally I think the whole system is a bit overkill for gaming.

 

[AlexisV]

Some of the early benchmarks were with immature drivers.

It's a decent enough GPU. Not stellar, but it's not too bad.