Starcraft 2 and MBA - Will it play?

[miknos]

Games are more GPU hungry, so can we expect to play Starcraft 2 nicely on the new MBA 13' ?

I saw some videos on youtube showing a MBP 13' playing SC2 nicely. But keep in mind the screen is 1440x900 and the processor is 1.86Ghz, so how worse would that be?

 

[fuzzielitlpanda]

Yes, should play just fine. The 320M is a very good GPU. I remember playing on medium settings very smoothly. I do recommend upgrading to 4GB of memory though

 

[cleric]

Played fine on my 1.86ghz rev B

 

[hcho3]

Will it play? Yes.
Will it play well with high resolutions? No.

 

[bchreng]

Will it play? Yes.
Will it play well with high resolutions? No.

Any idea if it can handle native resolution with everything set to low? (>30 fps 2v2 and 3v3)

 

[Kadman]

I have a Core i7 2.66 with 512MB VRAM and it's a bit choppy with things set to medium. My guestimate is that it'll run but may get a bit chunky in decent sized battles.

 

[rkuo]

On low the 320M stay about 30 fps easily. Possibly even on medium. My Mac Mini 2010 has no problem.

SC2 scales better with CPU tho so you would well advised to upgrade that.

 

[klover]

Hopefully they haven't downclocked the 320m for thermal/power reasons.

 

[newbiemacguy128]

Probably will slow down during big battles...or if you just play DOTA 24/7 like me, no problem.

This being on low anyways.

 

[xparaparafreakx]

Probably will slow down during big battles...or if you just play DOTA 24/7 like me, no problem.

This being on low anyways.

DOTA? League of Legends or when DOTA 2 comes out. That's on source so it should be okay.

I think SC 2 should be fine on low. I figure I put some small games on my new Air when I get it.

 

[Wrathwitch]

OK regarding the OP's post. I have a totally NOOB question.

Regarding games like you mentioned, and things like WoW, how do you get them ON the device???

Apologize for my ignorance but I was curious about that.

WW

 

[bchreng]

OK regarding the OP's post. I have a totally NOOB question.

Regarding games like you mentioned, and things like WoW, how do you get them ON the device???

Apologize for my ignorance but I was curious about that.

WW

A lot of games can be downloaded directly from the developer's website. Once you register a CD-Key with Steam or Blizzard for example, you're free to download the install files from their servers as often as you'd like. If you don't have the bandwidth, you can always connect an external USB optical drive and install from that instead.

 

[zen]

A lot of games can be downloaded directly from the developer's website. Once you register a CD-Key with Steam or Blizzard for example, you're free to download the install files from their servers as often as you'd like. If you don't have the bandwidth, you can always connect an external USB optical drive and install from that instead.

Don't forget the Macbook Air will wirelessly share an optical drive from another computer.

 

[major7]

do you think it will run fine games like counter strike?

 

[Wrathwitch]

Hey thanks for the info. Sorry for kind of hijacking the thread.

WW

 

[orpheus1120]

Games are more GPU hungry, so can we expect to play Starcraft 2 nicely on the new MBA 13' ?

I saw some videos on youtube showing a MBP 13' playing SC2 nicely. But keep in mind the screen is 1440x900 and the processor is 1.86Ghz, so how worse would that be?

If only I have a cent for everytime this question is asked.

Taken straight from the horse's mouth:

Mac Requirements
Mac Minimum System Requirements:

Mac® OS X 10.5.8, 10.6.2 or newer
Intel® Processor
NVIDIA® GeForce® 8600M GT or ATI Radeon® X1600 or better
12 GB available HD space
2 GB Ram
DVD-ROM drive
Broadband Internet connection
1024X720 minimum display resolution

Mac Recommended Specifications:

Intel® Core 2 Duo processor
4 GB system RAM
NVIDIA® GeForce® 9600M GT or ATI Radeon® HD 4670 or better

No specific C2D speed specified. So I'm sure MBA should be fine with SC2. Only think I would advise is get 4MB of RAM.

 

[highlightt]

I'd use it just to watch replays...i prefer to play games on my desktop

 

[jeznav]

I have a 10" HP mini netbook hackintosh on a 1.6ghz single core Atom. It struggles to play 720p movies with its crappy Intel GMA 950 and suffers to run unity webgames at best visuals.

I'm actually very interested in the 11" 128gb model with 1.6ghz and 4gb ram upgrade.

I'm going to install Starcraft 2 on my 16GB usb and a bunch of other benchmarks on this lowest model.