Sidebar Sidebar
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.

Upgrading a Pro to be on par with gaming PCs possible?

ChitoCrisis said:
I'm talking about On the level of PC gaming. I'm not sure if its easy to upgrade the latest video cards on Mac pros and if most are compatible.

I will buy a new Mac Pro this year when they come out and I'd like to be able to do this sort of thing. I like macs and OS X that's why.

If not ive been thinking about building my own gaming PC but I hate windows lol (I run it on my mbp to play some games) and I'd rather not have 2 towers in my room. I already have 2 tvs in there and all my gaming consoles take up a lot of space.

I have more uses for the Mac Pro. I'd use it for everything.
Click to expand...

Well if it's just strictly for gaming, then a Mac Pro isn't really the best choice.

Mine I set up for both. I don't need the bestest of best or hardcore overclocking. A pair of 670s in SLI and an 830 SSD for windows bootcamp. I can sit back and enjoy a game like Crysis 3 and get good frames.
 
OrangeSVTguy said:
Well if it's just strictly for gaming, then a Mac Pro isn't really the best choice.
Click to expand...

Hehehe... for sure...

Heh, I showed this thread to some game developer pals of mine (because I was going to write a long message to Derpage about game development and wanted to check the facts 1st) and you should have heard the four letter words come poring out about anyone who would select a Mac as a gaming machine. :rolleyes:
 
Tesselator said:
Well, if they're actually rendering to 1600p buffers (or whatever) then it'll look awesome at that resolution, and if not then it may look scaled. I have no idea which games do and don't tho. I would assume the vast majority of games which offered 1600 did in fact render to buffers that size - else it would seem rather silly to allow that to be selected.

Of course, most XBox and PS3 games are rendering the heavy stuff into a quarter or so buffer, then upscale it, and then render the HUD with full rez. At 1600, the HUD will be sharp, even when the heavy graphics are not. So... maybe huh? <shrug>
Click to expand...

Yeah, you get the drift. It's a a game of Tug of War between two teams of Russian Stacking Dolls or some other convoluted analogy! :D
 
yeah, if we're talking a machine strictly for gaming, a mac pro is a terrible choice right this second, and will probably continue to be a poor choice after the refresh comes out this year. GPU support will always be an issue, there's just no getting around that right now. If you want to be on the true cutting edge of PC gaming performance, you're going to need the latest greatest GPU, and that's going to be a new card every 6 months or so.

However, if you need to do a large amount of heavy lifting in OS X and would like to use the same machine for gaming rather than having a 2nd dedicated gaming PC, then a Mac Pro definitely does make sense. I needed to upgrade my audio production mac and my windows gaming rig at the same time in 2008- I bought one nicely configured 8 core mac pro instead, and I'm still happy with it now, though I've upgraded nearly everything in it . . . .only the fans are original, lol.
 
Just wanted to share my experience...

Recently I got a EVGA GeForce GTX 680 SC Signature NVIDIA with 2Gb ram in my 2009 MacPro 2.93GHz.

I didn't need any external power but I did have to buy a Startech PCI Express 6 pin to 8 pin Power Adapter Cable. Wow its so fast compared with the 5870, then just download an app like bootchamp. Its an expensive card but I would really recommend it. I have just finished playing Crysis 3 pretty much maxed out at 2560x1440. I also bought two 512gb SSD m4's drives from crucial.

I'm a After Effects/Cinema 4D animator and use my mac pro as a workhorse. It would be expensive to buy a macpro just for gaming but I don't see why you can't pimp it out to be a bad boy gaming machine too (if you got the cash).

If anyone's thinking about getting a 680 I would go for it. :D
 
All you need is an upgraded GPU and your all set. What's the fuss? Games have not been CPU bound for a century. I mean since conroe.
 
elvisizer said:
yeah, if we're talking a machine strictly for gaming, a mac pro is a terrible choice right this second...
Click to expand...

Right this second... ... ... And for the past 20 years straight. Even the Apple II in it's day was terribly inferior to Atari, MSX, and Vic20/C=64. AppleII was interesting because it was like a miniature IBM XT or something. Mac got it's name because of Adobe fonts in the Word Processing and Page Layout segments. In fact I guess we could say DTP (for the masses) was invented on the Mac. Similar to how Desk Top Video was on the Amiga.

But I can't think of a time when any Apple products were ever the optimal selection for game playing.
<scratches head>

I guess most of the reason these days is just because only about 20% of the game developers develop for or even port to, it. :(




Derpage said:
WARNING: THOSE FANS ARE HIGHLY DANGEROUS AND SHOULD NOT BE TOUCHED WHILE TRAVELING THROUGH ANY EU ALIGNED COUNTRY.
(completely safe anywhere else in the world)
Click to expand...

:D LOL :D
 
Last edited:
I guess the OP like myself and many others are coming from a background of hateful windows computer experiences, if Linux was an option for gaming, I'd have already done it, as I have done many a linuxbox or dual boot. This iMac I have now is getting long in the tooth, and compared to this, the current iMac or any pro machine would be a monster for graphics/gaming. All I want to know is when(if/when) a new pro comes out, will it get a respectable choice of cards so that we could choose to do some gaming.
 
wazgilbert said:
I guess the OP like myself and many others are coming from a background of hateful windows computer experiences, if Linux was an option for gaming, I'd have already done it, as I have done many a linuxbox or dual boot. This iMac I have now is getting long in the tooth, and compared to this, the current iMac or any pro machine would be a monster for graphics/gaming. All I want to know is when(if/when) a new pro comes out, will it get a respectable choice of cards so that we could choose to do some gaming.
Click to expand...

http://blog.linuxmint.com/?p=2302
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.
Top Bottom
Back