Comments on: New Mac Pro with Radeon HD 4870 card not quite a 3D gaming powerhouse

Updated 3D scores for Apple's new Mac Pro

[Mr. Dee]

Like Steve Ballmer said, you are only over paying for a logo from Apple. The unfortunate cost of brand identity.

[seven7dust]

nobody buys Macs for gaming n e way
but show me better Laptop than the Macbook
which will cost me only 500-400$ for the next 3 yrs of use

[tipoo_]

Its funny, on apples own gaming benchmarks for the new cards, they use different test platforms for each test... the Nehalem based Mac pro's for the new cards, and the old mac pro for the old cards.

[mcgeewee]

Try the same benchmarks on Windows XP or Vista, it should yield better framerates. No choice but to run Windows on these workstations anyways to play games.

[KevLeviathan]

The biggest problem here is that these are benchmarks for the OSX version (which is a bad port, probably using Cider).

Throw it into Windows via Bootcamp and you'll see that the 4870 is actually a top notch gaming card. Too bad most OSX games are horrible ports.

This is really a commentary on the sad state of gaming on OSX.

[ark_v2]

FPS in the 30's?
That must be a joke...***?!

[pithenumber]

Mac's aren't gaming computers
buy a PC, save some cash by getting higher frame rates

[shrimp4074]

Either the Mac OS X port of Call of Duty 4 is complete crap or the 4870 in the Mac Pros is no normal 4870.

[vdbe]

hmmm,
at the barefeats site call of duty pipeline is mentioned 64 ... guess cnet uses other standards ;-)

[SoCalHampshire]

The 4870 is a sick card, its the mac port or something funky messing the FPS up...I dunno.
CoD4 maxes out your FPS at 60...my moderate rig gets that easy. To give you a comparison:
(1680x1050 Max All Settings)
Phenom 9500 (locked)
8800 GT superclocked Ed. (not nearly as good as 4870)
4gb RAM
Vista 64

[EviLCuLT]

It's probably a mobility 4870, but even then the score is too low.

[jrzshor]

if i don't plan to play games but do photo stuff and the occasional imovie, which card is just fine- nvidia or ati?

[twyrick]

Call of Duty 4 for OS X is *not* a Cider port, but it's surely a poor port, performance-wise. I know several iMac users who bought it, only to find the Windows version of the game ran far better on the exact same system, when they booted into XP via Boot Camp and played it that way.

CoD4 in OS X runs at very playable frame-rates if you leave it on "auto" mode to detect video settings, but it typically selects low detail. I own it and play it all the time on a 2008 model Mac Pro with 8800GT video -- but yeah, I realize the game experience sucks compared to Windows. I just wanted a fun game to play that I don't have to reboot out of OS X to use.

[hexor]

People are overlooking that the bigger bottleneck is most likely the poor graphics driver on OS X for the card and not the COD port itself.

[thomcarl]

cnet is and always has been anti mac, besides that Mac's are for adults not kids that live to play games.

[SoCalHampshire]

Macs are for adults who want to spend money for no good reason. Is what youre saying? I have plenty of money; I make plenty and still wont blow my money on a mac because "it just works". I have a head on my shoulders and can get more out of a $1000 rig PC than $2500 mac anyday.

Sincerely,

"It just doesnt work"

[trout4u]

UUMMM, excuse me:

I made an account just to reply to your uneducated little Mac comment. I have been running PCs for years until 2 1/2 years ago. I worked on my brothers mac because my $2000.00 Microsucks PC was infected with one of the hundreds of thousands (if not millions) of viruses out there at that time. I run high end graphics, Im a photographer, I shoot video, I blog, I chat, I do everything that you can do on a computer.

After working on my brothers iMac, I said IMAC, meaning consumer grade, I found that this computer ran faster, safer, more efficiently, more beautifully than ANY PC I have ever owned, all 12 or 13 of them that I paid 2-3 THOUSAND dollars for with all the CRAP I had to but for my safety, add ons, software, upgrades, ect. And I STILL wasn't safe.

I learned Mac OSX in 2 days. Can you honestly say that you could or know someone who can learn a completely foreign OS in that short of time?

People like you who ***** about Apples prices are one of 4 things in my book: 1)uneducated, 2)ignorant, 3)jealous, 4)stupid.

I know this because I WAS one of these people before I had the oppertunity to be introduced to Apple's world. Good luck playing games that WE write on OUR Macs. :)

[perlmanFamily]

One other issue not noted here is that games do not tend to multithread well.
I would have used the lower end single chip model with the 2.93 GHz upgrade.

[furutan]

It is time for Apple to switch its video firm- hard- and software to support PC video cards and at full speed.

No matter what folks from the Winux camp may imagine, the only advantage of a non-Apple workstation is in the area of graphics processing. Feature for feature, Mac prices are more than competitive in this range. If PCs were built with the same quality as Macs (e.g., not being constructed of thin sheet metal covered in plastic) they would be uniformly more expensive.

[johnfleff]

Is the ATI Radeon? HD 4870 X2 Graphics card (adapter) compatible with the Mac Pro....if so, why doesn't Apple use it instead of the ATI Radeon? HD 4870 Graphics card?