MacBook Pro Santa Rosa 128MB vs 256MB - Benchmark compilation

Rob Art from barefeats.com just posted more very interesting results!

damn, that's a big increase in performance from OSX to WinXP. 43% and 115%!!

It also shows how big the performance advantage from 128MB to 256MB under Windows games can be...again (the 9% CPU count as well, of course). That could easily make the difference between smooth and not playable! Of course, 1440x900 still is a very high resolution to ask for when using a laptop!!!

 

I guess we really need to know if Vista turbocaching addresses the difference. Would love to see the same Prey benchmark on 128mb and 256mb under Vista.

 

how much turbocache does the 128mb and 256mb versions use? and that is a massive difference between os x and xp.

 

if Vista really uses as much RAM for turbo cache as many mentioned, I probably have to upgrade to more RAM, because I will need 2GB for appz many times already! (running bootcamp and some CS3 appz in OSX is really going to push it!)

 

You can tell vista how much ram it is allowed to use for the vga, so that won't be a problem

 

Hold up. I have a 2.2 ghz MBP with XP Home on it and played Prey just a couple days ago with 4x AA and 4x AF and 1024x768 resolution and got 40-60 FPS constant (I was using FRAPS to test FPS.)

I don't know what's up with that. I might have to do a more formal test and post some screens of the results. Could I have gotten better FPS because I was running XP Home?

 

yeah that might be it quadron. im not sure though. install vista : D

 

Hey guys, I decided to hook up Prey and take a few screenies just to show you guys the FPS I am getting. Settings were at 4x AA 16x AF 1024x768 highest settings on everything.

The FPS in the images are typical. When I enter a room, it will first be around 45ish then it will go up to 60 once I have been in there for a few seconds. I posted the screenshot of the dog/animal beasts through the window. That was the lowest my FPS ever got, looking through that window 37 FPS.

I included one screenshot from Doom 3. Settings were 4x AA, no AF, Ultra High, and 1024x768.

Both games ran very well, totally playable on both of them.

Oh, and if you wanted to add it to the list at the begginning of the thread, I got a 6511 on 3DMark05.

 

mm those are some tasty screen shots.. makes me wonder if i should just get the 2.2...

 

With the state the drivers are in though, can we really draw any long-term conclusions? I've already ordered a 2.2 GHz MBP, so of course it's in my interest to justify that purchase, but it also seems to me that the drivers for OS X and even XP that are available now are quite shoddy. Maybe this affects the more turbochaching-prone 128MB VRAM model even more than the 256MB model. Thoughts on this?

 

He ran it at 1440x900, while you did 1024x768.

 

You can't play Prey widescreen. The highest resolution you can play Prey on the MBP is 1024x768 (unless you hook up a external monitor, but even then, you can't go widescreen). (At least, that is the only settings options it gives me, unless I missed something.)

Maybe there was a game patch that added widescreen capability? Otherwise, Rob Art over at barefeets put the wrong resoution (like I did at first).

 

widescreengamingforum.com is your friend for tweaking widescreen settings from game. For Prey, it reports (not sure if the Mac version has 1.1, or gives you access to the \base folder (try right clicking on Prey and 'show package contents' if not)):

As of version 1.1, widescreen is supported natively. But some resolutions must still be used manually, including 1280x768 and 1920x1080.
Launch the game, go into the video options screen, and set the aspect ratio option to the appropriate setting. If your preferred resolution is 1280x768, then 16:10 will be the closest match. Scroll through the available resolutions and see if your resolution is there. If it is, use it and stop reading this solution. If not, read on.
Save your settings and quit Prey.
Go to:
<gameDir>\base
Edit preyconfig.cfg, and look for these lines:
seta r_customHeight "xxx"
seta r_customWidth "xxxx"
Edit them to set your resolution. Be careful not to confuse the height and width.
Now look for this line:
seta r_mode "x"
Change it to:
seta r_mode "-1"
Save, and launch Prey.

 

So what does everyone think about the bottom line here, is it worth forking out the extra cash for the 256 version? Im about to do it.

Will new drivers make the difference between the 2 larger or will they improve together?

Will the 256 version make driving a large (24 inch) external monitor better that much better?

Will the 128 version have better resale value?

Has anyone compared running packages like after effects?

Here in aust. its a 7 to 800 au dollars difference which seems hard to justify for an extra 128 GPU, the extra CPU and hard drive are just yawn worthy really. Still I wouldnt want fork out a heap and then realise all of the above would have been so much more workable if Id not been a mizer and just spent the extra.

thoughts any one

 

well... since one point of getting this new baby for me is to have a machine for the occasional game I went with the 2,4GHz model now.
My guess is, that although it will lose value more quickly, it will still sell at a significantly higher price than the 2,2GHz version in a year or so, so I wouldn't have spent 500$ more after all! Besides, I "only" paid 400$ more for the 2,4GHz one.

for me, the gaming issue is the only one that could justify to get the bigger one, the little extra speed in everyday applications is just a nice addon!

 

just got my 2.4 MBP 2gb 160gb 5400 rpm last night and ran it through some quick Doom 3 benchmarks to see how it stacked up against the barefeats.com Mac benchmark, and query re whether it would run faster in XP. The answer is, XP is around 70% faster.

In both OS, I used Doom 1.3.1, with the default OS install and drivers; and ran the 'timedemo demo1' command twice, and used the second result.

1280x800, High Quality:
Mac - 54.9
PC - 90.7

1440x900, High Quality
Mac - 42.9, with 4x FSAA 35.4 (but flameballs have graphical glitch)
PC - 75.9, with 4x FSAA 41.6 on first run (no glitches, but froze on second run)

1440x900, Ultra Quality
Mac - 45.9(?)
PC - 75.4

I think gameplay suffers visual 'tearing' at Ultra Quality, which is as I understand it just uncompressed textures, so probably not worth it anyway.

I installed Vista first, but Halo 2 was glitching, and drivers seemed a pain, so I reinstalled XP to run these Doom tests

Regards,
B

 

yeah i think ultra quality textures are only useful for either really high resolutions or just benchmarking to see what using more texture mem. does to performance...

 

Ultra only should be used for SLI systems or machines with 512MB of dedicated video memory.

 

Has anyone tried the GRAW2 MP demo on a 2.4Ghz MBP? I tried it on my 2.2 and it ran pretty damn terribly on all but the lowest settings at any resolution over 1024x768. I read that it's yet another bad XBOX 360 port which is a shame.

 

yeah. i tried it, and i had basically the same story. i ran it in 1280x800 i think (or whatever was closest to 1440x900 without going over) with maxed out settings (not aa or af though)

it was pushing out like 25 fps, but then i tried other resolutions and settings and it didnt really affect the framerate...

meaning- crappy xbox port.

 

its actually not a port. its a completely different game.

 

I don't know where you heard that but I'm sure it uses the Rainbow 6: Vegas engine, which is a direct port from the X360 meaning it's a port as well. However direct a port doesn't matter, since as long as the engine's a port, it's framerate goes to hell.

 

its definitely not the same game though

 

Can the people with scores in the charts tell us what their GPU core speeds and memory speeds are?

Josh

 

Can anyone help me?

 

Hi Guys! My first post in these forums and a brand new Macbook Pro owner. I have the 2.2GHz version but I'm not getting buyers remorse but more of a performance remorse. lol

I'm happy with the Macbook Pro I have now but I'm not sure if I would be happy in the long run. I could use the 500 difference to max out the memory to 4GB and get a nice 22" Monitor.

I have to read up on more experiences and decide for myself befopre the 14 day return window is done.

- JOhn

 

Yeah, core clock and mem speeds should definitely be included. Theres too big of a discrepancy in the numbers.

 

I posted some comments on overclocking mine to 600/675 in another thread.

 

3dmark06 results:
MBP 2,4, GForce 8600mGT 256MB, 2GB RAM - everything at normal clock speeds!
Windows Vista 32 Business, Bootcamp 1.3 driver

resolution points
--------------------------
1440__________3675
1280__________4060
1024__________4606
1024 4xAA AF___3562
1024 8xAA AF___2900

I might try overclocking the GeForce some other time...

 

Thanks for the info. Mad props!

 

What program do you guys use to benchmark under MAC OS?

- JOhn

 

I didn't run any OSX Benchmarks at all. I used Vista under Bootcamp and ran Futuremarks 3dmark 06!

Rob Art at Barefeats.com usually uses games. Doom3, Quake IV, Prey, Unreal Tournament. But OSX is driver limited anyways and does not really show you what your GPU is capable of at any time!

Here the link to barefeats.com (OSX performance)

 

2.2GHZ SR here...

This isn't going to be very scientific but I installed the Lost Planet demo via Steam and scored an average of 20fps in the time demo with the default settings.

Note: this was in Windows XP SP2 running in DX9 mode. Lost Planet uses some DX10 only effects if you're running in in Vista.

That is all.

 

I got the same. As well even at 20fps it was surprisingly playable with the Xbox 360 controller. Not so much with the keyboard/mouse since they seemed to have bigger latency issues for some reason.

 

Why am I not surprised that it works better with a gamepad? I tried all of the different mouse sensitivity options and the KB/mouse combo just felt off to me. I wasn't sure if it was the low FPS or bad control...

Funny how you CAN'T exit some menus with just the KB. You actually have to right click to back out of some menus. I didn't realize this at first and had to force quit using task manager a few times. Go figure...another shoddy console port

 

Do u guys think that starcraft 2 well be able to play with the 256mb?

 

yea im sure it will be fine. but i would pose the same question about the 128mb version

 

Yes, anyone? Will StarCraft 2 run okay on the 128mb-version of MacBook Pro?

 

Probably? Depends on when it actually comes out.

 

how about age of conan on the 128mb

 

OMG !! How could I ever miss this thread so far ?

Of course you can play StarCraft 2 on 128Mb! It's stil a RTS game and moreover you don't have to play it on WXGA+ resolution will all options maxed out

 

I'm also torn between which to choose. The 2.2 Ghz model just squeezes into my price range but I'm considering collecting more funds to get the higher end macbook pro. Is the 2.4Ghz really worth the money?

 

I feel the same way, unless new drivers with new games improve things its hard to justify the extra money.

I read someone say that you are better of using the price diffference towards a desktop machine that can do 3d stuff properly which I agree with for games but I want to drive a 24 inch external monitor and use the laptop as 2nd screen. I know that the stock 9600 128 meg in my g5 only just manages when I run itv and say vewing youtube stuff in safari. Itv would start dropping frames when I had my 'helios' desktop screen saver running at the same time so a little more power would help! I cant see a laptop card with the same amount of ram being any better even if it is a few years younger, thoughts ?

In australia the price difference is 7-800 more, Id like to see more consistant improvements in speed for that kinda price difference.

 

If you are gaming at lower resolutions it seems that the differences between the two cards is less. The 256 comes into play at the native 1440 x 900.

Really though, it is sort of ridiculous that Apple sets things up this way, when people just want the upgraded graphics card without the jacked up price of the processor.

Heh, even still, I spent time gathering together more money and opted for the 2.4, especially because of the video card increase. But then again, I like playing Supreme Commander on high settings (on my Alienware I get about 3 FPS). I CAN NOT WAIT to try out my new MBP when it gets here.

So, if you game at lower resolution, a 128 will still kick butt, it doesn't need the extra space. If it does need extra space, it will safely turbocache it.

If you want to game at max 1440 x 900 all of the time with max details then grab that darned 256 and stop thinking about it. But really, max details are NOT that important in my opinion. I've gotten by with medium and low for so long that it really doesn't matter that much to me. I usually play a game for a little bit at really high graphic quality settings just to check things out and then switch them down so I actually have an FPS above 9 and can start really playing. It all comes down to comfort factor and how much of a remorse type you are. If you are always going to worry about not getting the best of the best, then you should get the 256. Honestly though, you can minimize the difference between the two cards with such little tweaking that it really isn't that big a deal!

 

This very debate is examined:
http://www.barefeats.com/rosa03.html

I think this shows that the 128MB is probably a better deal, and the difference is minimal for 500USD. Seriously if you put 500USD in the bank literally, it will go a long way towards upgrading one year from now. Prices continue to sink in the market, and the technology gets better.

If you can get a discount somehow, the question becomes a bit more complicated.

 

Rob Art (the barefeats.com guy) only tests under OSX though and Doom3 Engine almost exclusively.

Only optimized drivers (not even the windows ones are really optimized at this point) will show you what the cards can do!

 

Seriously if you put 500USD in the bank literally, it will go a long way towards upgrading one year from now.

Well Im not sure I think less than a $100 in interest is a long way towards a new machine but the 500 its self is a good start.

I 'want' to be given a reason to spend the extra cash

Give me one apple and its all yours.

by the way does anyone here use the 128 version to run a 24- 30 inch monitor? wondering if it would suffer running itv and doing stuff on the other monitor like solidworks in windows for example?

 

Well I ran it in dual-monitor mode with my plasma and it always ran smooth, but that thing's only 720p so that doesn't really help to answer your question. That's definitely something to look up though as Nvidia's turbocaching might just be enough to properly run high resolution displays in dual view mode.

And to whoever said they bought the 2.4 MBP to play games on MAX settings at MAX resolution that was a pretty funny joke. I laughed a lot at that one, thanks.

 

I use my 1st gen Macbook Pro with an Ati x1600 128MB with a 24" monitor @ 1920x1200, and there is definately a little performance hit noticable when using exposé. Doesn't run as smooth as when only using the build in monitor. But I don't know if the Nvidia 128MB card would be the same...

 

Hi guy !

I have just buy a mbp 17" santa rosa, and on 3Dmark 2006 build 1.1.0 with the resolution of 1280*1024 I do 4025.