MBP 1.83- Civ IV Performance?

Hi all,
I have Civ IV for the PC, which I haven't played since switching to the Mac. I was waiting for the Mac vesion to come out to avoid Boot Camp, but I have read that performance is poor on with the new Mac version. Can anyone provide feedback on the performance? Should I install Windows to play or is the Mac version good enough?
Thanks in advance,
Mark

Mark,
I bought Civ IV for Mac when it came out beginning of this month. On my machine Civ IV work great (as far as I was expected). I do not have the drop out music the slow motion and other issues that a lot of people have been complaining in this forum: http://forums.civfanatics.com/forumdisplay.php?f=199
I also got the patch that Aspyr release few days ago: http://www.macgamefiles.com/detail.php?item=19218 but did not try since I installed it. Your machine is a little slower than my machine but in your case I will be more concern if you have the Minimum RAM (512) that came by default. I believe you have 128 of video RAM I do not know how critical it is (I have 256). I know it is a steep investment but I love it and that 3D environment is great to watch. A must have for Civ fans. I can not answer your Windows question, I have not put Windows on my machine.
Hope this help.
Thierry

Similar Messages

  • 17" MBP 500GB 7200RPM Hard Disk - Performance Issues

    Am I the only 17" MBP user that is having performance issues, along with the click+beep?
    My Hard Disk performs terribly:
    -3 hours to install 10.5.6 (Erase and Install).
    -30 minutes to duplicate 10GB of data.
    -An XBench Disk Test score of 15.22
    Results 15.22
    System Info
    Xbench Version 1.3
    System Version 10.6 (10A421a)
    Physical RAM 4096 MB
    Model MacBookPro5,2
    Drive Type ST9500420ASG
    Disk Test 15.22
    Sequential 15.01
    Uncached Write 60.44 37.11 MB/sec [4K blocks]
    Uncached Write 37.41 21.16 MB/sec [256K blocks]
    Uncached Read 5.38 1.57 MB/sec [4K blocks]
    Uncached Read 26.89 13.52 MB/sec [256K blocks]
    Random 15.42
    Uncached Write 5.95 0.63 MB/sec [4K blocks]
    Uncached Write 35.97 11.52 MB/sec [256K blocks]
    Uncached Read 27.85 0.20 MB/sec [4K blocks]
    Uncached Read 36.33 6.74 MB/sec [256K blocks]
    Apple refuses to replace it without me visiting a retail store (almost an hour drive).
    Should I just take the hit and buy a new drive?

    Personally, I would take it back, try a new one right in the store, and if that didn't work, I would demand my money back and wait until Apple fixes this hard drive issue. Oh, and tell the manager of the Apple Store you want an iTunes gift certificate for all your troubles and traveling time.
    Dave M.
    MacOSG Founder/Ambassador  An Apple User Group  iTunes: MacOSG Podcast
    Macsimum News Associate Editor  Creator of 'Mac611 - Mobile Mac Support'

  • Mac Mini vs. MBP 2.16 Core Duo Performance

    I currently have an MBP that has an external Firewire 400 RAID. I'm considering buying the high version of the Mini. Would this perform Core 2 duo better than my older MBP that has the earlier Core Duo?
    I'd like to do a little photo and video editing. So if there was an advantage in the Mini I'd probably pop for one. I suppose I should really be looking at an iMac as a fully loaded Mini seems to approach the price of an iMac.

    Thanks Boece, I didn't realize that. I'm thinking an iMac would probably be a better choice for me then. The price difference is not so great that the benefits would not be worth it. I fooled around with a Mini over the lunch hour and it did not seem as quick in Finder as my older MBP. I forgot to look at the memory in the demo Mini, so it might not have been a fair comparison. My older MBP also has a 7200 RPM HD (along with 2 gigs of memory)
    I'm not knocking the Mini. I am wondering in this current environment how much sense the Mini makes these days? It seems to me that the Mini out be be priced a little lower than it is.

  • MBP 13'' 2.53GHz overall performance

    I've just got a new MBP 13'' 2.53GHz and I'm quite disappointed about its performance.
    Out of the box, it takes ~90 seconds from turning on to the login screen and another 40 seconds from logging in to get Finder ready to use. There are no applications running at login time. I've read that having 4GB of RAM takes longer to boot but it doesn't feel right when it's more than 2 minutes.
    I can live with this boot time but then, for example, starting Safari for the first time takes 15 seconds. And so does any application.
    Finder is slow too, it takes up to 10 seconds to show the size of the .app files in the Applications folder. I've never seen the beach ball as often as with this new MBP.
    I've already reset the PRAM several times, no improvement.
    I've run the Test utility that comes with the Applications Install DVD and found no errors. Boot in verbose mode doesn't show anything weird.
    Any help is much appreciated.
    Thanks

    I've just returned from the Apple Store, actually it's a Premium Reseller, we don't have Apple stores in Argentina.
    Anyway, I left my MPB13 (250GB stock HD) three days ago, today they called me because it was ready. When I get there, they told me that they didn't find anything wrong with it. I've asked to talk to the technician, he said that it's normal to have the beachball from time to time. I explained to him that it's more than that and ran the AJA System Test (http://www.aja.com/products/software/) where you can see that the HD performance drops to almost 0 MB/s when reading a 512MB file. After showing that, he took the laptop again. While I was waiting for him to return, I've run the same test on another MPB13 that they were showing. It didn't have the 1.7 firmware and the performance was a steady ~70MB/s writing and reading. Bottom line, they kept my MPB, they will look more into it and probably change the HD and memory (that's what he said).
    So, it's not over but at least they recognized that something is not right. I've also mentioned this thread were they can find more information.
    I recommend this AJA System Test, I've run it in several Macs and the performance is always constant not like my MBP13 with EFI 1.7.

  • MBP vs iMac graphic card performance

    I perform heavy image and video editing on my Windows XP machine....my imac G4 is used by wife for email and browsing but can't use for my purposes....would like to get a new machine....portability is not a major concern but performance is.

    If you already have a good display with your WinXP box why not look at the Mac Pro? The Quad 2.8GHz MacPro is the same price as the Dual 2.8GHz iMac and for a little more you can have the superior graphics card. 
    mrtotes

  • Slow MBP keyboard & Apple Extended Keyboard Performance

    I have noticed that the above keyboards run slow, meaning there is an increased latency time from keystroke until the character appears, when I use IE 8.0.6001.18702 in Windows XP SP3 running as VM in Parallels 7.0.15107.  My base OS is Mac OX 10.7.5.  I know this is a rather unique situation; however, the keyboards have only recently begun to misbehave.  Any thoughts?

    Sorry, but what does this have to do with the iPod touch?
    If you're attempting to use a Apple Extended Keyboard with a Windows 7 system and have a problem, you should take this up on a Windows-oriented support site. The Apple Extended Keyboard itself has no programmable keys, so any key remapping would need to be done in Windows, and that's not a subject that should be addressed here (particularly not in the iPod touch forum).
    Regards.

  • MBP 3,1 with SSD - performance results :)

    From XBench 3.1:
    Results 178.35
    System Info
    Xbench Version 1.3
    System Version 10.5.6 (9G55)
    Physical RAM 4096 MB
    Model MacBookPro3,1
    Drive Type OCZ-VERTEX 1199
    Disk Test 178.35
    Sequential 131.92
    Uncached Write 202.55 124.36 MB/sec [4K blocks]
    Uncached Write 176.07 99.62 MB/sec [256K blocks]
    Uncached Read 66.59 19.49 MB/sec [4K blocks]
    Uncached Read 213.40 107.26 MB/sec [256K blocks]
    Random 275.19
    Uncached Write 116.55 12.34 MB/sec [4K blocks]
    Uncached Write 327.73 104.92 MB/sec [256K blocks]
    Uncached Read 2173.79 15.40 MB/sec [4K blocks]
    Uncached Read 409.19 75.93 MB/sec [256K blocks]

    You see this benchmarking silliness all the time once the drive has been bought at 5X the cost of SATA.

  • MacBook Pro performance issues w/2nd monitor and FCP7

    I have this MacBook Pro bought brand-new in January 2010:
      Model Name: MacBook Pro
      Model Identifier: MacBookPro5,2
      Processor Name: Intel Core 2 Duo
      Processor Speed: 3.06 GHz
      Number Of Processors: 1
      Total Number Of Cores: 2
      L2 Cache: 6 MB
      Memory: 8 GB
      Bus Speed: 1.07 GHz
    and until today had never attached a second monitor to it. Today I hooked up my Samsung 24" to do some dual screen editing in Final Cut 7.0.3. I was unable to play back my video at full speed in the second monitor, and after a few seconds of skippy playback I'd get that error message about unable to play back video at full speed and to check my RT settings. I was using a Mini DisplayPort to DVI adapter. My computer has no issues playing the video in the laptop's monitor at any resolution and any quality settings (I've never changed the RT settings or anything else in the menu ever but I tried every combination this time). I then tried using my TV as a 2nd monitor with an HDMI adapter. Same performance issues. I then tried my friend's newer 13" MBP 8,1 and it performed flawlessly with the same project & footage. I feel like my $3,000 computer should outperform a $1,200 one even if mine is a year and a half older. Any advice?
    Chris

    Wow, you posted this perfectly to coincide with an identical problem, albeit using Logic Pro 9.1.5 rather than FCP.
    Last week, I purchased a 23" external monitor to use alongside my "flagship" 2011 15" hi-res, 2.3 i7 Macbook Pro with 8Gb of RAM.
    It is connected via a mini-DVI to D-sub analog (not that that should matter?) and all appeared fine.
    The first issue I had was with my MBP's fan now running CONSTANTLY, when I have the second monitor attached. Even when the machine is completely idle.
    When using the machine to record audio, this is a fairly hefty problem and not something I had anticipated - indeed why would I anticipate such a thing?
    What is far, far worse though is that over the last few days I have had repeated problems with performance drop-outs and errors in Logic and I have trying to fathom out why. Realising that the only major system change made, was the above monitor connection, I ran some tests.
    I restarted my MBP, no other apps were running and with my new 23" monitor attached acting as main display with MBP built in display on as secondary
    I loaded up a fairly demanding Logic project which was hitting 40% to 60% CPU usage when using the built in MBP display last week
    I ran activity monitor and had CPU usage history open
    The above project now repeatedly overloads and playback halts in a given 8 bar section - with CPU at 80% most of the time
    I disconnected the external display, no shut down, I just let the machine switch to the built in 15".
    Started the same project, the same 8 bar section and hey presto - CPU usage back down to 40% to 60%
    The above was reflected in the CPU usage history with the graph showing CPU use down by about a half, when running this Logic project WITHOUT the external display.
    There is a very useful benchmark Logic project that has been used as a test by many users to gauge Logic performance on given Apple hardware.
    The project has about 100 tracks pre-configured with CPU intensive plugins, designed to tax the CPU.
    The idea is that you load up the project with tracks muted, press play and then unmute the tracks steadily until Logic us unable to play contiunously because of a system performance error.
    On my MBP, with the external monitor NOT attached, I can play back around 50 of the audio tracks in this benchmark project.
    With the monitor attached, I can get about 22 tracks playing.... which is actually a far worse a performance drop (-50% I think!?) than with the first example!
    I did also try with just the external monitor attached and not the MBP display and performance was about 10% better than with dual monitors - so still extremely poor, to say the least.
    This machine is the flagship MBP and has a dedicated AMD Radeon HD6750 GPU which should take care of most if not ALL graphics processing - I mean it's capable of running some pretty demanding games!
    Putting aside the issue of constant fan noise, there is no reason AT ALL, why using an external monitor should tax the i7 CPU this way - it's not as though Logic is graphically demanding... far from it.
    I am on 10.6.8, Logic 9.1.5, all apps up to date via "Software Update".
    I will of course, be contacting Apple...

  • Legacy MBP vs. 2009 MBP

    Hello All,
    I'm finally in the market for a new 15" MBP to replace my 2.16 GHz variant of the first generation MBP! I'm an architecture student and my core pro uses are running CS4 on the Mac side and various CAD/rendering related applications on the Windows side. My primary goal in getting a new MBP is getting the greatest performance +bang for the buck+. As such I'm looking at both the legacy 2008/2009 models that have been discounted and the 2009 line up that was just released. It seems to me that given my uses the graphics power provided by the 512MB 9600M GT would provide a distinct advantage over the 256MB 9600M GT. As such I'm looking at buying a legacy 2.66 GHz MBP that is equipped with the 512MB 9600M GT as opposed to the similarly priced, newly released 2.66 GHz MBP that is equipped with the 256MB 9600M GT. It seems to me that while the larger battery and better display would be nice to have, my money would be better spend on the higher performance legacy model. Is it correct to presume that the legacy MBP and newly released 2009 MBP are virtually identical with the exception of the battery, display, smaller graphics card and ExpressCard/SD swap? Would the legacy MBP provide better performance given it's larger graphics card or are there changes to the 2009 MBP that would give a performance advantage over the legacy models?
    Thanks for your time and advice,
    Eric
    Here are a few of the resources that I've been using in my research.
    [+MacBook Pro (15-inch, Mid 2009) and (15-inch, 2.53 GHz, Mid 2009) - Technical Specifications+|http://support.apple.com/kb/SP544]
    [+MacBook Pro (15-inch, Late 2008) - Technical Specifications+|http://support.apple.com/kb/SP499]
    [+MacWorld Review of 2009 MBP (Note the Speedmark Performance)+|http://www.macworld.com/article/141185/15inchmacbookpro.html]

    Hi MacRambler,
    Welcome to Apple Discussion Forums.
    I was in a very similar situation when I had to purchase a MPB earlier this week.
    Should I go with the newer 2009 model, or Late 2008 model?
    I eventually went with a Refurb Late 2008 MBP 2.53 for several reasons...
    http://store.apple.com/us/product/FB471LL/A?mco=MjE0NjE5MA
    1.) It was $550 cheaper than the newer 2009 Models with Dedicated Graphics. This one also came with 512MB of Graphics Memory vs 256 of the newer one. This was also a $2499 Laptop just 6 months ago. For $1449, its a steal right now IMO.
    2.) Despite the new battery innovations, I travel quite a bit, and reading reviews online of 4-4.5 hours or so battery life on the new one (Engadget Review), I felt having a replaceable battery I can swap on the fly was more beneficial. I was fine with losing the hour or so with the legacy battery assuming I could swap it out.
    3.) ExpressCard slot is more flexible than a SD Card Slot. Plus, my DSLR uses CompactFlash Anyway .
    4.) I was also debating between the refurbs with higher end processors, and ultimately determined the extra 130mhz of the 2.66 wasn't worth the $250 additional price tag over the 2.53 from the refurb site.
    I feel the new 2009 model was a lateral move in several ways, not necessarily an upgrade. The biggest deal was the price drops for new units. They're fabulous for the money, but the refurb was much cheaper and had better specs and less compromises.
    Now, there are some slight disadvantages from the newer model. Supposedly the screen is better on the newer ones. Supposedly they need to be side to side to notice the difference, but there were rave reviews of the screen when the Late 2008s come out. I figure they were excellent 6 months ago, they're still excellent now. I'm not worried about it. SD card can be useful for some people, though some people are upset with the loss of ExpressCard. I also mention the battery above.
    It looks like you've got all the changes down. The only one I didn't see is that the new one supposedly supports up to 8GB of Memory, while the older model can only address 6GB. Not sure if this will change with a future update or Snow Leopard, but something to keep in mind.
    I feel for your needs, having the discrete graphics is a must. I haven't seen any benchmarks comparing CS4 with the larger allocated memory, but there is a slight improvement while gaming.
    Sorry if my thought process is all over the place, I was just typing as ideas came to me. Good luck with your purchase.

  • Resume Time Machine Backup On New MBP (props available)

    Hello Officials,
    I do not mean to scare away answers, but I am an experienced Mac boy, and would be forever honored with help on (this now) complicated issue below:
    Info:
    My old MBP had a couple of logic board replacements, now I have the new MBP. I want to perform a clean install, and thus don't want to restore from my full time machine backup (3.3TB of data). I did use Migration-sh't-Assitant for my apps, (and proper delete process for ones I didn't want) but want further options. My main problem is that I would like to go back to having my old version of Mail (with mailbox's and rss) and my old +Address Book+. (I am aware of the longer steps to get these two to work) _As well as_, I want to resume my Time Machine backups from my old backups.
    Goal:
    Continue using my old Time Machine backups for my new computer. Without 'Browse Other..'.
    *You Should Know -That I Know*
    I can hold option for a different Time Machine, it is a terrible way to operate the machine and its files.
    It is a challenge due to the MAC address.
    I can just re-sync Mail with all my other accounts, but I have a lot. I don't want to do that.
    Address Book, even on my 'Browse other time machine disks' this is quite funky. Open to suggestions.
    I already moved the backup onto a new drive. This is different.
    Link
    An interesting terminal walkthrough. Unfortunately is dated and filled with errors:
    http://hints.macworld.com/article.php?story=20080128003716101
    I have been looking into this for hours, I'm interested in what there is.
    _*+THIS IS POSSIBLE TO DO+*_
    I sincerely thank you for your time, you are truly kind-
    ~Dylan Jones
    Message was edited by: thedylanjones

    thedylanjones wrote:
    Hello Officials,
    Hi, and welcome to the forums.
    But there are no "officials" here; this is a user-to-user forum. We're all users, just like you.
    I want to perform a clean install, and thus don't want to restore from my full time machine backup (3.3TB of data). I did use Migration-sh't-Assitant for my apps, (and proper delete process for ones I didn't want) but want further options. My main problem is that I would like to go back to having my old version of Mail (with mailbox's and rss) and my old +Address Book+. (I am aware of the longer steps to get these two to work)
    Not sure what you mean here. Do you mean the old versions of the Mail and Address book apps, or the old data? What version of OSX is on each Mac?
    An interesting terminal walkthrough. Unfortunately is dated and filled with errors:
    http://hints.macworld.com/article.php?story=20080128003716101
    That's outdated (2008), and not needed on Snow Leopard. When the first backup of your new Mac starts, you should get an option to "re-use" the backups. See #B5 in [Time Machine - Troubleshooting|http://web.me.com/pondini/Time_Machine/Troubleshooting.html] (or use the link in *User Tips* at the top of this forum). But note that however you answer that, Time Machine will do a new, full backup of the new Mac.

  • MBP Compared to a G4 iMac?

    There's lots of ruminating about the speed issues of non-universal applications on the MBP. I'm moving from a 17" iMac 700 to the 17" MBP. What can expect performance-wise with the main Adobe apps with ths kind of hardware change? Plus it will allow me to ditch the IBM thinkpad that I need to carry along. Any thoughts?

    I just tried to capture an hour of HDV of my son skateboarding. His G4 800 MHz iMac couldn't do it. I connected a fireWire drive and Sony camcorder to my MBP and captured almost an hour of video in real time with iMovie. I connect the FW drive to his imac and now he can edit. Photoshop runs slow on a G4 iMac compared to a MBP as well. i can't think of a single program that will run faster on an iMac (G4).

  • Slower MBP since 10.5.4 Most Recent Security Update and iTunes 7.7.1(1)

    Anyone notice a significant overall slowdown since installing updates to iTunes and the Security Updates that were released recently? My MBP is an Intel Core 2 Duo 2.3GHz with 4GB of memory; it should blaze, and used to, but not anymore. Very noticeable slowdown overall!

    After update 10.5.2 there has been performance issues on my MBP as well.
    Response performance varies - like your laptop is becoming tired..................
    Unfortunately, general freezing of the screen and all control (except power down), happens randomly - I read in another post that this only happens on Battery? - I believe this to be true...........
    Longer app loading times and annoyances from spotlight indexing at poor times.
    Window memory and size are lost on occasion - having to resize all quite often - crazy.
    Dock unhide judder from first mouse activation - I know it's petty, but I think the Dock is worth it.
    Sometimes, bootcamp partition desktop icon fails to appear with the other desktop icons, later after spotlight has calmed down.
    The last bug is usually a sign to run Onyx maintenance and rebuild spotlight and other preferences.
    Great program.
    This usually sorts it out for a week and then the symptoms come back.
    Logic Pro seems to take more RAM (I know i need to upgrade - only 3Gb available on my machine - nuts.)
    Still a very cool machine though - BF2 and Logic on one laptop.............
    Any positive ideas and solutions are welcome.

  • MBP + Aperture + Nikon D800 - Anyone?

    Greetings, Looking for anyone using a MBP with Aperture 3 + and the new Nikon D800.  Want to see how the MBP and Aperture are handling performance with the larger 36 megapixel RAW files.  Anyone?

    Don't have a D800, yet.
    But I have worked with 100+ MB TIFF from scanned slides for years. And that includes working with a 2006 MBP with 2 GB of RAM.
    Others will add refinements but there are several stress points in the Aperture workflow that may show the impact of larger files:
    -- Basic file handling. Importing, exporting, copying, etc. may all be a bit slower depending on your HD and bus speeds, etc.
    -- Browsing and similar processes should show little or no difference once all of your thumbs are rendered.
    -- Loading images will be slower, especially zooming to full resolution. This will be driven by two different factors - the size of the file and the processing power of your GPU.
    -- Similarly, computationally intensive Adjusting, like Shadows and Sharpening will take longer to render. Other simple Adjustments, like white balance, usually show no slow down.
    The usual rules apply:
    -- As much RAM as you can afford and, if you see bad slowdowns, shut off other programs. A small refinement is to avoid switching from one image to another when Adjusting as this requires the new image to be read into RAM.
    -- Keep your Library on your fastest, emptiest HD. (Consider relocating your Masters onto another HD to achieve this.)
    There is one unexpected side effect to D800 RAW files - if you use plug-ins that make TIFF, a colleague reports that these run to 200 MB each. Ouch!
    DiploStrat

  • MBP? Very dissapointed!!

    I recieved my mbp last thursday after waiting a whole month for it. I opened it and soon excitement turned into dissapointment as I heard the eery whine. I phoned apple and told them about it, the offered to replace or to repair, not being able to guarantee me a quiet mbp I chose to have it repaired. Friday comes and I recieve the box, monday dhl came and picked it up, it arrived to texas on tuesday and by wednesday it was already repaired and come today I recieve my supposidly repaired mbp. Yesterday when I saw that my mbp had been repaired so quickly I was a tad bit skeptical so I phoned applecare where they informed me that my logic board had been replaced. Today I eagerly open up the box, boot up my mbp to find that the whine is still there. The only thing I found differant was my screen saver, mac osx had not been reinstalled nothing. I phone applecare once again get transfered to a "specialist" whome does not know the trouble shooting steps and had to refer to a manual and would read directly from the manual. I go through the usual trouble shooting steps I had gone to the first time knowing that this would not do a thing. He then offered a second repair or a replacement. I decide I want a refund, but my machine being a cto unit they have to recieve approval. Thankfully I was approved for a refund and I am very glad. Sorry mbp rev a I give up, I will patiently wait for a rev b or for the 17". I feel that we have been treated like lab rats testing the new intel hardware. I must say though that apple has treated me very well each time that I have called and they have always been understanding of my situation. Buying the mbp in my case was a mistake but I hope apple will fix all of these annoying bugs for rev b.

    WOW v100 you are very smart!! Obviously this is not a question, if it were, I would have marked it as such, very sharp there! And yes, this is a very constructive comment. One week ago I was asking myself the same question, could the whine be repaired? Now I can say that it can not. Seems like another mbp police that needs to get a life!!
    As for your coment saba01, I understand, this is a great machine and I think it is the best money can buy. But what good does it do if the machine induces sharp headaches? Maybe you dont have the whine or not the same whine that us cpu whiners experience, but it is a very sharp eery headache inducing noise. As a law student I use a computer practicly all day long and in very quiet places and I can not use my mbp, it would affect my performance drasticly! With that said, I will continue on my 17" 1.67 which is DEAD SILENT as was my 12" 1.0. I can only hope that I can start my next academic year with a quiet mbp.

  • Slow Firewire 800 Performance (2006 MP)

    Was the original Mac Pro FW 800 performance slow...? I noticed recently that my 2008 Macbook Pro will read at 82.8 MB/s while the Mac Pro does only 69 MB/s and the write speeds (on this particular drive) is 69.0 and 56.0 MB/s respectively. Is it normal or expected for the Mac Pro to be 13.8 MB/s slower than the MBP on reads and somewhat slower on Writes?
    Note: these tests were done with new Hitachi 2TB drives in a Weibetech RTX-100 enclosure. Also some tests showed the MBP with even faster FW performance and with a bigger spread in the write speeds.
    Thanks,
    Robert

    FW800 is 800Mb so I'd say the 82 is not accurate. What did you use? do you trust the program?
    And there was nothing else connected to any of the FW ports also.
    Newer chipsets could hopefully be better.
    If you want performance, then go for SATA.

Maybe you are looking for