Arma 2 on a Macbook Pro = Fail ?

[Moosed 10]

Hi.

Has anyone here tried running this game on a Macbook Pro via Boot Camp ? The reason i ask is that i downloaded the demo from Steam but it doesn't seem to load up, i get the little boxes with the ticks and then nothing happens.

I remember reading a thread somewhere which said that someone couldn't get it working on their macbook until they updated to 1.03. Im assuming the demo is an old build, hence why it might not work ?

Id like to buy the game but i don't want to if it doesn't work like the demo, so i was hoping some macbook pro users might be on this site and be able to give me the low down.

Please mods, don't move this thread mods to the 300 page thread about pc specs... no one will respond to me in that thread, i have seen a few people post the same question with regards to macbooks and everyone overlooks it because 99% of people are ps users. If you leave this thread here then im much more likely to get a response and then hopefuly buy the game !

Cheers

[randir14 10]

I don't know anything about Macs or Boot Camp but a guy in this topic said he's running it on Boot Camp Windows XP. Is it like Windows where you can choose an older OS in compatibility mode? Maybe you have to set it to use XP.

http://forums.bistudio.com/showthread.php?t=74881

[telejunky 0]

There it comes to my mind "photoshop isn't a game" ;)

But back to you. So if the demo doesn't work, you may experience the pc. If you really want to play this great game then spent in sum 400€ on ebay for second hand amd processor, ati 4850, 4gb ddr2 and so on :) Ah good old xp licence is needed, too.

[GoOB 0]

I've run several games on my Macbook Pro, nothing as demanding as ARMA II though - I ran NWN 2, World In Conflict, Hearts of Iron II and the Witcher without too many unexpected issues. The issues I expected though were present, general choppiness, low (but quite playable) framerates and some heat artifacts after about two and a half hours in The Witcher. NWN 2 ran without much hassle at all though. All in all, I would only give it a try if you know you can get a refund for your copy of ARMA II if it turns out unplayable.

All in all, I never expected to do any gaming on my Macbook - I just expected it to be light, portable and capable of running the best image software out there, namely Apple Aperture.

Edited August 16, 2009 by GoOB

[AnimalMother92 10]

everyone who thinks macs cant game needs to have their head checked out. macs these days use PC components essentially and once theyre running windows with bootcamp, there is no difference. arma 2 runs wonderfully under windows 7 on my Mac Pro. full specs in sig..

[fumo 0]

no one can say OSX is meant for gaming, but to say Macs (as hardware) can't game is silly.

But if i read the specs of your Mac i doesn't see much "Mac" in it apart of the OS. Can we then still speak about "Mac as hardware"?

[AnimalMother92 10]

But if i read the specs of your Mac i doesn't see much "Mac" in it apart of the OS. Can we then still speak about "Mac as hardware"?

thats kinda my point. macs use a lot of PC components. the beauty of the design (airflow, ease of installing parts, etc) is in the Mac hardware

*ONTOPIC*

maybe try adding the -winxp parameter to the .exe?

Edited August 17, 2009 by AnimalMother92

[W0lle 1042]

Alright, all offtopic crap and bashing has been removed.

Maybe we can make a 2nd attempt to help the guy out? This time without offtopic discussions and bashing.

Don't make me come back and clean up again mkay?

[LJF 0]

Macbook Pro

There's your problem ...

j/k :D

How is gaming on a Mac? AnimalMother, you seem to be sitting high and dry in terms of hardware at least, how's it run other things?

[AnimalMother92 10]

There's your problem ...

j/k :D

How is gaming on a Mac? AnimalMother, you seem to be sitting high and dry in terms of hardware at least, how's it run other things?

every game i've tried runs great at high settings @ 1920x1200 with the exception of crysis and arma 2 (before tweaking). half life 2 ep 2, America's army 3, etc all run nicely, even when I had my 8800gt. i bought the gtx 285 hoping that it would help arma 2...

[LJF 0]

Nice, yeah, ArmA2 is the big killer at the moment :( I built my entire system just to run it and ... yeah ...

[BF2_Trooper 0]

Lol, deleted our little mac flame war I see. Anyways, I've got a suggestion. Have you tried updating your Window's directx? I remember one of the mods posted a link to the microsoft website that gave a cetain update to directx for people that had trouble getting ARMA2 to start up.

[Big Dawg KS 6]

Hmm, this is the only kind of Mac I can associate with ArmA...

[th3flyboy 0]

I'm not really sure, I don't use macs unless I'm forced to. Personally, I would rather run a game on linux than a mac... as I feel that macs are overpriced anyway, however, in light of your situation, try running on xp sp3 emulation if it's there, or win7 rc emulation.

[rtb 0]

Hiya, I'm running arma2 on a mac (2009) macpro w/gtx285 and didn't have any problems running @2048x1152 all sliders full bast until the mission in the campain where a squad is pinned down by a sniper in a factory complex.. no matter what settings i use textures go white, ultra choppy then CTD. Oh, i couldn't even start the game until v1.03 too..OH, bootcamp/vistax64 btw

Edited August 18, 2009 by rtb
forgot to add OS

[-RIP- Luhgnut 10]

Sorry - deleted anti-mac monologue. Carry on.

[gossamersolid 155]

have you updated your drivers? Otherwise I believe it would be a bootcamp issue.

BTW, somebody on the first page said his mac pro is really good. Well those specs are nice, but you could have bought the parts with a nice quality case (good airflow) and then you would have probably saved a ton of cash.

[GoOB 0]

But you wouldn't be able to run Mac OSX, Final Cut, QuarkXpress and Aperture who along with a few other programs are sometimes a requirement for working in certain industries. Gaming is far from the only reason for owning a modern computer, especially when it's of the Macintosh persuasion. That doesn't change the fact that gaming is indeed possible with one.

[axure 10]

Since Macs are x86 nowadays and you can easily install Windows, the only question is graphics card. The 13'' MacBook Pro has a GF 9400M, which will almost certainly turn out to be too weak for Arma2 (although it runs some less demanding games, like UT3, just fine.)

If you've got a bigger Mac with, say, a GF 9600GT, you should be able to run Arma2 in lo-med details.

Please mods, don't move this thread mods to the 300 page thread about pc specs.

Yeah, sometimes our moderators fail the common sense test... Edited August 18, 2009 by axure

[BF2_Trooper 0]

But you wouldn't be able to run Mac OSX, Final Cut, QuarkXpress and Aperture who along with a few other programs are sometimes a requirement for working in certain industries. Gaming is far from the only reason for owning a modern computer, especially when it's of the Macintosh persuasion. That doesn't change the fact that gaming is indeed possible with one.

QuarkXpress runs on Windows too. And so does Photoshop, Illustrator, Maya, 3DS MAX, ZBrush, and tons of other 2D/3D software. So sick of people making it sound like only Macs can run multimedia software. Final Cut and Aperture is made by Apple, I wonder why they only work on OSX? :eek:

[t1337Dude 10]

AnimalMother92, did you buy these components from Apple themselves or can you just buy them separately from Newegg?

[AnimalMother92 10]

AnimalMother92, did you buy these components from Apple themselves or can you just buy them separately from Newegg?

i bought the original machine from Apple

the RAM i buy from OWC because it's cheaper.

the hard drives can be purchased anywhere.

the GPU i bought from Apple, to replace the 8800GT, but you can purchase it from other stores too.

[rtb 0]

Solved my performace problems so far..