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Graphics performance in OS X - we need your info!

BluebellFloraBluebellFlora Posts: 7,110 Member
edited November 2016 in Mac - Technical Discussions
Hi everyone,

There seem to be inconsistencies between the same graphics cards for different users so let's try some simple comparisons. Doing this will hopefully help EA determine whether there are issues with certain cards or not. Please provide the following, I'l start with my specs:

Graphics card - NVIDIA GeForce GT 650M 1Gb
Operating System - Yosemite 10.10.2

Now onto the graphics settings in game:

Graphics Quality - Custom
Display Type - Windowed
Resolution - 1440 x 851
Retina Resolution: (if applicable)
Vertical Sync - No
Sims - High
Objects - High
Lighting - High
Reflections - High
Visual Effects - High
Edge Smoothing - Medium
3D Scene Resolution - High
View Distance - High
Uncompressed Sim Textures - No
Post Processing Effects - Yes
Laptop Mode - No

And now your average Frames Per Second (FPS), you use the cheat console for this. Hold down CTRL, Shift and C and in the window that opens type in fps on. In the bottom left corner of the game window you can now see a constantly changing number. Please provide a rough average in both Live Mode at Normal speed and in Build Mode:

FPS Live Mode: 50-55
FPS Build Mode: 45-50

How happy are you with the overall graphics performance. Are you experiencing any lag?

And finally, if you were previously playing the game in Boot Camp (ONLY Boot Camp, not a separate PC or VM), how do the graphics compare:

Boot Camp comparison - Slightly worse in OS X. I could play with Ultra settings in Windows. I have also had to lower Edge Smoothing from High to Medium to stop lag.
seperator.jpg

Click on the link for your graphics card to see how it is performing for others:

AMD/ATI Graphic Cards
Graphics card: AMD Radeon HD 6750M 1GB (AndyBrains)
Operating System: Yosemite 10.10.2
Performance: Good

Graphics card: AMD Radeon HD 6750M 512 MB (lissiea)
Operating System: Mavericks 10.9.5
Performance: Good

Graphics card: AMD Radeon HD 6770M 1GB (kaiserj)
Operating System: Yosemite 10.10.2
Performance: Great. OS X performs better than Windows in Boot Camp

Graphics card: AMD M290X 2GB (5K) (mschumann)
Retina Resolution: Yes
Operating System: Yosemite 10.10.3
Performance: Good

Graphics card: AMD M295X 4GB (5K) (ErikTheRod)
Retina Resolution: Yes
Operating System: Yosemite 10.10.2
Performance: Good

NVIDIA Graphics Cards
Graphics card:: NVIDIA GeForce 320M 256MB (jackjack_k)
Operating System: Yosemite 10.10.2
Performance: Good

Graphics card:: NVIDIA GeForce 320M 256MB (southaltan)
Operating System: Yosemite 10.10.2
Performance: Good

Graphics card: NVIDIA GeForce GT 650M 1GB (BluebellFlora)
Operating System: Yosemite 10.10.3
Performance: Good. Windows in Boot Camp performed better.

Graphics card: NVIDIA GeoForce GT 650M 1GB (Retina) (Lunder89)
Operating System: Yosemite 10.10.2
Performance: Ok

Graphics card: NVIDIA GeoForce GT 650M 1GB (Retina) (lisamwitt)
Retina Resolution: Yes
Operating System: Yosemite 10.10.2
Performance: Poor. Windows in Boot Camp performed better

Graphics card: NVIDIA GeForce GT 680MX 2GB (Figwit)
Operating System: Yosemite 10.10.2
Performance: Great

Graphics card: NVIDIA GeForce GT 750M 1GB (kaiserj)
Operating System: Yosemite 10.10.2
Performance: Great. OS X performs better than Windows in Boot Camp

Graphics card: NVIDIA GeForce GT 750M 2GB (Retina) (BrownBlossoms)
Operating System: Yosemite 10.10.2
Performance: Poor. Windows in Boot Camp performed better

Graphics card: NVIDIA GeForce GT 750M 2GB (Retina) (jedimacfan)
Retina Resolution: No
Operating System: Yosemite 10.10.2
Performance: Poor. Windows in Boot Camp performed better

Graphics card: NVIDIA GeForce GT 750M 2GB (Retina) (Delvyn93)
Retina Resolution: No
Operating System: Yosemite 10.10.3
Performance: Great

Graphics card: NVIDIA GeForce GT 750M 2GB (Retina) (daenerystubborn)
Retina Resolution: Rarely
Operating System: Yosemite 10.10.5
Performance: Great


Graphics card: NVIDIA GeForce GT 775M 2GB (Retina) (whoisblucraf)
Operating System: Yosemite 10.10.3
Performance: Ok but significantly better in Boot Camp

Intel Graphics Cards
Graphics card: Intel HD 3000 512 MB (EAfan99)
Operating System: Yosemite 10.10.2
Performance: Ok. Greyed out windows bug. OS X performs better than Windows in Boot Camp

Graphics card: Intel HD 4000 1GB (Jazzpuz)
Operating System: Yosemite 10.10.2
Performance: Ok. Greyed out windows bug

Graphics card: Intel HD 4000 1GB (conday884)
Operating System: Yosemite 10.10.2
Performance: Ok. Greyed out windows bug

Graphics card: Intel HD 4000 1GB (Retina) (MasonGamer)
Retina Resolution: Yes
Operating System: Yosemite 10.10.2
Performance: Good

Graphics card: Intel HD 4000 1GB (256Iris256)
Operating System: Yosemite 10.10.3
Performance: Low FPS

Graphics card: Intel HD 5000 1.5GB (Chumcha)
Operating System: Yosemite 10.10.2
Performance: Ok. Greyed out windows bug

Graphics card: Intel Iris (?) MB (Retina) (Srhxv8)
Operating System: Yosemite 10.10.2
Performance: Great. Greyed out windows bug
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Post edited by BluebellFlora on

Comments

  • ErikTheRodErikTheRod Posts: 47 Member
    edited February 2015
    [b]Graphics Card:[/b] AMD M295X 4GB
    [b]Operating System:[/b] OS X Yosemite 10.10.2

    [b]Graphics Quality[/b]: Custom
    [b]Display Type[/b]: Fullscreen
    [b]Resolution[/b]: 5120x2880
    [b]Retina Resolution:[/b]: Yes
    [b]Vertical Sync[/b]: No
    [b]Sims[/b]: High
    [b]Objects[/b]: High
    [b]Lighting[/b]: High
    [b]Reflections[/b]: High
    [b]Visual Effects[/b]: High
    [b]Edge Smoothing[/b]: Off
    [b]3D Scene Resolution[/b]: High
    [b]View Distance[/b]: High
    [b]Uncompressed Sim Textures[/b]: No
    [b]Post Processing Effects[/b]: Yes
    [b]Laptop Mode[/b]: No

    [b]FPS Live Mode[/b]: 20-30
    [b]FPS Build Mode[/b]: 20-30

    (Darn I'm not a member so I can't bold...)
  • BluebellFloraBluebellFlora Posts: 7,110 Member
    ErikTheRod wrote: »
    Graphics Card: AMD M295X 4GB
    Operating System: OS X Yosemite 10.10.2

    Graphics Quality: Custom
    Display Type: Fullscreen
    Resolution: 5120x2880
    Retina Resolution:: Yes
    Vertical Sync: No
    Sims: High
    Objects: High
    Lighting: High
    Reflections: High
    Visual Effects: High
    Edge Smoothing: Off
    3D Scene Resolution: High
    View Distance: High
    Uncompressed Sim Textures: No
    Post Processing Effects: Yes
    Laptop Mode: No

    FPS Live Mode: 20-30
    FPS Build Mode: 20-30

    (Darn I'm not a member so I can't bold...)

    So annoying that new users can't use bold etc.

    Thanks for the specs. I didn't realise there's a Retina Resolution :)

    apple-signature.png
  • southaltansouthaltan Posts: 152 Member
    Graphics card - NVIDIA GeForce 320M 256MB
    Operating System - Yosemite 10.10.2

    My graphics settings in game:

    Graphics Quality - Custom
    Display Type - Fullscreen
    Resolution - 1280 x 800
    Vertical Sync - No
    Sims - High
    Objects - High
    Lighting - Very High
    Reflections - Medium
    Visual Effects - Medium
    Edge Smoothing - Medium
    3D Scene Resolution - High
    View Distance - High
    Uncompressed Sim Textures - No
    Post Processing Effects - Yes
    Laptop Mode - No
  • BluebellFloraBluebellFlora Posts: 7,110 Member
    Thanks @southaltan. How's the game running? I'm sorry, I know you've been posting on other threads, you've probably already mentioned performance, and I've probably already responded but my brain's a bit fried at the moment! What's your fps too?
    apple-signature.png
  • Lunder89Lunder89 Posts: 155 Member
    I have the exact same graphics card. And know quite a bit about it, and its trouble.

    I have experienced that my Mac won't use all it's performance, it's not even running hard enough to get the fans to kick in. Then I change the resolution to Retina resolution, now it kicks in all of its performance, and fans, and I can go back to the 1440x900 resolution (where the game seems to perform the best). (And no leaving it in Retina resolution won't solve the issue)

    However this might not even be a problem with The Sims 4.
    I do play other games (totally weird), like F1 2013, Hitman Absolution and Tomb Raider 2013. All the games are ported by Feral Interactive. And they all have in common that they can't get all the power out of my Mac. They all lagg. But that is a problem that came with OS X Yosemite, on OS X Mavericks the games work fine.
    I have been in contact with Feral Interactive about it, and they can confirm there is issues with the GeForce GT 650M graphics card, and Apple are working on a fix. Feral Interactive thought it would be released in Yosemite 10.10.2, since it was in the beta of Yosemite. But for some reason it didn't make to the final release. Havn't heard from Feral Interactive since. Other than I have highlighted the issue.

    My graphics settings are:

    Graphics Quality - Custom
    Display Type - Full screen
    Resolution - 1440 x 900
    Vertical Sync - No
    Sims - High
    Objects - High
    Lighting - High
    Reflections - High
    Visual Effects - High
    Edge Smoothing - Medium
    3D Scene Resolution - Low
    View Distance - Low
    Uncompressed Sim Textures - No
    Post Processing Effects - No
    Laptop Mode - No

    Average FPS: 40

    The the computer in question:
    MacBook Pro Retina 15"
    Intel Core i7 2,4 Ghz, 8 GB Ram, GeForce GT 650M 1 GB, 256 GB SSD
  • JazzpuzJazzpuz Posts: 83 Member
    edited February 2015
    Graphics card - Intel HD Graphics 4000 1024MB
    Operating System - Yosemite 10.10.2

    MacBook Pro 13" Mid 2012, 2,5 GHz Intel Core i5, 8GB 1600 MHz DDR3.
    Not SSD.

    My graphics settings in game:

    Graphics Quality: Custom
    Display Type: Fullscreen
    Resolution: 1280 x 800
    Vertical Sync: No
    Sims: High
    Objects: Medium
    Lighting: High
    Reflections: Medium
    Visual Effects: Medium
    Edge Smoothing: Medium
    3D Scene Resolution: Medium
    View Distance: High
    Uncompressed Sim Textures: No
    Post Processing Effects: Yes
    Laptop Mode: Yes

    FPS Live Mode: 32-36
    FPS Build Mode: 32-43

    I'm having problems with bigger windows: in stead of viewing outside/inside - where the glass is supposed to be, it's grey. Smaller and "modern" rectangular windows have no problems though. I have tried changing 'Lighting', 'Reflections' and 'Visual effects' with no results.
    Other than that I feel the game runs pretty smoothly, no lag.

    EDIT: I did some more "extensive research" and it seem to be a problem with a selected few windows - the more detailed ones with a lot of bows and frames, the Willow Creek-type of windows. Some have a more light grey color where the glass is supposed to be while some are more darker grey. I tried playing with everything on low, I didn't remove the problem.
    Post edited by Jazzpuz on
  • southaltansouthaltan Posts: 152 Member
    > @BluebellFlora said:
    > Thanks southaltan. How's the game running? I'm sorry, I know you've been posting on other threads, you've probably already mentioned performance, and I've probably already responded but my brain's a bit fried at the moment! What's your fps too?

    well I tried it at those settings and it lagged horribly. So, i bumped it back to the Low-Medium settings then changed the sims to high and lighting to very high. Those settings are much better. Also, after a while the headphones (but settings are stereo) I am using start garbling. That was a good time to save and quit for a while.
  • BluebellFloraBluebellFlora Posts: 7,110 Member
    Lunder89 wrote: »
    I have the exact same graphics card. And know quite a bit about it, and its trouble.

    I have experienced that my Mac won't use all it's performance, it's not even running hard enough to get the fans to kick in. Then I change the resolution to Retina resolution, now it kicks in all of its performance, and fans, and I can go back to the 1440x900 resolution (where the game seems to perform the best). (And no leaving it in Retina resolution won't solve the issue)

    However this might not even be a problem with The Sims 4.
    I do play other games (totally weird), like F1 2013, Hitman Absolution and Tomb Raider 2013. All the games are ported by Feral Interactive. And they all have in common that they can't get all the power out of my Mac. They all lagg. But that is a problem that came with OS X Yosemite, on OS X Mavericks the games work fine.
    I have been in contact with Feral Interactive about it, and they can confirm there is issues with the GeForce GT 650M graphics card, and Apple are working on a fix. Feral Interactive thought it would be released in Yosemite 10.10.2, since it was in the beta of Yosemite. But for some reason it didn't make to the final release. Havn't heard from Feral Interactive since. Other than I have highlighted the issue.

    My graphics settings are:

    Graphics Quality - Custom
    Display Type - Full screen
    Resolution - 1440 x 900
    Vertical Sync - No
    Sims - High
    Objects - High
    Lighting - High
    Reflections - High
    Visual Effects - High
    Edge Smoothing - Medium
    3D Scene Resolution - Low
    View Distance - Low
    Uncompressed Sim Textures - No
    Post Processing Effects - No
    Laptop Mode - No

    Average FPS: 40

    The the computer in question:
    MacBook Pro Retina 15"
    Intel Core i7 2,4 Ghz, 8 GB Ram, GeForce GT 650M 1 GB, 256 GB SSD

    That's very interesting, thanks for that :) I haven't had any issues with my card..... yet!

    apple-signature.png
  • BluebellFloraBluebellFlora Posts: 7,110 Member
    @Jazzpuz - thank you :)
    apple-signature.png
  • BluebellFloraBluebellFlora Posts: 7,110 Member
    southaltan wrote: »
    > @BluebellFlora said:
    > Thanks southaltan. How's the game running? I'm sorry, I know you've been posting on other threads, you've probably already mentioned performance, and I've probably already responded but my brain's a bit fried at the moment! What's your fps too?

    well I tried it at those settings and it lagged horribly. So, i bumped it back to the Low-Medium settings then changed the sims to high and lighting to very high. Those settings are much better. Also, after a while the headphones (but settings are stereo) I am using start garbling. That was a good time to save and quit for a while.

    :)

    apple-signature.png
  • southaltansouthaltan Posts: 152 Member
    @bluebellflora I can't tell you about FP because I can't get the cheat bar to open. :/
  • Tremayne4260Tremayne4260 Posts: 3,126 Member
    CTRL + SHIFT + C
    Second Star to the Right and Straight on 'til Morning.
  • Candy810Candy810 Posts: 52 Member
    https://youtube.com/watch?v=D1IpOCVziSY

    I made a video of my gameplay and went through my settings. The game is working great for me! I used a free recording software so it looks a little fuzzy but that's not what it looks like in my game. Enjoy!
  • southaltansouthaltan Posts: 152 Member
    > @Tremayne4260 said:
    > CTRL + SHIFT + C

    That doesn't woek. I've tried it several times.
  • Tremayne4260Tremayne4260 Posts: 3,126 Member
    That is the standard command to open the Cheat window. Control (which is right under the Shift key) + Shift + the letter "C". You have to hold all three down at the same time. You did the exact same thing in Sims 3.
    Second Star to the Right and Straight on 'til Morning.
  • southaltansouthaltan Posts: 152 Member
    edited February 2015
    > @Tremayne4260 said:
    > That is the standard command to open the Cheat window. Control (which is right under the Shift key) + Shift + the letter "C". You have to hold all three down at the same time. You did the exact same thing in Sims 3.

    I know, I just restarted my macbook, so i'll try it when I open the game up again. For what its worth, I couldn't ever get the cheat window open on the sims 2 when i downloaded it from the app store a few months ago.

    i have a few screenshots why trying to open the cheat window.
  • GenevaGeneva Posts: 10 New Member
    > @Candy810 said:
    >
    >
    > I made a video of my gameplay and went through my settings. The game is working great for me! I used a free recording software so it looks a little fuzzy but that's not what it looks like in my game. Enjoy!

    The settings worked. Thanks!
    So happy I can play with high graphics now.
  • lissiealissiea Posts: 175 Member
    edited February 2015
    My game was choppy at 1920x1080 on high settings. It's fine after switching to the settings in @Candy810's video (thanks!). No lag even after playing for a few hours.

    Graphics card - AMD Radeon HD 6750M 512 MB
    Operating System - Mavericks OS X 10.9.5

    Now onto the graphics settings in game:

    Graphics Quality - Custom
    Display Type - Full
    Resolution - 1600 x 900
    Vertical Sync - No
    Sims - High
    Objects - High
    Lighting - High
    Reflections - High
    Visual Effects - High
    Edge Smoothing - Low
    3D Scene Resolution - High
    View Distance - High
    Uncompressed Sim Textures - No
    Post Processing Effects - Yes
    Laptop Mode - No

    FPS Live Mode: 20-35
    FPS Build Mode: 20-35
    Post edited by lissiea on
  • Candy810Candy810 Posts: 52 Member
    Glad I could help!
  • BluebellFloraBluebellFlora Posts: 7,110 Member
    Thanks everyone. If you're reading this and you haven't already posted your specs. please do so. You're really helping others if you do :)
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  • Simfan923Simfan923 Posts: 5,551 Member
    Graphics card - Intel HD 3000 512 MB
    Operating System -Yosemite 10.10.2

    Graphics Quality - Custom
    Display Type - Full
    Resolution - 1280 x 800
    Vertical Sync - No
    Sims - High
    Objects - High
    Lighting - High
    Reflections - High
    Visual Effects - High
    Edge Smoothing - Low
    3D Scene Resolution - High
    View Distance - High
    Uncompressed Sim Textures - No
    Post Processing Effects - Yes
    Laptop Mode - Yes

    FPS Live Mode: 20-30
    FPS Build Mode: 20-30

    Game runs fine. Other than the dark windows and 30-40 second loading screens. It's better than bootcamp.
    1FKDfKj.png
  • ChumchaChumcha Posts: 22 New Member
    edited February 2015
    I have the 2013 MBA 13"
    4 gb, 1.3 processor, HD 5000

    Resolution - 1440 x 900
    Vertical Sync - yes
    Sims - med
    Objects - med
    Lighting - low
    Reflections - low
    Visual Effects - med
    Edge Smoothing - off
    3D Scene Resolution - med
    View Distance - high
    Uncompressed Sim Textures - no
    Post Processing Effects - no
    Laptop Mode - no

    FPS Live Mode: 40-50's
    FPS Build Mode: 30-50's
  • conday884conday884 Posts: 19 New Member
    I'm running on OS X Yosemite with all settings on low, but 3D Scene Resolution on Medium and View Distance On High. I have 1.8 GHz Intel Core i5, 4 GB 1600 MHz DDR3, and Intel HD Graphics 4000 1024 MB. It runs very smoothly; however, there is a slight delay upon clicking something and the interactions popping up but nothing to bother me. Even though on low everything looks very nice with loading screen times ranging between 13 and 20 seconds. The only problem I have experienced is that windows are solid colored brown and then silver when zoomed out instead of clear glass... how do you fix this? Also how do you tilt the camera? Thanks all, and I hope I've helped some people with this, too!!!
  • lisamwittlisamwitt Posts: 5,078 Member
    edited February 2015
    Graphics card - Intel HD graphics 4000 & NVIDIA GEForce GT 650M
    Operating System - Yosemite 10.10.2

    Now onto the graphics settings in game:

    Graphics Quality - Custom
    Display Type - Windowed
    Resolution - 2560x1484
    Vertical Sync - No
    Sims - High
    Objects - High
    Lighting - High
    Reflections - High
    Visual Effects - High
    Edge Smoothing - Medium
    3D Scene Resolution - High
    View Distance - Low
    Uncompressed Sim Textures - No
    Post Processing Effects - No
    Laptop Mode - No


    FPS Live Mode: 50-55
    FPS Build Mode: 45-50

    How happy are you with the overall graphics performance. Are you experiencing any lag? I'm disappointed. They touted how it would run on low end machines. I have a decent machine. But, in fullscreen mode I have to have my settings all on low to play without significant lag. Now, in windowed mode I can play with most settings (but not all) on high and it plays pretty well. But it's disappointing that I have to play in windowed mode.

    And finally, if you were previously playing the game in Boot Camp (ONLY Boot Camp, not a separate PC or VM), how do the graphics compare:

    It played better in bootcamp. I had all my settings on high, fullscreen, no lag at all. If the playability doesn't improve for me, I may switch back to playing in bootcamp.

    Gallery ID: LadyGray01
  • BrownBlossomsBrownBlossoms Posts: 7 New Member
    Graphics card - NVIDIA GeForce GT 750M, 2GB GDDR5 memory (I have a late 2013 mbp retina 15" laptop with 512 GB space)
    Operating System - Yosemite 10.10.2

    Graphics Quality - Custom
    Display Type - Fullscreen
    Resolution - 1600 x1200
    Vertical Sync - No
    Sims - High
    Objects - High
    Lighting - High
    Reflections - High
    Visual Effects - High
    Edge Smoothing - High
    3D Scene Resolution - High
    View Distance - High
    Uncompressed Sim Textures - No
    Post Processing Effects - Yes
    Laptop Mode - No

    FPS Live Mode: 20-24
    FPS Build Mode: 11-12

    Okay, so judging by the above FPS and the horrible gameplay lag I'm experiencing, I'm wondering if my graphics card isn't kicking in here? I just...right now, I don't have a single clue why it's playing so horribly on the Mac side for me.

    However, here are my Bootcamp specs:

    Graphics Quality - Custom
    Display Type - Fullscreen
    Resolution - 1920 x 1200
    Refresh Rate: 60
    Vertical Sync - No
    Sims - High
    Objects - High
    Lighting - High
    Reflections - High
    Visual Effects - High
    Edge Smoothing - High
    3D Scene Resolution - High
    View Distance - High
    Uncompressed Sim Textures - No
    Post Processing Effects - Yes
    Laptop Mode - No


    FPS Live Mode: 40-50
    FPS Build Mode: 30-40

    Gameplay is MUCH smoother on Bootcamp for me.
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