In the end everyone can run the game how they wish, so happy you found the solution for you.

kristofferstrutzenblad16_ESO wrote: »

So, after consulting with Apple support I decided to get me a copy of Windows.

I would love to see the advice from Apple support that advised you to play ESO via Bootcamp and buy Windows to do so.

It's as simple as that. I've had big problems with my iMac 27" (3.5GHz i7, 16GB Ram, Nvidia 780M, 256 SSD) and this game. My FPS was terrible. When I changed my settings to lowest my FPS would rise up to as much as 70. But what I saw on the screen was something else. It felt like less than 20 FPS.

I installed it thru Bootcamp and now the game runs like a charm. I have between 45-65 FPS (true FPS). I can hardly spot any difference when I have 45 or 65 FPS now. It's amazing. And the best of all - I can run it at ultra settings with AA turned ON!

So, my advice simply is: Install Windows on your Mac to get a greater game experience!

I wish I didn't have to do it since I bought a Mac to get away from crappy Windows. But here I am playing the game thru the OS which I hated so much just a couple of weeks ago

As I said to you previously there was something wrong for you to have such low FPS. Turning off Vsync is the obvious thing as it limits FPS via double buffering so you will always get capped and not see the true potential. But if you switch that off then there is something else wrong.

The FPS you state are just the same for me as I get in the Mac ESO client with the same iMac so happily I wont need to play via Bootcamp, even though I have had it installed for months to test the PC client to compare and play beta before the Mac client came to beta.

If you read McRumours then you would have seen that I posted benchmarks between the two running on the same iMac with Windows 7 via Bootcamp. They also include like benchmarking with standard tool via Unigine Heaven which shows, there is little realtime difference between the two with their default graphic API. And the results in Mac & PC client again via their native API was similar also. This was in tests where the CPU was not maxed to avoid bottlenecking. You can still check those those on this Benchmarking thread.

Things like visuals and performance etc. are very subjective things and what works for one does not necessarily work for others. Thats why I prefer to get as even a comparison as possible to judge. The comparison was not like for like as OpenGL and D3D11 are different etc. But they do give an idea of the player that compares the two on the same setup.

There are other reasons why a player may play via Bootcamp such as the memory crash currently but this will get resolved.Some other minor issues remain but overall the Mac client is otherwise really comparable to the Pc client in performance on the same hardware.

You will always tend to get some better performance because the game will be more optimised for DirectX and graphics drivers are more up to date (no thanks to Apple). And that reflects as we know the much smaller market share that Macs have. But when a client is made native, it really makes the difference in performance and there just isn't the big differences between them.

I do like Bootcamp as is gives me the route to play games that are not ported to Mac, though I can see more games that will get ported in the future and will always support them when available, provided they give me decent game play. That's personal preference.

I'm glad you found a solution that works for you. I'm happy to be able to play this game with Ultra-High settings in native 2560 x 1440 and be happy to have comparable performance to a PC player but without having to live with Windows.

For anyone considering how it may be I urge them to check all reports and the benchmarks to get a good overview. The only thing really holding the Mac client back right now is the memory issue which is being worked on and allows me to play 2-3-4 hours without needing to reboot even now. When it's 64-bit that wont even be a factor.

I saw TESO working on MacBook '11 on both OS X and Windows 8.1. Both had VSYNC off. I wouldn't say that performance differs. What differs is no PvP crashes on Windows.

I think original poster had VSYNC turned on in fullscreen mode, which destroyed performance. On OS X you can make VSYNC behave nicely only in windowed mode, not fullscreen.

No, I've tried everything in order to not have to get a copy of Windows since I bought a Mac just to get away from Windows. So I'm not happy that I have to play via Windows.

I tried everything, I tried windowed mode (which helped, a little), I tried the thing where one went in to the folder and changed some numbers (which helped, a little), I turned off VSYNC, I turned all the settings down to minimun. But I couldn't get the game to run as smooth as I knew it should. And yes, things may be subjective. But it wasn't just me trying this out. I had a bunch of friends who wanted to try the game, all said the same "How can the FPS show that figure and still look this bad?".

I wouldn't recommend a PC. I bought a Mac since I was tired of Windows and all the problems I've had with my last laptop and PC. I'm very satisfied with my Mac and OS X. The problem is that I can't play a game on OS X just because. I want to get the full experience of a game and that includes the graphics. So, there is a BIG difference between running the game on OS X and Windows. I don't care what the test says, and even though it may be a subjective thing, there is nothing wrong with my eyes, nor my friends eyes.

Running the game on lowes settings with as much as possible turned off (in windowed mode) or on full with everything turned on (not windowed) and the latter still runs better than the first. I can't call that subjective. That's a fact!

And, I didn't run it thru Windows 8. I ran it thru Windows 7. Don't know if that matters but just wanted to clear that out.

kristofferstrutzenblad16_ESO wrote: »

And btw, Moonraker, support said to me: I don't know if it's much of a comfort but you could get Windows and try to run the game thru it. That is what I had to do, since I play Sims and Sims didn't run well thru OS X I had to install Windows in order to have it run properly. So, I don't get why they shouldn't recommend Windows? They have bootcamp so one could install Windows and even talk about how to install Windows on their webpage. Why would it be so far off for the support to recommend such thing? They are very aware of the problems the OS X has with some games etc.

If you talk about a game like the Sims 3 which has well know issues with really poor Cider port and support (from my own experience and from many players posting to the official forums, see links in link above) then perhaps they will suggest it as a last resort.

ESO could not be further apart from that, with a native Mac client, developed within the ZOS development team over four years. And I would be amazed if any Apple support with any knowledge of this game would suggest that, unless they just see it as some last resort, which is just not the case with the ESO Mac client for performance related problems.

As pointed out above, I can understand why some players would turn to Bootcamp in order to play PvP big battles while there is the current memory issue. Everyone can play it as they like. Once the issue gets addressed and over time we get the 64-bit client it wont be an issue. Other than the memory issue, there are no other major issues with it. Some cosmetic things, a few functionality bugs to fix and/ or change which is understandable in a client that is still in the first weeks of a game release.

If I was talking to Apple support I would want to know just why my iMac is performing in the way it is when others report it is working fine performance wise and have actual benchmarks to reference. Any computer can have hardware issues, partial errors, or just any number of potential issues that may lead to this.

I would also want to know how they would recommend Bootcamp as a solution when a game has just launched and that the real place to pose the game play question is with the developer once the player as endeavoured to ensure their is nothing wrong at their end. Any new game, especially an MMO is going to experience some problems during launch. And any decent support person would acknowledge that.

kristofferstrutzenblad16_ESO wrote: »

I don't like Windows, and it's annoying to reboot every time I want to play or do thing in OS X.

I actually did that (i.e. booting into Windows 7 64-bit on a Boot Camp partition) for three years on my current iMac's predecessor (mid 2010, 27" Nehalem Core i5 2,8 GHz), in order to play LOTRO. Yes, Turbine released a Mac client eventually, but it was so broken that any semblance of continuous play was illusional. It never worked for me. So I continued playing LOTRO on Windows Boot Camp, until I finally stopped (for other reasons that don't belong here). I didn't love it.

I have to work with (not just on) Windows every day, so I switched to the Mac and OS X at home 7 years ago, just to get some relief in my own private time. It's always been and still is a tedious effort to maintain a Windows installation, and I've been working with Windows since 3.10. Yes, of course things have changed a lot since back then, but the necessities of keeping a Windows installation in a running condition over a any stretch of time haven't changed much. Driver and program updates aside, Windows is still perfectly capable to shoot itself in the foot. (N.B.: I like GNU/Linux so much, because of the freedom to shoot it in the foot any way I want to) So I decided long ago that if I have to put up with it, I might at least get paid for it, and so I did. Nobody pays me to maintain Boot Camp (or would you? ).

I have nothing against using Windows inside of VMs on OS X, in fact I have several for different purposes, and they're a blast to work with, because snapshots. But I shun the fact of having to reboot the machine just to be able to play. It's horrible, clumsy, and entails more work (see above) than there needs to be.

Again, I recommend anyone who feel they may be in the same situation that I was in, or even want to try getting a better experience of the game - install Windows. Just try it if you have a copy laying around. It's totaly worth it. And I don't care what the test says, the reality speaks for itself.

Personally I'm glad that ZOS decided to support OS X. It was a strong incentive for me to try to get into beta, and I even passed up the opportunity to play at an earlier date, just to wait for the Mac client, which wasn't released at that time. If ZOS would announce tomorrow that Mac support was canceled, and the client discontinued, I would first appeal, and if they wouldn't relent, I'd cancel my sub. There are other fish in the pond with excellent support of OS X.

It's not that I'm not able to install Windows in Boot Camp, it wouldn't even cost me that much (or anything, that is, thanks to MSDN). It's just the fact that I simply don't want to anymore, not for just playing a game.

I'm not particularly impressed with the parent poster's "solution".

For some it's no big deal dual-booting into windows to play a game; for others like myself however, it's a major disruption. Frequently i'll have to spend a good portion of time patching windows/antivirus/other stuff and have too reboot at least twice to be able to play the game... and then boot back into OSX to do everything else.

And, to be frank, a major reason for investing in this game (and it is an investment as it's one of the most expensive MMO's out there) was that i could play the game natively in OSX. I probably would have skipped this altogether otherwise. The MMO market on the PC is hugely competitive and there are many new franchises on the horizon, such as Wildstar - if i was going to just buy a PC game i'd have given this one a miss.

I'm glad i invested in this game however - both because i'm enjoying it immensely and because very few MMOs that i've come across that offer a native OSX client and i'm ecstatic that ZOS is supporting this platform, even if the client has some teething problems.

I'm also quite mystified at the parent poster's frame rate problems; i'm running this on a 2009 macbook pro and am getting frame rates of >35 fps (many graphics options turned down of course). I can't see how a relatively new 27 inch iMac sporting an i7 processor is performing worse than my asthmatic laptop! I suspect there's a problem with his setup - perhaps a clean install would help?

kristofferstrutzenblad16_ESO wrote: »

Install Windows!

Troll post is trolling.