Rob from Bare Feats

TMG: I spoke to Apple PR about arranging an interview with someone about games for the Mac. Unfortunately they understood this as iPhone and iPod games. Repeated attempts to arrange an interview with someone at Apple about games for the Mac has got me nowhere. Gaming in my eyes is fast becoming a medium that could rival film in terms of emotional response and entertainment, but Apple just isn’t interested.

Rob: I think the Mac could be a gaming platform. I’m as frustrated as you are with their perception of gaming as something not worthy of their attention. I think part of the problem is Apple’s identity. They fought for so long to be taken seriously. I think they feel that as long as they stay away from games, they’d be taken seriously. 

What’s happening now, with OpenCL, is that they’re going to the GPU for more processing power. Take for instance the San Diego Supercomputer Center guys I know. Recently they were getting ready to buy some computers and they wanted me to come and help them do some testing. The thing is, they wanted to test with were games! I asked them why they wanted to test with games to test for 3D visualisation. They said that all of the code they use for scientific visualisation is pixel based, not vector based. They use OpenGL and they use all the things that games use. They wanted a computer that ran games quickly and then they would program in Java 3D (or whatever language they use), and they’d use all that technology that’s gone into making 3D accelerated games, to make their programs faster. Even they see that there is a connection between professional graphics and computation and what goes on in the game world.

What Apple is saying now is that they’re going to utilise all this power that gamers have been using to make other things go faster. I know ATI engineers are working very hard to get things working for Snow Leopard. But up until now, Apple have resisted support of CrossFire and SLI. I’m not sure why, as this will directly benefit performance.

TMG: I went down to London for a NVIDIA press release just after the MacBook’s were updated. I was speaking to Rene Haas and I asked if the Mac Pro’s will use the NVIDIA chipset. He wouldn’t tell me, but he gave me a little smile and said “wait and see”. Are they going to go fully NVIDIA? Doesn’t Leopard use huge amounts of CUDA?

Rob: No. ATI and NVIDIA both have their own proprietary programming languages for GPUs. Apple developed and proposed a standard called OpenCL and donated its specification to the Khronos Group, an industry association leading many of the standards for 3D graphics on personal computers.  Then they got AMD, Intel, ARM, IBM and Nokia to sign on as backers of this open standard. The only group they haven’t got is Microsoft. They’re off doing their own thing as usual!

TMG: [laughs]

Rob: They’re trying to develop something called ”Accelerator” or something like that. 

TMG: Why will they not learn that going open source and increasing interoperability is a good thing and will result in you selling more and being more future proof!

Rob: What’s really interesting is that there seems to be convergence here. Even if Microsoft doesn’t come along with this, people who have signed on don’t really care. Apple is interested in developing for the iPhone and for it to have greater capabilities. The GPU is ten times more power efficient than a main CPU. I feel they’ll be able to do more with the iPhone in the future if they work with the OpenCL standard. That includes people like ARM and Nokia. 

Then you have Adobe who is adding 3D capabilities to Photoshop and starting to utilise the power in the GPU to speed up certain filters and functions. Apple are already starting to use the GPU with Aperture and Motion. It’s like they’re getting dragged into it kicking and screaming and the games developers are all chuckling to themselves because it’s finally come full circle. All these guys developing 3D processors are now the cutting edge of processing.

TMG: In some ways, the Mac will be ahead of the PC with Snow Leopard (if they manage to effectively implement OpenCL). All these things are great, but if Apple still doesn’t get games as John Carmack stated this year, it won’t change anything. I don’t know if you get this, but when you speak to people about Macs they think they’re these wonderful machines just for creative people. I always respond that yes, they are – but they’re also good just as a computer. I don’t consider myself a creative professional. I didn’t buy my Mac because I wanted to be ‘creative’, I bought it because it has a great OS and it never crashes. It’s frustrating to see that the view is still that Macs are for creative people and no one else. I’d argue that if you compare a PC to a Mac in terms of ‘creativity’, there’s not much between them. Certainly Adobe Creative Suite runs faster on a Windows machines – so what the hell is more creative about a Mac?

Rob: That’s basically an urban legend that has lived on long past it’s usefulness. It’s right up there with Macs are more expensive than PCs. If you spec a PC the same as a Mac, they’re about the same.

TMG: So the image of Apple sadly still gets in the way of progress. Apple themselves seem so preoccupied with image that sometimes this gets in the way of content. If they explained practices or tried to give a picture of things to come, maybe it would be better. There’s certainly no strategy for games, or if there is, they won’t tell me about it!

Rob: I love Apple products. They do a great job. But there’s a certain arrogance that Apple has that has trickles down to all of their employees. It doesn’t serve them well. A little transparency would be nice, but I’ve never seen any of it.

TMG: The thing that is different about Macs is that they don’t have the range that PCs have. It’s another problem with games adoption on OSX. Some people spend £2000 on a gaming machine, others spend £500. You can’t get a Mac that’ll game for £500. There’s just not the range. If you’ll pay £2000, you’ll get a Mac Pro – but then it’s not the best gaming platform. The FB-Dimms, the lack of newer graphics card.

Rob: A Mini Pro. Two slots. We don’t need nine fans and two optical drives. All we want to do is upgrade processor, RAM, GPU. Apple doesn’t want to do that. I guess they’re making enough money!

TMG: [laughs] What’s the best card for gaming on Mac OS X in your opinion?

Rob: The GeForce 8800GT. In my experience, the games run faster with very few exceptions. I’ve talked to ATI about this and they’re trying to close the gap with the HD3870. They have closed the gap on certain games like CoD4 and ET:QW.

TMG: I did some testing on 10.5.4 (we’re now on 10.5.5) with the 8800GT and HD3870. It wasn’t particularly scientific, just me keeping an eye on the FPS counter, getting an idea of the overall performance, whether there was glitching, lag, slowdown, etc. In Ciderized games, the HD3870 was better. Often by around 50%.

Rob: When I ran ET:QW the 8800GT was faster by 20%. Prey was 10%. Halo about the same. Quake 4, the 8800GT was almost 50% faster. World of Warcraft, the HD3870 was faster. It depends on the game. Each game uses a different engine and has a different approach. Prey is the Doom engine, which is different from Halo, which is different from World of Warcraft.

TMG: Of course if you want the best card for OS X and Windows, it’s another story! Probably the 8800GT?

Rob: No. I say the Radeon HD 3870 “Mac & PC Edition” because you can install two of them and run them in CrossFire mode under Windows. Hopefully, when the next generation of Mac Pros are released, along with Snow Leopard, you’ll be able to run ATI’s CrossFire mode under both Mac OS X and Windows. NOTE: NVIDIA’s SLI mode does NOT work on the Mac Pro under Windows because it “looks” at the motherboard and says, “this is not an SLI enabled board.”

For more information on the HD3870, take a peek at ATI’s product page. For an depth look at benchmarks for Mac games and creative apps, look no further than Bare Feats!