Mac OS X Steam Performance: Half Life 2 Episode 2, Still Slower than Windows
by Anand Lal Shimpi on June 4, 2010 2:04 PM ESTImage Quality: Still Foggy
As Ryan pointed out in his more timely piece, image quality under OS X is noticeably worse than under Windows.
The Mac screen shots are foggier for some reason and despite the fix that was applied to Portal, Half Life 2 Episode 2 appears to have worse texture filtering quality under OS X than Windows. This is more pronounced of a difference than what we saw under Portal.
Half Life 2 Episode 2 - Windows 7 - Click to Enlarge
Half Life 2 Episode 2 - OS X - Click to Enlarge
It looks like something is wrong with the AF setting, reverting to Trilinear filtering confirms my suspicion:
Half Life 2 Episode 2 - OS X - Trilinear Filtering - Click to Enlarge
But AF isn’t completely disabled. Using the Windows version for comparison it looks like Half Life 2 Episode 2 just forces 4X AF regardless of what you set the texture filtering option to:
Windows 7 4X AF
OS X 16X AF
The sky and muted colors are still a problem and I can’t seem to find out the cause of that one. There’s some texture banding off in the distance in the sky that’s only visible in the OS X version.
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Flunk - Saturday, June 5, 2010 - link
Yes, everyone knows that Mac OS X is based on OpenStep.Well, actually a lot of people don't know that. You don't need to be a jerk about it.
sprockkets - Saturday, June 5, 2010 - link
openstep is an API, OSX is built on a Mach BSD kernel, and not on the microkernel version of it.overzealot - Sunday, June 6, 2010 - link
You're both correct, and in no way contradicting each other. Can't we all just get along?vol7ron - Sunday, June 6, 2010 - link
You did not read what I wrote. I said "like any linux-based OS", I did not say it was, but I do not deny that it's roots have Linux/Unix foundations, afterall OS X is POSIX compliant. This article was about gaming performance. The point I was making was that Windows and Apple both have their strengths and client base, but when it comes to gaming, Windows is still the preferred platform for the majority of gamers. Regarding the advocation statement that you made, I don't care about the OS argument. I'm non-biased, so long as it is secure and does what I need it to do. If your OS makes you happy, that's good. If you can persuade me to switch, or use one over another, I'll thank you. I make use of VMWare and what I can say is I like competition. I urge the many vendors to put out a competitive, high-quality product. vol7ronScali - Sunday, June 6, 2010 - link
If you want a UNIX shell on Windows, there's various options, such as Cygwin and msys.thomaslangston - Monday, June 7, 2010 - link
I'll get my UNIX shell via Putty.muhahaaha - Tuesday, June 8, 2010 - link
get your ugly face off my browser screen doucheScali - Wednesday, June 9, 2010 - link
Not the same thing, is it?You'd get a shell on the UNIX machine, not on your Windows machine.
Which doesn't do you much good if it's the Windows machine you want to be running commands on.
SSSnail - Tuesday, June 8, 2010 - link
three words: PuTTy.Try to justify moar harder pls. LoL.
Phynaz - Friday, June 4, 2010 - link
Fell better now?I know I shouldn't be, but I'm still amazed by people that have such low self esteem as to be threatened by the existence of a Macintosh computer.