Bad Performance since Update on Big Sur

Mac Technical Support
41

So you advocate it not being wise to update your OS - ever, apparently. While out here in the real world we update our OS’s to take advantage of the latest security updates (among other things) that are very positive.

Look, this isn’t difficult. Apple is not to blame if third-party software doesn’t run correctly. For crying out loud - Apple telegraphs where the puck is going to go nearly eighteen months ahead of time. The Big Sur beta has been available to everyone with a developer account for nearly a year.

There simply is nobody else to blame, logically or any other way short of crafting an insane delusion. Blizzard/Activision is a huge corporation with gobs of assets. If they gave a single rip about their customers, Diablo III would have been working perfectly the day Big Sur was released in final form to the public.

It’s a very simple business decision - support your product, or kill it off. Blizzard wasn’t caught off guard by the release of Big Sur, they just went cheap as they always do. That’s a decision they should be held accountable for, by their customers. Give us what you promise, Blizzard, or totally end support. Period. That is a decision that can never be laid at the feet of Apple.

8 Likes
42

Yeah I totally agree. These issues should not be occurring but sadly the Diablo 3 community pays no money like a monthly subscription and the company has already made their money off of our game purchase. There are so few players remaining on this platform that I just don’t think they care to fix or correct these issues.

4 Likes
43

Seriously?

As I have already posted, Blizzard/Activision had ample time to ensure ALL of their Mac software functioned perfectly under Big Sur. There are literally thousands of developers that do not have the billions of dollars of assets of Blizzard/Activision that managed - somehow - to make their software 100% Big Sur compatible. Blizzard/Activision literally has no excuse when others are showing it is possible.

Despite this vicious pack of facts, Blizzard/Activision wants me to compensate for laziness/apathy/incompetence and work to make my system compatible with their software? That will be the day.

Look, it’s like I also said - support Diablo III fully as promised, or kill it off. Just stop making excuses or expecting us to do your heavy lifting.

Fix. The. Software.

4 Likes
44

Looks like they left this game dead in the water. You rarely see any customer support on these forums anymore. And if they do show up it will just say something like update your OS (when there are zero updates available). Shouldn’t the game be updated/patched to fix these problems? Obviously not an Apple Issue as this problems exists across different OSs.

3 Likes
45

I agree.

The problem is Blizzard/Activision still actively sells copies of Diablo III. That’s fine as far as it goes, but to promise support and to not deliver it is to perpetrate a fraud. I can’t imagine for the life of me why the Attorney Generals of the various States haven’t gone after Blizzard/Activision for that fraud. It would be a slam dunk case.

  1. Buy a copy.
  2. Install it.
  3. Update to Big Sur.
  4. Try and fail to obtain tech support.
  5. BONUS POINTS : discover tech support consists of telling you to update YOUR computer because the problem isn’t widespread.

It should be as easy as falling off a chair to win that case.

Again, to Blizzard/Activision I say : Fix. The. Software.

3 Likes
46

Its not Big Sur or graphics per say, its very high latency with graphical icons representing your stash, or the blacksmith that is occurring. In otherwords the way the Mac I/O with the games database is occurring.
Originally I did not notice it being as slow with non-season as seasonal, with betas of Big Sur. But remember a lot of us were slighted by Blizzard where we couldn’t even play 2.6.10 PTR. Afterwards I just kinda tried it in the working PTR, didn’t notice the extreme slowdown of inventory database in town. Now it seems that 11.0.1 and 11.1 b2 are exhibiting some really high latency of this games data base independent of whether you are solo or group. That is unique, it not like when you are playing rifts or GR’s, it when you come to town and everything is slow on the host talking to your game client.

47

I see different behavior. Even before I start a game session, the animation of my character on the start screen is noticeably poor quality. When I play a game, the fps is noticeably slow in town as well as out on bounties or whatever. It is difficult for me to pick up a dropped item when on the move. I set max fps to 30 (down from default 60 pre-Big Sur) which helps some but not a lot. For me, I don’t notice much latency in viewing inventory, blacksmith lists or actions, etc.

2 Likes
48

Frequently I see when looking at the stash or blacksmith, menu items don’t show and inventory is just blank until something catches up. This in town not playing anything FPS to weight the game down, go figure.

1 Like
49

I gave up. In my opinion, the game should be played from Windows operating system. So, I have been playing it using Boot Camp.

50

Came here after seeing how poorly d3 runs on my late 2013 15 inch retina mbp…

Unplayable unless it’s potato resolution

If I have to switch to windows for that It kinda defeats the purpose

Sad that in 2020 it’s still not possible to play simple games on Mac, I remember even back in 2014 i struggled

Oh well

51

Same story. Performance was fine, then I upgraded to Big Sur. Character textures on pre join screen seem garbage expect for items an pets which look good? In game performance is terrible.

Model Name: MacBook Pro
Model Identifier: MacBookPro16,1
Processor Name: 8-Core Intel Core i9
Processor Speed: 2.3 GHz
Number of Processors: 1
Total Number of Cores: 8
L2 Cache (per Core): 256 KB
L3 Cache: 16 MB
Hyper-Threading Technology: Enabled
Memory: 32 GB
System Firmware Version: 1554.50.3.0.0 (iBridge: 18.16.12561.0.0,0)
Serial Number (system): C02C61XCMD6T
Hardware UUID: 63752D08-8D37-5CF4-B828-0317F83AF308
Provisioning UDID: 63752D08-8D37-5CF4-B828-0317F83AF308
Activation Lock Status: Enabled

Only interesting logs are:

Nov 30 09:43:40 Yavin Diablo III[24805]: getattrlist failed for /System/Library/Extensions/AppleIntelKBLGraphicsGLDriver.bundle/Contents/MacOS/AppleIntelKBLGraphicsGLDriver: #2: No such file or directory
Nov 30 09:43:40 Yavin Diablo III[24805]: getattrlist failed for /Library/GPUBundles/AMDRadeonX6000GLDriver.bundle/Contents/MacOS/ATIRadeonX6000SCLib.dylib: #2: No such file or directory
Nov 30 09:43:40 Yavin Diablo III[24805]: getattrlist failed for /System/Library/Extensions/AMDRadeonX6000GLDriver.bundle/Contents/MacOS/ATIRadeonX6000SCLib.dylib: #2: No such file or directory
Nov 30 09:43:40 Yavin Diablo III[24805]: getattrlist failed for /System/Library/Frameworks/OpenGL.framework/Resources//GLRendererFloat.bundle/GLRendererFloat: #2: No such file or directory

1 Like
52

Just tried on bootcamp and it runs perfectly in 1920x1080 with graphics on high, while on Big Sur it struggles at anything higher than 1440x900 with low/disabled graphics… Even this way, it’s barely playable.

Either it stutters, drops frames, or i just literally have 10 fps

Incredible

53

As a counterpoint, I must be one of the few whose performance under Big Sur seems to have actually improved. I’m running at 2560x1440 on a 2018 15" MBP running Big Sur, with all settings on high, and I’m seeing framerates in the 90-100 range.

Three things to note:

  • I’m running the game on an external 4k display, and the game’s app is set to open in low resolution (to match the ambient scaled resolution i have set for that screen)
  • I’m using an eGPU (BlackMagic), and the game’s app is set to prefer the external gpu
  • I’m using a wired logitech G502 mouse, and have updated the logitech gaming software and drivers post-OS upgrade

I’m wondering if the third is the real key. In Activity Monitor, does anything stand out as using too much CPU? I’m specifically wondering if it’s drivers for high-refresh gaming mice that are one of the roots of the problem.

My second thought is that it’s perhaps Radeon drivers for some of the mobile GPUs that are at fault.

One other final thought: I run in Fullscreen (Windowed) mode.

54

Same here, DIII on Big Sur is notplayable, even on the start screen where I choose my character the animations (breathing and leafs fallen down) are lagging brutally. But I have noticed something weird: I got two screens, and when I switch with the mouse to the second screen, the animations of my characters are fine. Switching back to the main screen (running DIII in fullscreen window mode), the problems appear again.

55

What kind of mouse are you using?

56

Update to my post above, after reading otab’s post. I tried switching to Fullscreen (windowed) mode instead of regular fullscreen, even though the game warned that performance could suffer. The game was right! I could barely use the cursor, even on the menu screen.

I set it back to fullscreen and then tried a reduced resolution, half of normal (2560x1440 vs normal 5120x2880) and wow, performance and playability is restored! And I went back to my normal 60fps setting instead of the 30 I’d had to drop to at normal resolution, and the game looks gorgeous, everything is smooth, and it’s playable again. Half resolution is disappointing, but it’s sure good enough for now.

I hope the problem is identified and patched soon, but at least I can play again.

4 Likes
57

Actually no mouse. I use the Apple trackpad and a Wacom tablet.

58

As a counterpoint to your counterpoint, you cannot be taken seriously as you are not running a stock Mac system.

You say the external display is 4K? Well, I am running a native 5K display on an iMac, with no sort of external GPU. I say try unhooking EVERYTHING from your system - the eGPU, the display, everything USB, EVERY connection - then try running D3 again and tell us what happens.

Until then, you have such a niche system nothing you say is of value to everyone at large except that Blizzard/Activision has done such a crappy job of programming one has to throw 1.5 video cards at the problem to get it to work! I am betting you will join us mere mortals and won’t be reporting how great DIII runs once you have a bone-stock Mac system.

59

@StudBeefpile, that’s a fair response, and worth testing, so I did.

I unplugged everything, and ran the game with nothing but my power brick and my Logitech G502 mouse attached. I ran the game with “Open in Low Resolution” checked in the Finder, and the laptop screen set to “Default for display” in the Displays preferences.

I left all settings the same as I’d had them when running on the eGPU, and the game auto-set the resolution to 1680x1050, Fullscreen. (which is the retina-emulated resolution of the 15" MBP screen in default for display mode)

Sitting in town (in Act 5), the frame rate was in the 90s. I ran a rift, which dropped me into the Graveyard map, and the built-in frame rate meter never dipped below 70. It was often in the 90s. Perfectly playable.

Sorry to disappoint you, but your assumption is invalid and for me the game runs just fine with this system info, bone-stock:

|Model Name:|MacBook Pro|
|OS Version|macOS Big Sur 11.0.1|
| Model Identifier:|MacBookPro15,1|
| Processor Name:|6-Core Intel Core i9|
| Processor Speed:|2.9 GHz|
| Number of Processors:|1|
| Total Number of Cores:|6|
| L2 Cache (per Core):|256 KB|
| L3 Cache:|12 MB|
| Hyper-Threading Technology:|Enabled|
| Memory:|32 GB|
| System Firmware Version:|1554.50.3.0.0 (iBridge: 18.16.12561.0.0,0)|
| Activation Lock Status:|Enabled|

One thing I’m very curious about here is what kind of mouse people are using who are experiencing awful framerates. I run a Logitech wired gaming mouse. I’m wondering if others are maybe running something from Razer? Or maybe running a wireless mouse?

I’ve experienced problems with framerates in D3 in conjunction with Razer software before. I’ve also had problems when running a wireless mouse.

Another thing I’d suggest trying is to check the “Open in Low Resolution” checkbox in the app’s Get Info dialog, from the Finder. I’ve found that helps, as it moves Retina display resolution scaling out of the game’s area of responsibility, and gives it to the OS instead.

Please note: I’m not trying to be confrontational here. I’m trying to figure out what’s different between how I’m running the game and seeing acceptable frame rates and others who are not.

Believe me, I have my share of frustrations with the game right now. For me, the game disconnects with a 1016 error randomly every 3-30 minutes, which is insanely frustrating when trying to do anything that requires time, such as the Boss Mode conquest.

60

Hmm… Well, that throws the theory that it might be a Razer software issue out the window :slight_smile:

Have you tried disconnecting the tablet?

Have you tried setting the game app to open in low resolution, via the Finder? I’ve noticed over the years that makes a huge difference for me.