MacOS 14.4.1, Intel i9, 64 GB RAM
You guys destroyed the performance of WoW on my Mac. I’m getting 14 fps in graphics mode 4.
Ridiculous!
season 4 didn’t change anything over season 3, like at all. we’ve been on 10.2.6 for weeks. So if something changed today, it’s likely with your system, or just fact a lot more players are logging in again.
you also give no information about which mac model or gpu you have
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Sadly, I am also suffering from terrible lag. I am on graphics setting 1 and still having issues. I can trace my issues to my device, I think.
I’m rocking a 2018 MacBook Pro (Intel) with 16GB DDR4. My internal card is a Radeon Pro 560X 4 GB. I’m sure Sonoma isn’t helping the issue.
I’ve been delaying the inevitable… time for a new laptop for many other reasons but it may be WoW that pushes me over the edge as the game is almost unplayable right now.
Omegal, you have helped me out in the past with recommendations about my power supply which addressed the issue at the time. After Sonoma, things only got worse, which was anticipated albeit annoying. If you have any new insight, I would love to hear it. Thanks for being a Mac WoW warrior.
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If you are in need of new laptop, you wouldn’t be disappointed with an M3 pro or max, a base M3 probably wouldn’t feel adequate for gaming or pro work.
But also important to ask why you use a mac, I will say that if gaming is your ONLY purpose, you may be better served in value to get a gaming desktop pc. If it has to be a laptop though, personally i think apple builds better laptops for both power and power consumption, though but you pay heavily for it.
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Right of the bat let me tell you that I am a techie. I’m my own tech support. Second, NOTHING changed at all in my system. I’m meticulous about keeping track of variables. My graphics card is a Radeon RX Vega 56 8 GB which functioned PERFECTLY before the patch. Thus let’s look at what changed: The patch!
There was no patch. the only thing that changed yesterday was they flipped a switch and enabled season 4. we’ve been on this patch for weeks. Like I said maybe it’s just cause a lot more players are around compared to previous weeks since people had less reason to actually login. More populated cities tend to be rough on cpu in wows engine.
we also still don’t know your CPU, Ie what year your mac is. that’s probably biggest component for wow to be honest. cpu matters more than gpu when it comes to raids, and cities.
Right. A switch to activate the changes to the software.
Yeah, I use my Mac for writing and thought about picking up a MacBook Air. My entire ecosystem is Apple and I love how all my devices work together. Plus, I used to work for Apple so I still have the Kool-Aid flowing through my veins. Haha.
I really only play WoW, and plan on playing TWW so I figured if I invested a bit more into an M3 Pro MacBook Pro then I could kill two birds with one stone. How has your experience been with your Mac? What do you use and how does it run? Again, thanks in advance for your guidance.
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Like you, the only game I play on my Mac is WoW. But I feel that with the acquisition of Blizzard/Activision, Microsoft I going to sabotage Mac development again (i.e. Office for Mac).
It’s already obvious by the exclusion of the MacOS platform for Diablo IV.
I’m an artist and use my system do edit photos and the occasional video. But I am not happy at all with the Intel processor and hope to pick up an M4 or M5 system when they are out and I have the cash. My wife has a MacBook Air (forgot which M chip) that screams.
Microsoft has nothing to do with no diablo 4, or fact mac quality is slipping. Mac has been deprioritized for years now, long before that acquisition. it’s not likely MS is gonna change it though, but they can’t be blamed for it since activision gutted mac support ages ago
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I have noticed increasing problems with lag spikes over the past while. MUCH worse since the patch. Can’t tell if it’s the game or the mac tbh - I suspect it’s wow as I don’t get this anywhere else.
Still working fine here too (M2 Max).
I’m on a M2 MBP and WoW works fine. Sometimes the PTR doesn’t work. and if I install/launch the PTR, the “Gaming Mode” notification will keep using the test icon instead of the retail WoW icon when I launch retail, but that is a cosmetic issue.
But then I have 32GB of RAM, and I know a lot of folks scrimp on RAM. Personally, I would rather swim in RAM and have that buffer, but that’s me.
My recommendation is that folks first check their ISP and make sure they are not being throttled. Then I would check add-ons. there is an add-on called “WarmUp” that when run will show you your add-on load. You can also use /console SET worldPreloadNonCritical 0 to help reduce loading screen lag (thanks to Bellular for this).
What we did find, running through H-Fyrrak a few weeks ago, and later in Vault, that a fair number of people were hitting heavy lag spikes, and some were outright disconnecting regardless of platform. For Fyrrak, we fixed this by splitting the team down from 30 to 2 15-20s (some folks ran twice) and that fixed the lag.
Going way back to Wrath days, things that ping other people (like the old ilevel add-on) or are otherwise chatty will increase the chances of lag, especially when in larger groups with others who also are running similar, chatty addons. Addons like WeakAuras and ElvUI also add a heavy load to the game.
To the point of lack of development for Mac and Microsoft’s role - IIRC, Microsoft fired the Blizzard team responsible for maintaining all the libraries, including the Mac libraries. Prior to that, my unofficial understanding was that there was no plan to deprecate any platform, just no plan to include the Mac for new games. While it is prudent to worry about Microsoft’s decision to continue to support Mac for Blizzard games, it is also in Microsoft’s best interest to continue to offer WoW on the Mac since regulatory agencies are still keeping a firm eye on Microsoft and it’s potential monopoly in the gaming market. Coupled with Apple’s efforts to make porting PC games to the Mac “easier” (though Apple has an interesting view on what “easy” is) I am not terribly worried at this time about WoW on the Mac.
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I’ve been noticing significant lag since Season 4 started. At first I was blaming the NFL draft as my ISP doesn’t seem to account for increased sports streaming on their servers. But in game, folks on both Mac and PC have been experiencing lag spikes and D/C’s.
I switched from my 2017 5k 27" iMac to a MBP M3Max (64GB)in March. Big difference in play. Better FPS, no lag in dungeons, etc. Now with Season 4 and no patch other than 2.6 going in a few weeks back, I’m seeing lag in DragonFlight in interactions, but I’m not getting load in lag in Valdrakken.
I’m running the MBP M3Max (mac15,9 with 64GB Ram)with a CalDigit Dock and Display Port to a LG 4k 27inch display. I’m running a 4 button trackball and a DasKeyboard Mechanical KB through the dock. Also using a fan driven
cooling pad.
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Heads up everyone. I followed Blizzard’s recommendations for resetting my UI. Not the internal game method, but the method where you rename the files in your finder and then launch the game. The lag spikes are gone and I can play the game again.
Now, I need to save some loot for a new MBP… game on.
I actually often tell users NOT to do this. it’s better to full load then to have performance issues cause you appear to enter world sooner but then have poppin and hitching. if anything users will do this then complain games running badly (cause it’s still loading things).
if loading screens are very long, make sure wow is run from an SSD, if your internal disk isn’t an SSD get an external SSD. Second thing is reinstall wow from time to time. if it hasn’t had a clean install in long time, loading screens will be MUCH MUCH slower due to how badly designed wows file system is. Best way to do this is to exit wow and launcher, delete the DATA folder (and ONLY data folder). fire up launcher. then hit update and it’ll redownload entire game but in doing so it reoptimizes data in a way that’s super beneficial to faster loading screens.
I also can’t emphasize enough for users being aware of their UI being out of date. It’s why the default copy paste blizzard cs gives is literally to rename it cause often times that’s first place there is a problem, since users are notoriously bad at keeping things there up to date or understanding when “up to date” is no longer possible (maybe the addon is no longer maintained etc)