Anyone running CMBB demo on older iMacs?

[Danny Chung]

When I first saw the minimum chip requirements for CMBB for the Mac, my heart nearly stopped. What, 500MHz? I'm still running an Oct 1999 era DV iMac (the 400MHz). For iMacs at the time, this was cutting edge, man. It's now running on OS 9.2.2

Nevertheless, I said, bugger it, I'll download the demo anyway.

To my surprise, the demo loaded up no problem and can run the demo. Although the games are smallish, there is still a longer than normal wait for the computer to crunch the numbers.

My question is this:

Should I run out and get the new iMac (the 17 incher is lovely) just so that can guarantee my enjoyment of full version of CMBB (I don't think I can stand any more of those long calculation times especially for the big scenarios).

My one problem is I'm in between jobs and although I have enough savings to buy one, a new iMac would drive my old lady nutty.

[Schrullenhaft]

The full version shouldn't be that much slower than the Demo. The full version has more models and textures in it, so that would be the biggest reason for anything being slower (disregarding scenario size).

I don't know why everyone is so up in arms about 'calc' times for scenarios. It's not like every scenario in CMBB is some divisional-sized battle. Most of the battles are probably going to continue to be approximately the same size as CMBO scenarios were. Just because there are larger maps and a higher possible unit count in battles doesn't mean that people are always going to use them - its a playability/time issue that will determine most size preferences. Some scenarios in CMBO were large and others were small - this trend will continue simply due to player preferences.

So you should be fine with your current iMac if you're happy with what you see in the Demo. There will be more variety to the units, so you could tax your video card a bit harder than CMBO might have done.

The minimum specs were not the absolute minimum that CMBB would run on. They are recommended minimums and even then there can be variations as to how well adapted a machine may be that meets, exceeds or is under those requirements.

And the East Front will be child's play compared to the mental and psychological warfare the 'old lady' will wage with you if you step over that 'financial line in the sand'.

[Danny Chung]

Hey thanks for the reassuring reply, man.

If the demo works OK on my current iMac, then great. I'll be looking forward to the full version.

No worries

[Jarmo]

What, 500MHz?

Actually.. it says Pentium III 500Mhz or a G3.

(no mention whatsoever of G3 speed, any will do)

You might be limited by VRAM though, your machine has

either 8 or 16 megs, both should be pretty much workable,

but 8 might not cope with large scenarios.

Have to wait and see to be sure.

You can see what you have with System Profiler,

in Apple Menu.

[pavlov]

Just my two cents--I think the makers of CM have done a great job creating a product that is useable by older machines (older than six months) but is still top-of-the-line software, something that simply cannot be said of most of the new software available.

For my part, I've run CMBO and CMBB Demo with no problem on my imac dv+ 450 mhz --Except when I attempted to load every single hires CMBO mod I could lay my hands on, I eventually discovered there is an upper limit that my machine could handle. Even so, I haven't had any real slow downs except when there is a lot of white smoke. I don't know what the deal is with that.