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Comment by MrDOS

9 hours ago

The CPUs were powerful enough, sure. The GPUs (Intel GMA950) absolutely weren't. Even on Windows with better drivers, Half-Life 2 is a slideshow on that class of hardware.

Depends a LOT on the res.

E.x. notebookcheck indicates that FEAR (released a yearish later) could get 20-30ish FPS at 640x480 but chokes at 1024x768 (at numbers matching the HL2 lost coast demo slideshow at 1024x768).

Gotta remember a lot of mac people were just happy to play something more modern than Marathon or Giants CK

  • There were also MacBook Pro models with dedicated GPUs that were capable of running HL2 decently. The 2006 MacBook Pro 15-inch had a 32-bit only Yonah Core Duo and a Mobility Radeon X1600.

    I got my gaming start on one such machine - the Mobility Radeon was fine for HL2/Portal at 1024x768. Good memories.