[QUOTE=Rhythmdvl]
That baffles me. I do the editorial/analytical/programming end of things, she does the graphic design end of things. Maybe I’m stuck in the past, but I always thought the main advantage of Macs was their graphical capabilities. Maybe it’s static images, or maybe I really am thinking in 1990s terms, but either way, I have a hard time wrapping my head around my WinBox being that graphically superior to hers.
Also, how will the playing field be slanted? Will her screen have to be heavily pixilated in order to get the same frame-rate? Does frame rate make a difference in playing or just aesthetics?
[/QUOTE]
Let me start with the last part first: yes, her screen may have to be heavily pixelated in order to get the same frame-rate. Whether that makes a difference to play or not depends on your skill level (and the age of the game – older games tend to have lower rquirements). For a novice, it might not matter; for skilled players, a low frame rate will kill them, and high pixelation can mean they need to be closer to enemies to see/hit them.
On the graphical issues. Macs still have substantial graphical advantages over PCs, but frame rate of games isn’t one of them. Most games on the PC are written to the DirectX API, which is ground-up written for games, with an eye toward using all the hardware capabilities of your card. On the Mac, the API used is OpenGL, which is a much broader-scoped system, aimed as much at scientific programming as gaming. While you can achieve the same speeds in both, it’s much harder to write an OpenGL application that can take advantage of all of a card’s capabilities; it tends to increase the work on the developer to discover and exploit all of the card’s features. But the OpenGL/DirectX differences are minor compared to the pure hardware differences: Video cards tend to double in speed about every 6-8 months. Apple, for whatever reason, will usually use a video card several generations behind the current PC standard (much less the current cutting edge). This will usually kill frame rates in favor of lower power consumption and/or cost (depending on whether we’re talking PowerBooks or desktops). A PC user can replace his video card when it becomes obsolete for about $100, Mac users can’t, for the most part (there are no third party video cards for the Mac Pro that I’m aware of, for example: even though Macs are now Intel and use the same bus architecture as current PC’s, the cards aren’t compatible Windows/Mac.)
That said, the Macs still are generally superior graphics-wise, just not in framerate. Windows has always had much poorer algorithms for dithering color, for example (displaying more colors than a display can handle by mixing them). The Mac has a wide variety of “special effects” like compositing and transformations easily accessible to the programmer and even the end user. The Mac has QuickTime integrated with the OS; the Mac has OpenGL built into much more of it’s basic functionality. The Mac still has an ease of use preferred by graphics professionals, and Apple cares about such thing as professional color (for example, the finder can be put in a “greyscale” version to keep the distraction of bright colors down.). Interface conventions like drag-and-drop and inter-application compatibility are much higher on the Mac than they are in Windows; this can make an artistic workflow better, even if the individual applications are the same. Macs have much more sophisticated text and font handling, especially for international applications. And of course, some of it is pure tradition; Macs have always been the domain of the artistic.