Macs and Maya

# 1 08-05-2012 , 12:59 AM

Registered User
Join Date: May 2012

Posts: 3

I am new to maya and computer hardware for the most part and this may seem like a pretty redundent question but I am looking for a computer or a laptop to run maya. I have been told desktops work the best so I went looking for that. I have to say I am a big apple fan. I am currently looking at an iMac. the specs of it seem to tell me that it would run it just fine. The only thing im really concerned with is the graphics card. It uses a AMD Radeon 6970M GDDR5, 2GB I beleive and I have heard that maya does not really support that graphics card. Can some light be shed on this for me?

Last edited by Sneaky; 08-05-2012 at 03:42 AM.

Quote

# 2 08-05-2012 , 02:14 AM

Technical Director
Join Date: Feb 2004

Posts: 2,988

I've never had any problems with Maya on a Mac.

I've found your graphics card on Autodesk's site, and it has been tested with Maya 2013. The only problem is that in Viewport 2.0, text overlays aren't displayed properly. This isn't a problem as 99% of your work will be in the normal Viewport anyways. This problem however, could very well be fixed in newer driver versions.

https://usa.autodesk.com/adsk/servlet...8435456&hw=241

Imagination is more important than knowledge.

Quote

# 3 08-05-2012 , 03:41 AM

Registered User
Join Date: May 2012

Posts: 3

Thanks, I appreciate the help a lot. Seems I might go with the iMac then, but ill keep an open mind until the purchase. Again thanks for the help!

Quote

# 4 08-05-2012 , 04:59 AM

Moderator
Join Date: Jan 2004

Location: Michigan, USA

Posts: 2,998

I always cringe when I read Maya and Laptop in the same sentence. I know a lot of people do it including myself (I have an old 32bit laptop that I can still run maya 2009 on) but I'd never set out to have a laptop be my primary maya system.

"If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of giants." Sir Isaac Newton, 1675

Quote

# 5 08-05-2012 , 05:29 AM

Technical Director
Join Date: Feb 2004

Posts: 2,988

I use my MacBook Pro as my primary, and it works fine for me.

Imagination is more important than knowledge.

Quote

# 6 08-05-2012 , 07:23 AM

Moderator
Join Date: Jan 2004

Location: Michigan, USA

Posts: 2,998

It 'cause I am an old fart and the last laptop I bought had 4GB of mem, with a 2Ghz dual core processor and a crappy mobile graphics card. I keep forgetting that some of the latest laptops have some juice.

"If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of giants." Sir Isaac Newton, 1675

Quote

# 7 08-05-2012 , 01:44 PM

Registered User
Join Date: May 2012

Posts: 3

Well I'm thinking of getting an iMac which I will have a choice of 8 or 16gigs of ram and a 2TB ATA 7200rpm drive along with that graphics card. I would like to get an SSD drive but those are getting out og my budget. It will be at 3.4GHz as well. So I feel pretty comfortable going with the iMac rite now. I have definatly looked at the MacBook Pro as well. again though I'm leaning more towards the desktop iMac.

Quote

# 8 08-05-2012 , 04:02 PM

Technical Director
Join Date: Feb 2004

Posts: 2,988

It 'cause I am an old fart and the last laptop I bought had 4GB of mem, with a 2Ghz dual core processor and a crappy mobile graphics card. I keep forgetting that some of the latest laptops have some juice.

Originally Posted by ctbram

Mine's a 2.4 GHz Core 2 Duo with 4 GB of ram, with a Geforce 320M. Since I'm doing mostly dev work, it works fine for me user added image