How to: Upgrade your Intel GMA 950 graphics Mac using GMABooster
If you have a Mac with Intel’s integrated Graphics Media Accelerator (GMA) 950 inside—MacBook, Mac mini, iMac—here’s a free, software-only method that can boost performance by increasing the GPU’s clock speed by up to 2.4 times.
Bit-Tech brings us news of Vladimir Plenskiy’s GMABooster, which was designed with netbook in mind but has been ported to the fairer platform just because it was a cool thing to doâ„¢. According to Bit-Tech:
The application works by changing the clock speed of the ultra-low voltage version installed into netbooks of 133/166MHz to the standard desktop speed of 400MHz. As the graphics chip is designed for these speeds, there’s little or no risk of anything crashing or overheating.
Pretty much the same is true of GMABooster for the Mac, which requires OS X 10.5 Leopard and a copy of Apple’s CHUD Tools 4.6.1 (Softpedia).
I will be testing GMABooster on my 1.66GHz Mac mini once I get time to load OS X 10.5. In the mean, if you’ve got a Mac mini with Leopard loaded, dig in and come back to share your experiences…
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May 2nd, 2009
Hey. Mac Mini is @400MHz already. You should better test MacBook which is @250MHz. I’m playing World of Warcraft on MacBook (with GMABooster hack). I can confirm that this tool has totally boosted in-game FPS! It’s a pity this thing hasn’t been invented in 2006…
June 2nd, 2009
I tryed it on my old MacBook to play The Sims 3 but NOooo, my characters still look all black….objects and lancapes are ok
June 3rd, 2009
Yeah i have the sims 3 on my late 2006 macbook and my people are all black and some textures do not appear
June 3rd, 2009
Yeah i have the sims 3 on my late 2006 macbook and my people are all black and some textures do not appear
June 4th, 2009
Zaikam: I’m having the same problem!! What do we do?
June 18th, 2009
I’m having the same problem with the SIMS3 too! What is there to do?!
July 6th, 2009
i dont know, i have a 2007 macbook and it cant even run spore creature creator
July 20th, 2009
issue about sims 3 isnt about the clock speed it is about pixel shader so you can deal with it overclocking the gpu (i guess
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January 29th, 2010
Have you guys tried, I don’t know, maybe changing the skin colour in the character creation screen? Gosh, I can’t believe such xenophobia! Let me tell you, the blackness of your people has nothing to do with the gameplay – they do not infest your swimming pools or spontaneously catch on fire just because they look like they have oil all over them. “MY PEOPLE ARE ALL BLACK” IS NOT A PROBLEM, BUT A FEATURE!
February 2nd, 2010
some thinks it could make HL2E2 work?
March 15th, 2010
Sylph is an idiot. The Sims aren’t black like African American black so put that race card away, stat. The Sims are showing up completely black as in shadow: clothes, skin, facial features, shoes, everything except hair and eyes. No textures, no color, no graphics at all. And anyone know how to fix it other than get a new computer?
May 18th, 2010
I can tell Sylph has very poor social skills if at all any.
June 8th, 2010
You guys are so fucking stupid.
September 8th, 2010
Haha. Wow, you guys are stupid.
November 12th, 2010
Erick and Chopchop
Sylph was obviously kidding you dumbshit . Don’t you have a sense of humor?
November 25th, 2010
I am dumbshit and Sylph is indeed an idiot and wasn’t kidding.
March 19th, 2011
I just wanna know how to fix it. I have issues with my sims being all “black” and the baby looks an alien with these long legs and arms. Kinda scary. I noticed the characters like the maid and babysitters and neighbors are not affected by anomaly of the monotone onyx color. I switched families and once the woman had a baby her baby was just a long stick figure that resembled a giraffe. Does any body have a bleeping fix for it!!
June 22nd, 2011
I think it is a shader issue which can only be resolved by updates for sims 2 or better drivers, i don’t know if any updates or drivers are available that can solve this, so i think you should all get a new computer because it is like 4-5 years old which is not very good, i have a mid 2007 macbook with gma950 and im going to get a macbook pro soon. i advice you all to do so too if you have enough money and wanting a computer that is faster(alot faster).
October 26th, 2011
sweet. so will this GMA 950 booster thingy not improve the Sims 3 graphics at all?