Although it’s not ready yet, the PokerStars developers have been hard at work on the Mac software. I was lucky enough to get my hands on the ‘alpha’ Mac version, which is an early stage of testing prior to beta.
The Mac Poker Stars software looks very good so far and the installation was as easy as downloading the file and opening it up. All of the features the PC version has are shown in the menus, but many are ineffective in the current test version. The software does run smooth though, which is a big relief.
This is lobby. It’s pretty ugly and generic right now, but I’m sure they’ll fix it up in a future version. The tourney, sit & go, and events tabs are grayed out and ineffective. All of the the cash game tables are available and working including the HORSE and triple draw tables.
The table looks great and allows for different themes and backgrounds. I prefer this blue and black background over the default theme because it’s easy on the eyes during long sessions. One glitch I discovered was that the slider will only let you bet all or nothing. That wasn’t a problem during this hand though.
These are the dealer options. Most of them aren’t available to use, but they will be implemented in a future version.
Resizable tables! You can’t tell from the resized screenshot, but the Poker Stars tables get large enough to fill up your whole screen and small enough to multi-table on a small monitor without any overlap.
Overall the Mac software rocks! I wish I could dive into some real money tables, but the test versions are on a separate play money server.
The full version is estimated to be released some time around May, but this could always change. As Poker Stars gets closer to releasing the Mac software, I’ll be sure to post more information.
Wow.. looks good. I’ve been holding off joining pokerstars until the mac client came out. Looks like they’re making progress!
[…] On the bright side, their site does say they are “upgrading Absolute Poker Instant Play EVERYDAY… Tournaments, Omaha, Stud and all the features of our download software coming SOON!”. And everything that is supposed to be working seems to be working. In the time it took to load up the poker room (42 seconds), I could have downloaded, installed, and opened up the Mac pokerstars beta version. It was a reminder of the 56k days. However, everything ran smoothly after the initial load. […]
[…] update: Mac Pokerstars screenshots – 02/14/07 […]
[…] Mac Poker Stars Screenshots – 2/14/07 […]
How can I become a tester for them?
You can become a PokerStars beta tester by emailing a request to [email protected]
I would like to be a mac beta tester for Poker Stars
AWESOME! Runs great on my Mac, so glad it finally came out.