"Announcing the new Apple product. It comes in blue."
Yay! I love blue! Blue is awesome!
I wish it came in red.
What? How dare you! If you don't like blue you can
go elsewhere simple as that.
But isn't this a discussion of Apple products?
No! It's a um, er, well, sputter, oh just go away!
If you are stilling using your previous argument then you think Apple is forcing you to buy in blue and everyone is just to stupid to understand that you want red.
You seriously don?t understand what choice is, do you?
Yes an iMac is a consumer device that will be in those places, but most of the people whining about matte screens are wanting to use the iMac in more of a Pro or at least Prosumer way, so in that case, while yes being pretty old school, if they're really serious about minimizing glare there is the option of a hood. No you don't need to turn off all the lights and close the drapes to use your computer. My apartment has big windows at the end of the living room and my wife and I use the dining room it's attached to as a computer room. My monitor is perpendicular to the windows and I have no problems from the lighting.
I don't have any reflections on my screen b/c most of the time this room is kept reasonably dim and like I said, I have my contrast and brightness controlled so the picture suits my preferences. My eyes aren't being damaged like has been claimed in this thread and my computer works just fine.
You may think some of the suggestions are bullshit but guess what, they were fucking suggestions. The reality of the matter is that Apple isn't making iMacs with matte screens and a measly 1300 people isn't going to change their minds. Maybe I just used my head when I decided where I wanted to have my computer setup. Nah, can't be that simple.
This whole Pro versus Consumer is so dumb. Its as simple as this:
Pros have very specific specifications for their tools. Often that means they must use custom made equipment. This is why Pro tools are expensive. Small audience that requires something 'just-so'.
Consumers are willing to temper their expectations to reach a price-point and lowest-common-denominator interface, aesthetic, whatever other characteristic.
The situation becomes more complex when this happens: Sometimes a Consumer device just happens to fulfill one person's Professional requirements. A second person takes notice and thinks, wow, that would be great if I didn't need to spend so much on a professional tool! Upon reflection (pun fully intended) the second person determines the Consumer device won't meet their requirement.
Then the situation becomes nasty when the second person publicly insults the first person as 'not professional' since they can make due with their Consumer device as a professional tool.
This happens in lots of businesses. My girlfriend is a jeweler. A lot of her tools are custom made from rough blanks to fit her hands and working style precisely. She couldn't buy them at any price, she must custom make them for herself. Still, many other tools can be had very cheap at the local Home Depot (consumer stuff, nothing high-end)
In the Pro Mac User business, whatever the fuck that means anyway, it's different for everyone...There is a perfectly good Mac Pro that you can attach to any screen you like to suit your Professional requirements. Yeah, its more expensive...but suck it up, Pro!
Full disclosure: I am a Pro Mac User who is very pleased with my 27" iMac at home. I build websites, do graphic design and photography work on this machine and I couldn't be happier. In my case the Consumer device fits my needs perfectly well! Don't hate on my or belittle me because the iMac works for me. It's just chance that the machine fits the task.
Now, photographing my girlfriend's jewelry has required me to build a custom jewelry photography studio in the back of her shop. Should I cry because some people can make due with a studio-in-a-box they buy off the internet? I suppose I could, but that's not my style.
If you are stilling using your previous argument then you think Apple is forcing you to buy in blue and everyone is just to stupid to understand that you want red.
You seriously don?t understand what choice is, do you?
I do understand what choice is. You don't understand what a discussion is. In your world all conversations on Apple Insider would go like this:
"I wish Apple would fix the bug so that permissions don't get corrupt when I export pictures from iPhoto"
Whatever, my gaming PC I built which puts the iMac to shame cost a hell of a lot less. And yes, I use both PC's and Macs - been using Macs since the SE.
The point I was trying to make is that Apple should offer SAS as a middle range option instead of forcing consumers to choose between slower SATA and fast but expensive SSD. But apparently people on here are just to stupid to understand.
No we aren't stupid, we've given you any number of perfectly good reasons why Apple doesn't use SAS drives. Excessive heat, noise and energy usage are the first part, costing generally triple what the same storage space costs in SATA form is another. I'll let other people get into the debates about the quality of various SAS controllers b/c I don't feel the discussion needs to even go that far. 1TB SATS drives are $80 these days. Why pay 3 times that for something that would change the iMac from being a very power efficient and quiet machine into something loud and far less effecient?
No we aren't stupid, we've given you any number of perfectly good reasons why Apple doesn't use SAS drives. Excessive heat, noise and energy usage are the first part, costing generally triple what the same storage space costs in SATA form is another. I'll let other people get into the debates about the quality of various SAS controllers b/c I don't feel the discussion needs to even go that far. 1TB SATS drives are $80 these days. Why pay 3 times that for something that would change the iMac from being a very power efficient and quiet machine into something loud and far less effecient?
Some have yes. That's great. In this case I'm responding to the 'if you don't like it then don't use a Mac' crowd.
That said, I'd be curious to see some numbers on how awful SAS drives are in terms of heat and power. The 2.5" models are hugely more efficient than the older 3.5" ones.
In the beginning frames the glare is extreme, and the guy removes the glass panel with some tape. The glare is significantly reduced. I know if you want to use an iMac with antiglare adhesive, you'd probably want to put it on this bottom layer and keep the top glass panel off entirely.
Some have yes. That's great. In this case I'm responding to the 'if you don't like it then don't use a Mac' crowd.
That said, I'd be curious to see some numbers on how awful SAS drives are in terms of heat and power. The 2.5" models are hugely more efficient than the older 3.5" ones.
Yes, I've tried to be a bit more reasonable than that and give actual reasons
I don't spend any time looking at reviews of products that are typically used in enterprise fashion so I don't know if reviews of those products typically go into sound levels, heat production and power usage. They probably do talk about power usage. Those kind of products aren't typically reviews at places like tomshardware, arstechnica or anandtech tho, so I'm not sure where to go looking for those reviews. Would be interesting to see how they stack up currently, but the price difference for the same amount of storage alone is probably enough to make Apple not consider them. If you do find any reviews for some of these SAS drives feel free to post them, b/c we can easily find reviews of the kind of hard drives that would be found in Apple's products on sites that account for heat, power and noise.
And the key phrase here is "I know just about everything there is to know about blindness except what it feels like to be blind."
No the key phrase is that the comment happened 3 hours before you posted you had vision problems. Unless you believe your blindness also provides the ability to warp space and time. In which case I feel pretty ripped off. You aren't the only one with vision problems.
This whole Pro versus Consumer is so dumb. Its as simple as this:
Pros have very specific specifications for their tools. Often that means they must use custom made equipment. This is why Pro tools are expensive. Small audience that requires something 'just-so'.
Consumers are willing to temper their expectations to reach a price-point and lowest-common-denominator interface, aesthetic, whatever other characteristic.
The situation becomes more complex when this happens: Sometimes a Consumer device just happens to fulfill one person's Professional requirements. A second person takes notice and thinks, wow, that would be great if I didn't need to spend so much on a professional tool! Upon reflection (pun fully intended) the second person determines the Consumer device won't meet their requirement.
Then the situation becomes nasty when the second person publicly insults the first person as 'not professional' since they can make due with their Consumer device as a professional tool.
...
In the Pro Mac User business, whatever the fuck that means anyway, it's different for everyone...There is a perfectly good Mac Pro that you can attach to any screen you like to suit your Professional requirements. Yeah, its more expensive...but suck it up, Pro!
Or you could attach a Eizo 27" CG275W to the iMac and relegate the "sub-par" glossy screen to email, twitter and tool palette duty. The Eizo even comes with a hood and self-calibrates.
Funny, it happens to be 16:9 (2560x1440)..I guess Eizo doesn't know pro needs either...
Yes, I've tried to be a bit more reasonable than that and give actual reasons
I don't spend any time looking at reviews of products that are typically used in enterprise fashion so I don't know if reviews of those products typically go into sound levels, heat production and power usage. They probably do talk about power usage. Those kind of products aren't typically reviews at places like tomshardware, arstechnica or anandtech tho, so I'm not sure where to go looking for those reviews. Would be interesting to see how they stack up currently, but the price difference for the same amount of storage alone is probably enough to make Apple not consider them. If you do find any reviews for some of these SAS drives feel free to post them, b/c we can easily find reviews of the kind of hard drives that would be found in Apple's products on sites that account for heat, power and noise.
Found this from Seagate's website, comparing their enterprise SAS drive to their Sata offering.
SAS - 4.58W Idle, 8.32W Average, 3.0 bels (Idle) (whatever a bel is)
SATA - 3.84W Idle, 6.35W Average, 2.2 bels (Idle)
To me 2W doesn't seem like it would matter in a desktop - but in such a tight enclosure maybe it does.
Certainly more expensive than in the US with some glaring exceptions like French cheese and wine, and fine quality Belgian chocolate and beer.
But as I said, in the past Apple often tried to align the prices after updates according to currency balance. Of course, even then, the computers were still more expensive before considering tax but not as much as this time. Probably they are right, in the bigger scheme of things, to do so from their own perspective as a company in an unstable financial climate, but I believe that the iMac sales are going to suffer in Europe.
Apple did adjust the Cdn prices for the iMac this time, I'm not sure why they didn't do it for Europe (or even Asia for that matter).
2) The SSD option sounds nice but boot time on the mac is so much faster than a PC it is crazy. With my 8 gig of ram I'm never swapping so the SSD option IMHO is better left for MAC books. If money was no object, I would love to have a 512 SSD so I'm not knocking it.
That's a good point - with lots of free RAM there is no need for swapping. In that case, upgrading to 12GB in the new iMacs sounds like a no brainer.
Quote:
Originally Posted by ssls6
4) with the money I saved above, I would try to get a couple of 1TB thunderbolt external drives. They sound crazy good.
My thoughts exactly!
I think my mind is made up - I'm going to pick up a base 21.5" iMac on my next visit to the US. As much as I want a 27" iMac, unfortunately it will not fit in standard luggage with the original packaging.
Apple did adjust the Cdn prices for the iMac this time, I'm not sure why they didn't do it for Europe (or even Asia for that matter).
Yep, no dice in Australia where our dollar is streaming ahead of the greenback. Then again I noticed a guitar pedal that retails $150 in the US is marked up by several retailers here to an astonishing $749. And it's a piece of rubbish to boot. Nothing to do with our GST, or import duties, it's just a goldmine that will rapidly dwindle as people get more and more savvy to online purchasing. Good riddance.
Yep, no dice in Australia where our dollar is streaming ahead of the greenback. Then again I noticed a guitar pedal that retails $150 in the US is marked up by several retailers here to an astonishing $749. And it's a piece of rubbish to boot. Nothing to do with our GST, or import duties, it's just a goldmine that will rapidly dwindle as people get more and more savvy to online purchasing. Good riddance.
I noticed the $200 price difference between the US and Australian Apple stores for the 21.5". Is it possible to order from the US store in Australia? Or don't the US models run on 240v AC?
No the key phrase is that the comment happened 3 hours before you posted you had vision problems. Unless you believe your blindness also provides the ability to warp space and time. In which case I feel pretty ripped off. You aren't the only one with vision problems.
And you sound like a bitter little piss who apparently was flowing heavily this afternoon. I don't announce in every forum that I have vision problems and if you'd bothered to read the rest of my post, you would have noticed that I apologized for being cranky that day
As for me having the ability to warp space and time, I guess I left my sonic screwdriver in the Tardis. But hey, thanks for setting me straight sonny
Now, look at the i5 and i7 Sandy bridge processors (2500 and 2600). The i7 is much faster in many of the tests - and that underestimates the difference in the iMac because Hardcore's test uses a 3.3 GHz i5 vs a 3.4 GHz i7 while the iMac uses a 3.1 GHz i5 vs a 3.4 GHz i7.
Depending on what you're doing, the speed difference could be significant.
I noticed the $200 price difference between the US and Australian Apple stores for the 21.5". Is it possible to order from the US store in Australia? Or don't the US models run on 240v AC?
No, don't think so on the ordering bit, but as far as the voltage I'm pretty sure it's merely a plug head difference, most high end electronics are switchable. We're not likely to be treated as well as Canada by Apple in this instance and in any case Customs will sting you enough on an iMac to make it irrelevant - however if it were a Mac Pro the diff between a US ordered and a locally bought is immense and might be worth your while to go down a 3rd party seller line. We're talking over a grand tacked on here.
Now, look at the i5 and i7 Sandy bridge processors (2500 and 2600). The i7 is much faster in many of the tests - and that underestimates the difference in the iMac because Hardcore's test uses a 3.3 GHz i5 vs a 3.4 GHz i7 while the iMac uses a 3.1 GHz i5 vs a 3.4 GHz i7.
Depending on what you're doing, the speed difference could be significant.
Actually I was referring to RAW image (format) processing - I'm not aware of any photo processors that can efficiently make use of more than 4 cores. But you are right, the clock speed difference could be noticeable here.
Anyways, thanks for pointing out that review as I hadn't realized there was such a large performance gain in the Sandy Bridge over the previous series.
The new iMacs aren't bad at all. But some of the things on them are a couple of years over due.
eg a decent GPU at all price points. Quad core at all price points. This could have been done last year at least. (If not the year before. Quad core had been out ages at all prices points for years on the PC side...) But they clung to death to that Core 2 duo.
The 6970...with a 2 gig GPU option? *Are my eyes deceiving me? Mind you, it's not like on the PC side that 2 gig cards haven't been fairly popular for some time now. But none the less, it's a welcome addition. It's a very decent card that stacks up to the desktop competition very well. It's the kind of card you need to run a 2500x1400 display.
The Sandy bridge platform finally sees the iMac coming of age. It welcome, if (I feel) long over due.
The iMac is now a workstation in all but name. Yesterday's workstation? Today. The 27 inch iMac with quad core i7s (Speedboost.2 upto 3.8 gig?) is something yesteryear's Power Mac could only dream of.
I'd quibble that the top of the line iMac should have the 2 gig gpu, i7 and 8 gig of ram standard. As optional extras it takes the price up to £2045.
What next for the iMac? 6-8 cores next year? When Ivy comes to town? Can monitor sizes get any bigger? Now that it packs some gpu muscle (at last...) will it push further with the next update? Will the 'i7s' come as standard on the top two modesl (as they should be presently...)
Apple 'almost' gave it everything they got. (But you still have to pay for some of those as extras...) It's a worthy update. But as the Mac Pro heads off to 8 cores x 2 for 32 threads...maybe the iMac has one surprise left for us. We may just have to wait until next year for it.
Comments
"Announcing the new Apple product. It comes in blue."
Yay! I love blue! Blue is awesome!
I wish it came in red.
What? How dare you! If you don't like blue you can
go elsewhere simple as that.
But isn't this a discussion of Apple products?
No! It's a um, er, well, sputter, oh just go away!
If you are stilling using your previous argument then you think Apple is forcing you to buy in blue and everyone is just to stupid to understand that you want red.
You seriously don?t understand what choice is, do you?
Yes an iMac is a consumer device that will be in those places, but most of the people whining about matte screens are wanting to use the iMac in more of a Pro or at least Prosumer way, so in that case, while yes being pretty old school, if they're really serious about minimizing glare there is the option of a hood. No you don't need to turn off all the lights and close the drapes to use your computer. My apartment has big windows at the end of the living room and my wife and I use the dining room it's attached to as a computer room. My monitor is perpendicular to the windows and I have no problems from the lighting.
I don't have any reflections on my screen b/c most of the time this room is kept reasonably dim and like I said, I have my contrast and brightness controlled so the picture suits my preferences. My eyes aren't being damaged like has been claimed in this thread and my computer works just fine.
You may think some of the suggestions are bullshit but guess what, they were fucking suggestions. The reality of the matter is that Apple isn't making iMacs with matte screens and a measly 1300 people isn't going to change their minds. Maybe I just used my head when I decided where I wanted to have my computer setup. Nah, can't be that simple.
This whole Pro versus Consumer is so dumb. Its as simple as this:
Pros have very specific specifications for their tools. Often that means they must use custom made equipment. This is why Pro tools are expensive. Small audience that requires something 'just-so'.
Consumers are willing to temper their expectations to reach a price-point and lowest-common-denominator interface, aesthetic, whatever other characteristic.
The situation becomes more complex when this happens: Sometimes a Consumer device just happens to fulfill one person's Professional requirements. A second person takes notice and thinks, wow, that would be great if I didn't need to spend so much on a professional tool! Upon reflection (pun fully intended) the second person determines the Consumer device won't meet their requirement.
Then the situation becomes nasty when the second person publicly insults the first person as 'not professional' since they can make due with their Consumer device as a professional tool.
This happens in lots of businesses. My girlfriend is a jeweler. A lot of her tools are custom made from rough blanks to fit her hands and working style precisely. She couldn't buy them at any price, she must custom make them for herself. Still, many other tools can be had very cheap at the local Home Depot (consumer stuff, nothing high-end)
In the Pro Mac User business, whatever the fuck that means anyway, it's different for everyone...There is a perfectly good Mac Pro that you can attach to any screen you like to suit your Professional requirements. Yeah, its more expensive...but suck it up, Pro!
Full disclosure: I am a Pro Mac User who is very pleased with my 27" iMac at home. I build websites, do graphic design and photography work on this machine and I couldn't be happier. In my case the Consumer device fits my needs perfectly well! Don't hate on my or belittle me because the iMac works for me. It's just chance that the machine fits the task.
Now, photographing my girlfriend's jewelry has required me to build a custom jewelry photography studio in the back of her shop. Should I cry because some people can make due with a studio-in-a-box they buy off the internet? I suppose I could, but that's not my style.
If you are stilling using your previous argument then you think Apple is forcing you to buy in blue and everyone is just to stupid to understand that you want red.
You seriously don?t understand what choice is, do you?
I do understand what choice is. You don't understand what a discussion is. In your world all conversations on Apple Insider would go like this:
"I wish Apple would fix the bug so that permissions don't get corrupt when I export pictures from iPhoto"
"If you don't like it then don't use a Mac!"
Whatever, my gaming PC I built which puts the iMac to shame cost a hell of a lot less. And yes, I use both PC's and Macs - been using Macs since the SE.
The point I was trying to make is that Apple should offer SAS as a middle range option instead of forcing consumers to choose between slower SATA and fast but expensive SSD. But apparently people on here are just to stupid to understand.
No we aren't stupid, we've given you any number of perfectly good reasons why Apple doesn't use SAS drives. Excessive heat, noise and energy usage are the first part, costing generally triple what the same storage space costs in SATA form is another. I'll let other people get into the debates about the quality of various SAS controllers b/c I don't feel the discussion needs to even go that far. 1TB SATS drives are $80 these days. Why pay 3 times that for something that would change the iMac from being a very power efficient and quiet machine into something loud and far less effecient?
No we aren't stupid, we've given you any number of perfectly good reasons why Apple doesn't use SAS drives. Excessive heat, noise and energy usage are the first part, costing generally triple what the same storage space costs in SATA form is another. I'll let other people get into the debates about the quality of various SAS controllers b/c I don't feel the discussion needs to even go that far. 1TB SATS drives are $80 these days. Why pay 3 times that for something that would change the iMac from being a very power efficient and quiet machine into something loud and far less effecient?
Some have yes. That's great. In this case I'm responding to the 'if you don't like it then don't use a Mac' crowd.
That said, I'd be curious to see some numbers on how awful SAS drives are in terms of heat and power. The 2.5" models are hugely more efficient than the older 3.5" ones.
Why don't you get some suction cups and remove the glass screen?
Yes this is a possible workaround.
Reference this video from an older model:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cy0o2WdrN3M
In the beginning frames the glare is extreme, and the guy removes the glass panel with some tape. The glare is significantly reduced. I know if you want to use an iMac with antiglare adhesive, you'd probably want to put it on this bottom layer and keep the top glass panel off entirely.
Anyone know of a replacement bezel?
Some have yes. That's great. In this case I'm responding to the 'if you don't like it then don't use a Mac' crowd.
That said, I'd be curious to see some numbers on how awful SAS drives are in terms of heat and power. The 2.5" models are hugely more efficient than the older 3.5" ones.
Yes, I've tried to be a bit more reasonable than that and give actual reasons
I don't spend any time looking at reviews of products that are typically used in enterprise fashion so I don't know if reviews of those products typically go into sound levels, heat production and power usage. They probably do talk about power usage. Those kind of products aren't typically reviews at places like tomshardware, arstechnica or anandtech tho, so I'm not sure where to go looking for those reviews. Would be interesting to see how they stack up currently, but the price difference for the same amount of storage alone is probably enough to make Apple not consider them. If you do find any reviews for some of these SAS drives feel free to post them, b/c we can easily find reviews of the kind of hard drives that would be found in Apple's products on sites that account for heat, power and noise.
And the key phrase here is "I know just about everything there is to know about blindness except what it feels like to be blind."
No the key phrase is that the comment happened 3 hours before you posted you had vision problems. Unless you believe your blindness also provides the ability to warp space and time. In which case I feel pretty ripped off. You aren't the only one with vision problems.
This whole Pro versus Consumer is so dumb. Its as simple as this:
Pros have very specific specifications for their tools. Often that means they must use custom made equipment. This is why Pro tools are expensive. Small audience that requires something 'just-so'.
Consumers are willing to temper their expectations to reach a price-point and lowest-common-denominator interface, aesthetic, whatever other characteristic.
The situation becomes more complex when this happens: Sometimes a Consumer device just happens to fulfill one person's Professional requirements. A second person takes notice and thinks, wow, that would be great if I didn't need to spend so much on a professional tool! Upon reflection (pun fully intended) the second person determines the Consumer device won't meet their requirement.
Then the situation becomes nasty when the second person publicly insults the first person as 'not professional' since they can make due with their Consumer device as a professional tool.
...
In the Pro Mac User business, whatever the fuck that means anyway, it's different for everyone...There is a perfectly good Mac Pro that you can attach to any screen you like to suit your Professional requirements. Yeah, its more expensive...but suck it up, Pro!
Or you could attach a Eizo 27" CG275W to the iMac and relegate the "sub-par" glossy screen to email, twitter and tool palette duty. The Eizo even comes with a hood and self-calibrates.
Funny, it happens to be 16:9 (2560x1440)..I guess Eizo doesn't know pro needs either...
Yes, I've tried to be a bit more reasonable than that and give actual reasons
I don't spend any time looking at reviews of products that are typically used in enterprise fashion so I don't know if reviews of those products typically go into sound levels, heat production and power usage. They probably do talk about power usage. Those kind of products aren't typically reviews at places like tomshardware, arstechnica or anandtech tho, so I'm not sure where to go looking for those reviews. Would be interesting to see how they stack up currently, but the price difference for the same amount of storage alone is probably enough to make Apple not consider them. If you do find any reviews for some of these SAS drives feel free to post them, b/c we can easily find reviews of the kind of hard drives that would be found in Apple's products on sites that account for heat, power and noise.
Found this from Seagate's website, comparing their enterprise SAS drive to their Sata offering.
SAS - 4.58W Idle, 8.32W Average, 3.0 bels (Idle) (whatever a bel is)
SATA - 3.84W Idle, 6.35W Average, 2.2 bels (Idle)
To me 2W doesn't seem like it would matter in a desktop - but in such a tight enclosure maybe it does.
Certainly more expensive than in the US with some glaring exceptions like French cheese and wine, and fine quality Belgian chocolate and beer.
But as I said, in the past Apple often tried to align the prices after updates according to currency balance. Of course, even then, the computers were still more expensive before considering tax but not as much as this time. Probably they are right, in the bigger scheme of things, to do so from their own perspective as a company in an unstable financial climate, but I believe that the iMac sales are going to suffer in Europe.
Apple did adjust the Cdn prices for the iMac this time, I'm not sure why they didn't do it for Europe (or even Asia for that matter).
2) The SSD option sounds nice but boot time on the mac is so much faster than a PC it is crazy. With my 8 gig of ram I'm never swapping so the SSD option IMHO is better left for MAC books. If money was no object, I would love to have a 512 SSD so I'm not knocking it.
That's a good point - with lots of free RAM there is no need for swapping. In that case, upgrading to 12GB in the new iMacs sounds like a no brainer.
4) with the money I saved above, I would try to get a couple of 1TB thunderbolt external drives. They sound crazy good.
My thoughts exactly!
I think my mind is made up - I'm going to pick up a base 21.5" iMac on my next visit to the US. As much as I want a 27" iMac, unfortunately it will not fit in standard luggage with the original packaging.
Apple did adjust the Cdn prices for the iMac this time, I'm not sure why they didn't do it for Europe (or even Asia for that matter).
Yep, no dice in Australia where our dollar is streaming ahead of the greenback. Then again I noticed a guitar pedal that retails $150 in the US is marked up by several retailers here to an astonishing $749. And it's a piece of rubbish to boot. Nothing to do with our GST, or import duties, it's just a goldmine that will rapidly dwindle as people get more and more savvy to online purchasing. Good riddance.
Yep, no dice in Australia where our dollar is streaming ahead of the greenback. Then again I noticed a guitar pedal that retails $150 in the US is marked up by several retailers here to an astonishing $749. And it's a piece of rubbish to boot. Nothing to do with our GST, or import duties, it's just a goldmine that will rapidly dwindle as people get more and more savvy to online purchasing. Good riddance.
I noticed the $200 price difference between the US and Australian Apple stores for the 21.5". Is it possible to order from the US store in Australia? Or don't the US models run on 240v AC?
No the key phrase is that the comment happened 3 hours before you posted you had vision problems. Unless you believe your blindness also provides the ability to warp space and time. In which case I feel pretty ripped off. You aren't the only one with vision problems.
And you sound like a bitter little piss who apparently was flowing heavily this afternoon. I don't announce in every forum that I have vision problems and if you'd bothered to read the rest of my post, you would have noticed that I apologized for being cranky that day
As for me having the ability to warp space and time, I guess I left my sonic screwdriver in the Tardis. But hey, thanks for setting me straight sonny
I would say that for RAW processing there won't be a huge difference between quad-core i5 and i7..
Not true.
Look at:
http://www.hardcoreware.net/intel-sa...ance-review/3/
Now, look at the i5 and i7 Sandy bridge processors (2500 and 2600). The i7 is much faster in many of the tests - and that underestimates the difference in the iMac because Hardcore's test uses a 3.3 GHz i5 vs a 3.4 GHz i7 while the iMac uses a 3.1 GHz i5 vs a 3.4 GHz i7.
Depending on what you're doing, the speed difference could be significant.
I noticed the $200 price difference between the US and Australian Apple stores for the 21.5". Is it possible to order from the US store in Australia? Or don't the US models run on 240v AC?
No, don't think so on the ordering bit, but as far as the voltage I'm pretty sure it's merely a plug head difference, most high end electronics are switchable. We're not likely to be treated as well as Canada by Apple in this instance and in any case Customs will sting you enough on an iMac to make it irrelevant - however if it were a Mac Pro the diff between a US ordered and a locally bought is immense and might be worth your while to go down a 3rd party seller line. We're talking over a grand tacked on here.
Not true.
Look at:
http://www.hardcoreware.net/intel-sa...ance-review/3/
Now, look at the i5 and i7 Sandy bridge processors (2500 and 2600). The i7 is much faster in many of the tests - and that underestimates the difference in the iMac because Hardcore's test uses a 3.3 GHz i5 vs a 3.4 GHz i7 while the iMac uses a 3.1 GHz i5 vs a 3.4 GHz i7.
Depending on what you're doing, the speed difference could be significant.
Actually I was referring to RAW image (format) processing - I'm not aware of any photo processors that can efficiently make use of more than 4 cores. But you are right, the clock speed difference could be noticeable here.
Anyways, thanks for pointing out that review as I hadn't realized there was such a large performance gain in the Sandy Bridge over the previous series.
eg a decent GPU at all price points. Quad core at all price points. This could have been done last year at least. (If not the year before. Quad core had been out ages at all prices points for years on the PC side...) But they clung to death to that Core 2 duo.
The 6970...with a 2 gig GPU option? *Are my eyes deceiving me? Mind you, it's not like on the PC side that 2 gig cards haven't been fairly popular for some time now. But none the less, it's a welcome addition. It's a very decent card that stacks up to the desktop competition very well. It's the kind of card you need to run a 2500x1400 display.
The Sandy bridge platform finally sees the iMac coming of age. It welcome, if (I feel) long over due.
The iMac is now a workstation in all but name. Yesterday's workstation? Today. The 27 inch iMac with quad core i7s (Speedboost.2 upto 3.8 gig?) is something yesteryear's Power Mac could only dream of.
I'd quibble that the top of the line iMac should have the 2 gig gpu, i7 and 8 gig of ram standard. As optional extras it takes the price up to £2045.
What next for the iMac? 6-8 cores next year? When Ivy comes to town? Can monitor sizes get any bigger? Now that it packs some gpu muscle (at last...) will it push further with the next update? Will the 'i7s' come as standard on the top two modesl (as they should be presently...)
Apple 'almost' gave it everything they got. (But you still have to pay for some of those as extras...) It's a worthy update. But as the Mac Pro heads off to 8 cores x 2 for 32 threads...maybe the iMac has one surprise left for us. We may just have to wait until next year for it.
Lemon Bon Bon.