I think a new iMac should sport an AMD Athlon X4 (620/630) with the 790gx or better chipset. That will be a good low price for great performance and will outshine the current Intel setup with the 9400 class GPU. Put that in the aluminum body and sell it for less.
If the price point is going to stay the same, the core i5 with the p55 chipset and a GPU with some dedicated VRAM will be good.
I agree that Apple could make some big cost savings by using AMD+ATI for "mainstream desktop". The only thing is the iMac by this stage is so geared towards using laptop parts they have to stick with Intel+Nvidia ... And by stick to it, I mean they're stuck. No great leaps in quadcore laptop CPUs (it is tough to design such CPUs) and Nvidia is really facing problems with getting GPUs down to 40nm and they are still churning out laptop GPUs based on 2007/2008 designs (the 100 series is a rebranded 9 series which was more or less rebranded 8 series)
Yeah,nothing but trouble. I feel guilty for getting the joke nvidia ,even before I registered the picture I was laughing.
LOL I actually dislike TOS, I'm a DS9 kind of guy. I haven't watched much TOS in fact, but somehow I did watch the Trible (spelling?) episode and it stuck in my mind.
Dude, I knew someone would do this. You just took one of the first or second page synthetic benchmarks and came to your conclusion.
Look at the 3D, gaming and video encoding benchmarks and you can see the Athlon2 X4 comes in around a Core2 *QUAD* but at a lower price point.
The Anandtech article was quite reasonable in showing where it shines, and where it doesn't. I would suggest you go back and actually read the whole article.
I mean, look at that benchmark you showed, the Core2 Duo does better than the Core2 Quad, which can't be the case all the time when using the computer, right? ...Even the Pentium does better than an Intel Quad in that benchmark.
But I do agree we are talking about desktop parts anyway so they can't even use a 65W (IIRC) Core2 Quad in an iMac, let alone any AMD.
Edit: I don't mean to sound rude, just that I think AMD's value is really misunderstood sometimes.
You can't just look at a highly threaded applications, where more cores=better, and draw your conclusion either.
I agree theses chips are very appealing for they market they're after. $400 will soon buy you a very capable windows machine at Best Buy.
But for an extra $100, I'l take the i5, thank you. It's faster in every respect.
But I can see where you, and others, would find the new Athlons appealing.
You can't just look at a highly threaded applications, where more cores=better, and draw your conclusion either.
I agree theses chips are very appealing for they market they're after. $400 will soon buy you a very capable windows machine at Best Buy.
But for an extra $100, I'l take the i5, thank you. It's faster in every respect.
But I can see where you, and others, would find the new Athlons appealing.
Fair enough.
So anyways I would go out and buy the Athlon2 X4 today so I can go from dualcore to quadcore while still using my existing AM2+ board.
Then I remember what I do need is to go from my 4830 512MB GPU to something to the level of a 4870 1GB GPU... Because I have a 1920x1080 screen now (well, since 2 months ago) -- they were/are so inexpensive now for a full HD screen... It's a lot of pixels and textures to push around though, for good PC titles to play at max res. Trouble is ATI doesn't have any other good 40nm cards released and shipping en mass besides the 4770... after all these months?
So anyways I would go out and buy the Athlon2 X4 today so I can go from dualcore to quadcore while still using my existing AM2+ board.
Then I remember what I do need is to go from my 4830 512MB GPU to something to the level of a 4870 1GB GPU... Because I have a 1920x1080 screen now (well, since 2 months ago) -- they were/are so inexpensive now for a full HD screen... It's a lot of pixels and textures to push around though, for good PC titles to play at max res. Trouble is ATI doesn't have any other good 40nm cards released and shipping en mass besides the 4770... after all these months?
A year ago I bought my parents an inexpensive Compaq machine with an Athlon x2 cpu. Are the new quad core Athlons socket compatible with the old X2 ones? If so I'll get one and drop it into their machine.
I've already added RAM and a new gpu so my son can play games on their computer when he visits. I actually am beginning to enjoy tinkering with that machine.
So anyways I would go out and buy the Athlon2 X4 today so I can go from dualcore to quadcore while still using my existing AM2+ board.
Then I remember what I do need is to go from my 4830 512MB GPU to something to the level of a 4870 1GB GPU... Because I have a 1920x1080 screen now (well, since 2 months ago) -- they were/are so inexpensive now for a full HD screen... It's a lot of pixels and textures to push around though, for good PC titles to play at max res. Trouble is ATI doesn't have any other good 40nm cards released and shipping en mass besides the 4770... after all these months?
Take heart, yon gamer... ATI's 5000-series cards will be out soon. Starting with the expensive but superfast 5870/5850 by the end of this month, but the 5770 is promised by November. 5770 should have the same specs as the 4870, but with a 40nm GPU and slightly less memory bandwidth. Should lead to good deals on the 4870, too.
Quote:
Originally Posted by backtomac
A year ago I bought my parents an inexpensive Compaq machine with an Athlon x2 cpu. Are the new quad core Athlons socket compatible with the old X2 ones? If so I'll get one and drop it into their machine.
I've already added RAM and a new gpu so my son can play games on their computer when he visits. I actually am beginning to enjoy tinkering with that machine.
They're socket-compatible with AM2/AM2+ but support depends on the BIOS. That's asking a lot of a cheap Compaq. It may very well work, but it also might not.
Who cares about blu-ray, the disks are still too expensive...
Speak for yourself. Some of us would like the option, and the disks are not too expensive if you a) shop around, and b) can't stand the poor quality of DVDs.
Speak for yourself. Some of us would like the option, and the disks are not too expensive if you a) shop around, and b) can't stand the poor quality of DVDs.
It's amazing. In just over 5 years I have grown to totally hate and be disgusted by the quality of DVDs. Damn You HD, Damn You !!!
The benefits of dual-channel RAM are measurable but almost never noticeable.
While the first implementations where questionable I don't believe that is the case any more. Certainly your workload is a factor but with todays apps and vastly improved CPUs I think it is fair to say you would notice going back to Single channel memory.
I really wonder when the new iMac will be announced, but I guess waiting for it might be worth it.
This is always tough but I'd suggest this, if you don't need it right now don't buy. There is a CHANCE that the iMac might debut with a new chip set soon. If they can't get it out by early November then you will have to wait until some time early next year. This is all my opinion though so take it with a grain of salt.
Normally I'd suggest simply buying when you want it but any sort of i5 or i7 would be a huge improvement. More importantly with the advent of Snow Leopard you really want at least four cores in your CPU. SL is showing impressive results with some software already thus when software is more generally SL enabled, those cores will be very handy.
These comments are based on my SL experience on a early 2008 MBP. In many ways it is very impressive. Yes there are glitches here and there but this is obviously a heavily refactored OS so that is expected to some extent.
heating problems can occur but they don't have to. A thinner cabinet actually has some benefits for thermal design as a thin cabinet gives the designer the ability to manage air flow. As for complaints about hot iMac cases that is the result of having hot parts close to the case. A hot case is only an issue if the chips themselves are operating to hot. Otherwise that is a sign that the case is carrying away heat.
Thinner or not the number one issue with the iMacs case is serviceability. Apple needs to take lessons from the MBP and completely overhaul the case. Thick or thin if I can service the machine myself without special tools Apple has a winner.
I would like Apple to support this in the refresh -
1. New cordless mouse design. The mouse has always been one of Apple's weakest points.
I use a Bluetoth mouse. It really makes sense to cut the cord on the mouse.
Quote:
2. Easy access to the hard drive. I really hated upgrading my hard drive by having to disassemble the screen.
This is huge and I'm really hoping Apple takes the bull by the horns here. They did an excellent job with the MBP overhauls so this should be a snap for them.
Quote:
3. Solid state drive option.
Certainly a good idea. However I'd like them to take a page from their server hardware. In this case a small 128GB flash drive for boot and app storage and the HD setup to store mass data. This gets us by the idea that flash drives are tiny storage capacity wise and adds considerable performance for little money.
Quote:
4. USB 3.0 with x2 extra ports.
Why not make em all USB 3? Whatever they do we still need the Firewire ports, in fact I'd like to have several.
Quote:
5. A display without image persistence, gloss / matte option.
How about a big display. Say 28 to 30".
Quote:
6. Faster DVD drive, maybe a Bluray option
Actually I'm hoping they just delete the drive. Give us an SD slot instead.
Quote:
7. Easy access to the video card.
This is not a big deal for me, in fact whu not integrate it right on the motherboard?
Quote:
Overall I would like to see Apple refresh their lineup with new components more frequently throughout the year, since tech specs go stale very quickly.
Having said all that, I'm still happy with my Macs. I've been a user / customer since 1990.
Yes I'm most impressed with my 2008 MBP. That is my first Mac since the Mac Plus. That change has a lot to do with iTunes and the arrival of Mac OS/X.
While the first implementations where questionable I don't believe that is the case any more. Certainly your workload is a factor but with todays apps and vastly improved CPUs I think it is fair to say you would notice going back to Single channel memory.
Dave
No, not really. A system using dual-channel RAM is going to be 3-4% faster than a system without according to benchmarks of real-world apps (i.e., not memory benchmarks). Gaming on integrated graphics sees the most improvement, as the IGP uses system memory.
Which can give additional room for possibly hotter components.
The thing here is that the internals in the iMac are a mess. Truely disgusting especially when sitting side by side with the MBP internals. So yeah a bigger machine can help but what is really needed is a new approach. A clean layout of the components, and the PC board could dramatically impact user acceptance too. If people think the new machine is reasonable serviceable I actually think people looking for something XMac like might accept it. That is if another disk bay can be had in the unit.
Honestly I would think that most folks who are interested in upgrading would already do their research and know which units are capable of upgrades and which are not.
I consider the iMac to be much like a laptop in this regard. The only exception is the hard drive, which unfortunately appears to be very complicated to change out on your own.
I think the bulk of buyers simply aren't interested in taking the guts out of their computers. I'm not saying I wouldn't want to see a user serviceable iMac, but I don't think it will be high on Apple's priority list unfortunately.
Comments
A bit off topic, but when will we see a move from trible-channel to four or five-channel RAM?
I know ATI uses ddr5 RAM in some of their graphic cards
Intel is building an 8-core processor and AMD is building a 12-core processor, both for next year, that will each have four DDR3 controllers.
It'll probably never come to consumer processors of the sort you use. It only benefits servers. So don't worry about it.
GDDR5 is just high-speed graphics RAM. Its name does not indicate the number of memory channels (the Radeon 4870's GPU has four).
I think a new iMac should sport an AMD Athlon X4 (620/630) with the 790gx or better chipset. That will be a good low price for great performance and will outshine the current Intel setup with the 9400 class GPU. Put that in the aluminum body and sell it for less.
AMD Athlon X4
If the price point is going to stay the same, the core i5 with the p55 chipset and a GPU with some dedicated VRAM will be good.
I agree that Apple could make some big cost savings by using AMD+ATI for "mainstream desktop". The only thing is the iMac by this stage is so geared towards using laptop parts they have to stick with Intel+Nvidia ... And by stick to it, I mean they're stuck. No great leaps in quadcore laptop CPUs (it is tough to design such CPUs) and Nvidia is really facing problems with getting GPUs down to 40nm and they are still churning out laptop GPUs based on 2007/2008 designs (the 100 series is a rebranded 9 series which was more or less rebranded 8 series)
Yeah,nothing but trouble. I feel guilty for getting the joke nvidia ,even before I registered the picture I was laughing.
LOL I actually dislike TOS, I'm a DS9 kind of guy. I haven't watched much TOS in fact, but somehow I did watch the Trible (spelling?) episode and it stuck in my mind.
Dude, I knew someone would do this. You just took one of the first or second page synthetic benchmarks and came to your conclusion.
Look at the 3D, gaming and video encoding benchmarks and you can see the Athlon2 X4 comes in around a Core2 *QUAD* but at a lower price point.
The Anandtech article was quite reasonable in showing where it shines, and where it doesn't. I would suggest you go back and actually read the whole article.
I mean, look at that benchmark you showed, the Core2 Duo does better than the Core2 Quad, which can't be the case all the time when using the computer, right?
But I do agree we are talking about desktop parts anyway so they can't even use a 65W (IIRC) Core2 Quad in an iMac, let alone any AMD.
Edit: I don't mean to sound rude, just that I think AMD's value is really misunderstood sometimes.
You can't just look at a highly threaded applications, where more cores=better, and draw your conclusion either.
I agree theses chips are very appealing for they market they're after. $400 will soon buy you a very capable windows machine at Best Buy.
But for an extra $100, I'l take the i5, thank you. It's faster in every respect.
But I can see where you, and others, would find the new Athlons appealing.
You can't just look at a highly threaded applications, where more cores=better, and draw your conclusion either.
I agree theses chips are very appealing for they market they're after. $400 will soon buy you a very capable windows machine at Best Buy.
But for an extra $100, I'l take the i5, thank you. It's faster in every respect.
But I can see where you, and others, would find the new Athlons appealing.
Fair enough.
So anyways I would go out and buy the Athlon2 X4 today so I can go from dualcore to quadcore while still using my existing AM2+ board.
Then I remember what I do need is to go from my 4830 512MB GPU to something to the level of a 4870 1GB GPU... Because I have a 1920x1080 screen now (well, since 2 months ago) -- they were/are so inexpensive now for a full HD screen... It's a lot of pixels and textures to push around though, for good PC titles to play at max res. Trouble is ATI doesn't have any other good 40nm cards released and shipping en mass besides the 4770... after all these months?
Fair enough.
So anyways I would go out and buy the Athlon2 X4 today so I can go from dualcore to quadcore while still using my existing AM2+ board.
Then I remember what I do need is to go from my 4830 512MB GPU to something to the level of a 4870 1GB GPU... Because I have a 1920x1080 screen now (well, since 2 months ago) -- they were/are so inexpensive now for a full HD screen... It's a lot of pixels and textures to push around though, for good PC titles to play at max res. Trouble is ATI doesn't have any other good 40nm cards released and shipping en mass besides the 4770... after all these months?
A year ago I bought my parents an inexpensive Compaq machine with an Athlon x2 cpu. Are the new quad core Athlons socket compatible with the old X2 ones? If so I'll get one and drop it into their machine.
I've already added RAM and a new gpu so my son can play games on their computer when he visits. I actually am beginning to enjoy tinkering with that machine.
Fair enough.
So anyways I would go out and buy the Athlon2 X4 today so I can go from dualcore to quadcore while still using my existing AM2+ board.
Then I remember what I do need is to go from my 4830 512MB GPU to something to the level of a 4870 1GB GPU... Because I have a 1920x1080 screen now (well, since 2 months ago) -- they were/are so inexpensive now for a full HD screen... It's a lot of pixels and textures to push around though, for good PC titles to play at max res. Trouble is ATI doesn't have any other good 40nm cards released and shipping en mass besides the 4770... after all these months?
Take heart, yon gamer... ATI's 5000-series cards will be out soon. Starting with the expensive but superfast 5870/5850 by the end of this month, but the 5770 is promised by November. 5770 should have the same specs as the 4870, but with a 40nm GPU and slightly less memory bandwidth. Should lead to good deals on the 4870, too.
A year ago I bought my parents an inexpensive Compaq machine with an Athlon x2 cpu. Are the new quad core Athlons socket compatible with the old X2 ones? If so I'll get one and drop it into their machine.
I've already added RAM and a new gpu so my son can play games on their computer when he visits. I actually am beginning to enjoy tinkering with that machine.
They're socket-compatible with AM2/AM2+ but support depends on the BIOS. That's asking a lot of a cheap Compaq. It may very well work, but it also might not.
Who cares about blu-ray, the disks are still too expensive...
Speak for yourself. Some of us would like the option, and the disks are not too expensive if you a) shop around, and b) can't stand the poor quality of DVDs.
Speak for yourself. Some of us would like the option, and the disks are not too expensive if you a) shop around, and b) can't stand the poor quality of DVDs.
It's amazing. In just over 5 years I have grown to totally hate and be disgusted by the quality of DVDs.
Intel is building an 8-core processor and AMD is building a 12-core processor, both for next year, that will each have four DDR3 controllers.
It'll probably never come to consumer processors of the sort you use. It only benefits servers. So don't worry about it.
GDDR5 is just high-speed graphics RAM. Its name does not indicate the number of memory channels (the Radeon 4870's GPU has four).
Okay now I understand, thank you for clearing that up
Intel is building an 8-core processor and AMD is building a 12-core processor, both for next year, that will each have four DDR3 controllers.
It'll probably never come to consumer processors of the sort you use. It only benefits servers. So don't worry about it.
Macs Pro use server-class processors. :-)
The benefits of dual-channel RAM are measurable but almost never noticeable.
While the first implementations where questionable I don't believe that is the case any more. Certainly your workload is a factor but with todays apps and vastly improved CPUs I think it is fair to say you would notice going back to Single channel memory.
Dave
..............
I really wonder when the new iMac will be announced, but I guess waiting for it might be worth it.
This is always tough but I'd suggest this, if you don't need it right now don't buy. There is a CHANCE that the iMac might debut with a new chip set soon. If they can't get it out by early November then you will have to wait until some time early next year. This is all my opinion though so take it with a grain of salt.
Normally I'd suggest simply buying when you want it but any sort of i5 or i7 would be a huge improvement. More importantly with the advent of Snow Leopard you really want at least four cores in your CPU. SL is showing impressive results with some software already thus when software is more generally SL enabled, those cores will be very handy.
These comments are based on my SL experience on a early 2008 MBP. In many ways it is very impressive. Yes there are glitches here and there but this is obviously a heavily refactored OS so that is expected to some extent.
Dave
heating problems can occur.
I vote that it doesn't need to be thinner.
heating problems can occur but they don't have to. A thinner cabinet actually has some benefits for thermal design as a thin cabinet gives the designer the ability to manage air flow. As for complaints about hot iMac cases that is the result of having hot parts close to the case. A hot case is only an issue if the chips themselves are operating to hot. Otherwise that is a sign that the case is carrying away heat.
Thinner or not the number one issue with the iMacs case is serviceability. Apple needs to take lessons from the MBP and completely overhaul the case. Thick or thin if I can service the machine myself without special tools Apple has a winner.
Dave
I would like Apple to support this in the refresh -
1. New cordless mouse design. The mouse has always been one of Apple's weakest points.
I use a Bluetoth mouse. It really makes sense to cut the cord on the mouse.
2. Easy access to the hard drive. I really hated upgrading my hard drive by having to disassemble the screen.
This is huge and I'm really hoping Apple takes the bull by the horns here. They did an excellent job with the MBP overhauls so this should be a snap for them.
3. Solid state drive option.
Certainly a good idea. However I'd like them to take a page from their server hardware. In this case a small 128GB flash drive for boot and app storage and the HD setup to store mass data. This gets us by the idea that flash drives are tiny storage capacity wise and adds considerable performance for little money.
4. USB 3.0 with x2 extra ports.
Why not make em all USB 3? Whatever they do we still need the Firewire ports, in fact I'd like to have several.
5. A display without image persistence, gloss / matte option.
How about a big display. Say 28 to 30".
6. Faster DVD drive, maybe a Bluray option
Actually I'm hoping they just delete the drive. Give us an SD slot instead.
7. Easy access to the video card.
This is not a big deal for me, in fact whu not integrate it right on the motherboard?
Overall I would like to see Apple refresh their lineup with new components more frequently throughout the year, since tech specs go stale very quickly.
Having said all that, I'm still happy with my Macs. I've been a user / customer since 1990.
Yes I'm most impressed with my 2008 MBP. That is my first Mac since the Mac Plus. That change has a lot to do with iTunes and the arrival of Mac OS/X.
Dave
While the first implementations where questionable I don't believe that is the case any more. Certainly your workload is a factor but with todays apps and vastly improved CPUs I think it is fair to say you would notice going back to Single channel memory.
Dave
No, not really. A system using dual-channel RAM is going to be 3-4% faster than a system without according to benchmarks of real-world apps (i.e., not memory benchmarks). Gaming on integrated graphics sees the most improvement, as the IGP uses system memory.
How about a big display. Say 28 to 30".
Which can give additional room for possibly hotter components.
Which can give additional room for possibly hotter components.
The thing here is that the internals in the iMac are a mess. Truely disgusting especially when sitting side by side with the MBP internals. So yeah a bigger machine can help but what is really needed is a new approach. A clean layout of the components, and the PC board could dramatically impact user acceptance too. If people think the new machine is reasonable serviceable I actually think people looking for something XMac like might accept it. That is if another disk bay can be had in the unit.
Dave
I consider the iMac to be much like a laptop in this regard. The only exception is the hard drive, which unfortunately appears to be very complicated to change out on your own.
I think the bulk of buyers simply aren't interested in taking the guts out of their computers. I'm not saying I wouldn't want to see a user serviceable iMac, but I don't think it will be high on Apple's priority list unfortunately.
RAM and Hard Drive upgrades are the only necessity.
For the price point, I think Apple needs to do away with integrated graphics in the iMac entirely.
But the graphics card doesn't need to be accessible.