Thought on new iMac education model.

Posted:
in Current Mac Hardware edited January 2014
If Apple can offer a downgraded version of the new iMac G5 for the education, why not go a step in the other direction? Offer a "special edition" with either a Geforce FX5700 or a Radeon 9600 with 128mb of RAM.
«1

Comments

  • Reply 1 of 25
    toweltowel Posts: 1,479member
    Wow. I wouldn't have expected the EDU-only model to have a different video card. I thought previous EDU-only simply lacked an optical drive, or had CD-ROMS, along with smaller HD and less RAM. The iMac's video card is still in no way replaceable, without swapping out the entire motherboard, right? It's not in any kind of slot, is it? Of course, this iMac's board seems to be user-replaceable anyway. Maybe Apple will offer some sort of upgrade or SE in the future. But that doesn't explain how it makes economic sense for them to go through all the trouble of designing a whole separate motherboard just for the low-end EDU market. Weird.
  • Reply 2 of 25
    thttht Posts: 5,421member
    I'd hazard a guess that the education market is a whole lot bigger than the BTO market and therefore worth the inventory investment for the low-end iMac edu board. The design time is probably pretty close to nothing on Apple's scale to put in the MX chipset. It's the inventory, not the engineering, that'll usually cost Apple.



    If Apple had a really really good just-in-time manufacturing process, they could offer BTO option iMac G5's with a GeForce 5700 or Radeon 9600/9700 w/128 MB, but they apparently don't have such a manufacturing model and don't want to suffer the inventory glut.
  • Reply 3 of 25
    kotatsukotatsu Posts: 1,010member
    There is clearly a demand for iMac G5 with a good GPU. You just need to browse the message boards or read the reviews. Such a machine would reall help uptake with the more dedicated home user, especially those who like to play games.



    The more machines that can play games, the more games will be made and the more will be bought.



    I think you're aiming far to low with talk of a Radeon 9600. That's really old news now, Apple should be offering 9800 as a cheap upgrade, then X800 for those that can afford it. They're not ultra expensive pro chips, they're just high performance game GPUs which are not at all uncommon in PCs.



    It's the deal breaker for me. When Apple have an iMac with a high end GPU in it, I will place my order.
  • Reply 4 of 25
    placeboplacebo Posts: 5,767member
    Why? For the same reason you can fill a glass halfway, but not twice its capacity. I'm almost positive it's for heat reasons.
  • Reply 5 of 25
    Quote:

    Originally posted by kotatsu

    There is clearly a demand for iMac G5 with a good GPU. You just need to browse the message boards or read the reviews. Such a machine would reall help uptake with the more dedicated home user, especially those who like to play games.



    The more machines that can play games, the more games will be made and the more will be bought.



    I think you're aiming far to low with talk of a Radeon 9600. That's really old news now, Apple should be offering 9800 as a cheap upgrade, then X800 for those that can afford it. They're not ultra expensive pro chips, they're just high performance game GPUs which are not at all uncommon in PCs.



    It's the deal breaker for me. When Apple have an iMac with a high end GPU in it, I will place my order.




    The 9600XT could be cooled by the iMac's current setup. The 9800 would require a major redesign and a large fan. The 9600XT might not be the ultimate graphics card, but ti would still be a substantial improvement for gamers over the 5200.
  • Reply 6 of 25
    kickahakickaha Posts: 8,760member
    What Placebo said. Check out the wattage requirements (and therefore heat output) of those high-end GPUs. Oy.
  • Reply 7 of 25
    pbpb Posts: 4,255member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by Placebo

    I'm almost positive it's for heat reasons.



    So this would mean the new iMac will remain with a 5200 for the rest of its life? No, I think that the iMac G5 will see a GPU bump somewhere next year or beginning 2006 (quite probably with a today's nVidia GPU, e.g. from the 5xxx series), and this new GPU will accompany it until the next major redesign (if this is going to happen in 2-2.5 years; if it takes longer, I believe there will be another GPU bump in the meantime). Simply Apple don't want to run out of GPU update possibilities just from the start by using a more capable (and more hot) GPU.
  • Reply 8 of 25
    kickahakickaha Posts: 8,760member
    Nooooooo.... GPUs get cooler for the same performance as time goes on, just like CPUs. There's just not as much demand to do so, since the high-end GPUs are generally purchased by folks who are going to slap them in a gaming rig with an insane power supply and massive (loud) cooling system.



    But they will get cooler.



    However, for the moment, I'm not convinced that other more capable GPUs would meet the heat requirements. I think the choice of GPU is much more limited by heat than upgrade possibilities *at the moment*.
  • Reply 9 of 25
    pbpb Posts: 4,255member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by Kickaha

    Nooooooo.... GPUs get cooler for the same performance as time goes on, just like CPUs.



    OK, perhaps you are right. I am not going to debate this point since we ignore Apple's reasons for this choice. Next year will tell for sure.
  • Reply 10 of 25
    kotatsukotatsu Posts: 1,010member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by BenRoethig

    The 9600XT could be cooled by the iMac's current setup. The 9800 would require a major redesign and a large fan. The 9600XT might not be the ultimate graphics card, but ti would still be a substantial improvement for gamers over the 5200.



    I have a Radeon 9800 Pro 256mb in my PC. It's one of ATI's own cards, and only has a small fan on top. It does get hot, and Doom 3 is able to get it pretty toasty, but it certainly doesn't have the over sized monster fans you get on the big NVidia cards. Or even on the top ATI cards.



    What about Radeon 9800 Mobility? Surely that must be able to cope with pretty tame cooling.
  • Reply 11 of 25
    My Radeon 9800 Pro by Atlantis is completely fan free. I am currently thinking about buying a new iMac, a better GPU would make my decision a lot easier.
  • Reply 12 of 25
    the nVidia 5200 is really the only logical and possible choice for the new iMac. if you would stop to realize the incredible nature of the iMac, you would find that a different card is relatively impossible at this stage. Unless they packed mobile parts in it, they have to stick with what they deal with. and by using mobile chipsets, they aren't building a desktop, they're building an oversized notebook with a stand. they don't want that. i don't want that. the only game right now thats going to present a real problem for the 5200 is doom 3, and thats not even out yet. think about it. by the time they release doom 3, they'll probably have a new GPU in it, so quit ur complaining and read the threads that already go over this topic
  • Reply 13 of 25
    kickahakickaha Posts: 8,760member
    But what would be the geeky fun in something rational like *that*?!?
  • Reply 14 of 25
    Quote:

    Originally posted by exhibit_13

    the nVidia 5200 is really the only logical and possible choice for the new iMac. if you would stop to realize the incredible nature of the iMac, you would find that a different card is relatively impossible at this stage. Unless they packed mobile parts in it, they have to stick with what they deal with. and by using mobile chipsets, they aren't building a desktop, they're building an oversized notebook with a stand. they don't want that. i don't want that. the only game right now thats going to present a real problem for the 5200 is doom 3, and thats not even out yet. think about it. by the time they release doom 3, they'll probably have a new GPU in it, so quit ur complaining and read the threads that already go over this topic



    I am not sure I follow what you are saying and if I do then I am going to have to disagree. I think there are plenty of other GPUs that could have worked. The difference between laptop parts and desktop parts isn't really an issue since a lot of the time they are very similar if not the same. I wouldn't mind having an iMac with a "mobile" Radeon 9600/9700. I don't doubt that most modern games will run on a new iMac but I do doubt that they could run at the iMac's native resolution which would really be the prefered way to play games.
  • Reply 15 of 25
    i think we'll probably see a first revision in say, 6 months or so, and in that time, we will find a new GPU in it which will be faster, and hopefully have more video ram on it. apple needed something cooler to put in until they could find a faster, better solution. AGP 8x helps too... so it'll do fine for now i think
  • Reply 16 of 25
    emig647emig647 Posts: 2,455member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by BenRoethig

    The 9600XT could be cooled by the iMac's current setup. The 9800 would require a major redesign and a large fan. The 9600XT might not be the ultimate graphics card, but ti would still be a substantial improvement for gamers over the 5200.



    Very true, I'm perfectly happy with my 9600xt in my dual 2.0 g5... I have a 5900xt in my AMD 64 box... works great... but when I host LAN parties here... everyone wants the mac...
  • Reply 17 of 25
    emig647emig647 Posts: 2,455member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by exhibit_13

    i think we'll probably see a first revision in say, 6 months or so, and in that time, we will find a new GPU in it which will be faster, and hopefully have more video ram on it. apple needed something cooler to put in until they could find a faster, better solution. AGP 8x helps too... so it'll do fine for now i think



    The g5 iMac will only get a faster gpu if the powermacs get a faster gpu... apple isn't going to sell an iMac with a faster gpu then the low and mid range Powermacs.
  • Reply 18 of 25
    Quote:

    Originally posted by exhibit_13

    i think we'll probably see a first revision in say, 6 months or so, and in that time, we will find a new GPU in it which will be faster, and hopefully have more video ram on it. apple needed something cooler to put in until they could find a faster, better solution. AGP 8x helps too... so it'll do fine for now i think



    There are more powerful options that are doable right now, and AGP 8x doesn't mean anything. No game even takes full advantage of 4x.



    Quote:

    The g5 iMac will only get a faster gpu if the powermacs get a faster gpu... apple isn't going to sell an iMac with a faster gpu then the low and mid range Powermacs.



    Then they should hurry up and refresh the PM options. They're regular add-on cards in that product lineup, so it couldn't be much simpler.



    The fact that 2 of the PowerMacs come with a 5200 Ultra standard is insane. There's no excuse for anything weaker than a 9700 to be in the "professional" systems at this point.
  • Reply 19 of 25
    emig647emig647 Posts: 2,455member
    Quote:

    Originally posted by nowayout11

    There are more powerful options that are doable right now, and AGP 8x doesn't mean anything. No game even takes full advantage of 4x.



    Keyword.... GAME....



    Professional applications such as cinema, Maya, etc... take full advantage of it. This is a complaint to professionals... not gamers.



    You are right though... 5200 in bottom and mid g5 is INSANE! I still don't get why we can't just drop a 9800xt off of the pc market side and flash the rom with MBToolkit. Anyone wanna elborate on this one?
  • Reply 20 of 25
    kickahakickaha Posts: 8,760member
    Hit Cmd-F. Type 'heat'. Hit return.
Sign In or Register to comment.