iMac Graphics Card Details and Comparisons (HD 2X00 Series)

[Haoshiro]

There has already been a couple topics and several posts that talk about and argue the merits of the new macs, this thread aims to give the people who jump into this forum the facts as well as some comparisons.

It's intended as a quick reference of information for those who are considering purchasing the new iMac ("Mid 2007"), and need technical details about the GPU to help their decision.

To start things off, let's get a few details out of the way.

iMacs are essentially "desktop laptops", they use mobile processors, mobile ram, and they also use mobile GPUs. This is not specifically advertised.
Because of this, keep in mind any time the GPUs are talked about in the specifications, they are actually the "Mobility" (ATI) or "Go/M" (nVidia) series graphics cards.
If you want to play games the best thing to do in an iMac is to add more memory (RAM), stock 1GB tends to be a bottleneck and will prevent the rest of the system from reaching its full potential.
The HD 2400 XT is less powerful then the "plain" HD 2400
Yes, the HD 2600 Pro (Mobility) in the new iMacs is the best GPU offered in an iMac to date (that's right, better then the X1600 and the 7300GT)
The HD 2X00 Series cards have a completely different architecture that few games are taking advantage of right now. It's designed to be shader intensive - In fact they can easily offer double the shader operations of the nVidia 8 Series cards! (8600GT, etc). This will be more of a payoff in newer shader-heavy games/engines then current gen games.
They are also very new cards - and as with any brand new GPU expect major performance improvements with more optimized drivers. Developers likely haven't even had much time with them yet, so look at benchmarks distrustingly for now, performance is almost garaunteed to improve as both drivers and game software matures.


Okay, on to some specs and comparisons.

The first comparison here will not be of the "Mobility" class since I can't find a good site that includes the mobile version of the HD 2X00 series cards (they are too new).

GPUReview.com - ATI HD 2600 Pro VS X1600 Pro (http://www.gpureview.com/show_cards.php?card1=522&card2=350)
(You can change the cards to view different comparisons, hopefully the site will update with the mobile versions of the new cards soon.)

One thing you should notice immediately from that comparison is the the HD 2600 has a HUGE boost in Shader Operations from 72,000 vs 6,000. It's worth noting, though, that the X1600 has a separate Vertex unit, so those numbers aren't a direct 1:1 ratio.

For more details on shader operations, see:

GPUReview.com - Shader Operations (http://www.gpureview.com/shader-operations-article-357.html)

Here's a notable snipped:

Though it's not a perfect indicator of performance, all else being equal, a card with more pixel shader processing power will outperform a card with lower pixel shader power. As games get more and more shader dependent, cards with more shading power will pull farther and farther ahead of competing cards.

A perfect example of this phenomenon is the X1800 XT and the X1900 XTX. Both cards have nearly identical specifications, with the exception of shader processing power. The X1900 XTX has 3 times the shader processing power of the X1800 XT. This change alone is enough to make the X1900 XTX nearly twice as fast as the X1800 XT in shader-heavy games.

So what games are shader-heavy? I'm not sure about current games, especially as a lot of this is still classed as "DirectX 10" and "Shader Model 4.0", which no games out (to my knowledge) support this.

My best guess, would be newer games: Crysis, RAGE, UT3, etc. Specifically, anything that will be running on CryENGINE 2 (Crysis), iD Tech 5 (RAGE), and Unreal Engine 3 (UT3, Gears of War)

That being said, the GPUs in iMacs aren't (and will never be), high-end cards. These aren't HD 2900s or 8800 GTXs, don't expect to max out resolution and settings.

----------

Now, here's some technical details on the cards in question (I'll list the Mobility HD 2600 Pro, then only list notable performance number differences for the other cards):

ATI Mobility Radeon HD 2600 - Overview (http://ati.amd.com/products/mobilityradeonhd2600/index.html)

ATI Avivo HD

High Definition video playback, including full HD DVD and Blu-ray disc support while on battery

"Radically New" and Efficient 3D Architecture
Performance-per-Watt (Requires only 45W)


ATI Mobility Radeon HD 2600 - Specifications (http://ati.amd.com/products/mobilityradeonhd2600/specs.html)

Features

390 million transistors using 65nm fabrication process (Should run cooler then 90nm)
Unified superscalar shader architecture
128-bit 4-channel GDDR3 memory interface
256-bit internal ring bus for memory read/write

Unified Superscalar Shader Architecture

120 stream processing units (Dynamically balance for vertex/geometry/pixel shaders)
128-bit floating point precision for all operations
Command processor for reduced CPU overhead
Up to 40 texture fetches per clock cycle
Up to 128 textures per pixel
High-resolution texture support (up to 8192 x 8192)
8 render targets (MRTs) with ant-aliasing support
Physics processing support

Full support for Microsoft DirectX 10.0

Shader Model 4.0
Geometry Shaders
etc

Anti-aliasing features

Multi-sample anti-aliasing (up to 8 samples per pixel)
Custom Filter Anti-Aliasing (CFAA) for improved quality
Adaptive super-sampling and multi-sampling
All anti-aliasing features compatible with HDR rendering

Texture filtering features

2x/4x/8x/16x high quality adaptive anisotropic filtering modes (Up to 128 taps per pixel)
128-bit floating point HDR texture filtering
Shared exponent HDR (RGBE 9:9:9:5) texture format support



ATI Mobility Radeon HD 2400 XT - Specifications (http://ati.amd.com/products/mobilityradeonhd2400xt/specs.html)

Features

180 million transistors using 65nm fabrication process
64-bit single channel GDDR3 memory interface

Unified Superscalar Shader Architecture

40 stream processing units
Up to 16 texture fetches per clock cycle

Anti-aliasing features

Multi-sample anti-aliasing (up to 4 samples per pixel)



ATI Mobility Radeon X1600 - Specifications (http://ati.amd.com/products/mobilityradeonx1600/specs.html)

Features

157 million transistors using 90nm fabrication process
128-bit 4-channel GDDR3 memory interface

Ultra-Threaded Shader Engine

DirectX 9.0
Shader Model 3.0
12 pixel shaders
5 vertex shaders



The standout in these specs to me, personally, is that the Mobility HD 2400 XT has such a drastically slower memory interface! A single channel 64-bit interface compared to 4-channel 128-bit interfaces.

On the surface it looks like everything else might beat out the X1600 found in older iMacs, but it seems highly likely the memory interface will strangle the card from ever outperforming it, though. Time will tell, I suppose.

[MAW]

as someone ready to purchase and a bit jaded with all the negative posts this past 24 hrs. i'd like to thank you for putting the gpu issue into perspective. very helpful!!

i am gpu ILLITERATE and only know how to judge a card based on googling fps performance so i make no claim to wisdom here but, just my $.02, i see both sides of the arguement on this issue.

while some were expecting and hoping(myself included,based on readings) for maybe the 8600, the hd 2600 seems to be more suited for every day ilife application( i.e. the video encoding capabilities) which is what the imac itself seems to be intended for.

ofcourse in an ideal world we would get all the new imac has to offer AND the ability to play crysis @ max rez. and settings. but it's obvious with this refresh that the imac is intended to further bridge the gap between computer and entertainment center and it's a big balancing act to pull off and nigh impossible to please us all.


that said, i think these new machines are lovely and can't wait to get mine!!!

[GFLPraxis]

Two minor corrections.
iMacs are essentially "desktop laptops", they use mobile processors, mobile ram, 2.5" hard drives, and they also use mobile GPUs. This is not specifically advertised.

Mobile processors, mobile RAM, and mobile GPUs are correct, but iMacs use DESKTOP hard drives, which is why they are suitable for video editing (though obviously a Mac Pro is even better). Mobile processors are usually as good as desktop, except they cost significantly more and cap out lower (2.8 GHz vs 3.33 GHz in the case of the Core 2 Duo IIRC).

Only Mobile GPUs are usually worse than their desktop counterparts, AND more expensive.

Yes, the HD 2600 Pro (Mobility) in the new iMacs is the best GPU offered in an iMac to date (that's right, better then the X1600 and the 7300GT)

The question in a lot of people's minds right now, though, is this. The previous iMac offered a BTO option of the 7600GT. Does the HD 2600 Pro beat that?


It's clear that the new iMac's stock cards beat the old iMac's stock cards, but the high end iMac had the option of an even better card, and I think that's the real question.

-----

Thanks for clearing things up though. I think one of the most important things people miss is that these new cards are DirectX 10/OpenGL 2 cards. When the next generation of games comes, these will probably have significant performance advantages just because of the greater feature set.



It's nice to have a thread for clearing through the FUD. I can't figure out what features iMovie has because alongside people claiming there is no audio rubberbanding and dual-soundtracks are people claiming there are no transitions and titles (obvious from watching the keynote that some of these are false). The level of FUD is just ridiculous.

I would like to see people just shut up about iMac complaints though. We're talking about $300 price drop, bigger screens, better CPU, bigger hard drives, better hardware (gigabit ethernet, 802.11n, BT2.0), glass screens that can be cleaned easily, a new design, and the stock GPUs are slightly better. People are complaining that the GPU's are not much better and rating it negative. Anyone who can consider the new iMacs a "lackluster update" (I've seen that comment) because the GPU is only slightly better is simply insane.





EDIT:
Wait, this is one of those new cards with HD encoder/decoder chips on board, right? Does OS X utilize that?!?

[TheSilencer]

OK, let´s see the G84M 8600 Specs.

284 million transistors.
80nm process
475MHz Core
7.6 billion texel/sec fillrate
32 shader units, 950MHz
12.8/22.4GB/sec bandwidth
128bit memory interface
up to 1400MHz memory clock speed
91.2Gigaflops shader processing power

And some additional features, HDCP, supported quality modes and so on:

http://www.nvidia.com/object/geforce_8600_8500_tech_specs.html

Compared only the "RAW" processing power:
GF8600M GT - 91.2Gigaflops
HD2400 XT - 56Gigaflops
HD2600 PRO - 114Gigaflops

Main problem with the new ATi cards are driver and architecture. Technically, they could gain 30-40% more power if driver and games or programms can use them full but even 50% more would only mean that you now have in Command and Conquer 3 (PC) not 28FPS (1024x768, high quality) go to 42FPS.


The new card compared to the old card from the 24" iMac, the 7600GT beats the HD2600 Pro.

http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=3023&p=6

[Haoshiro]

... but iMacs use DESKTOP hard drives ...


Wasn't extremely easy to track down proof of that (as SATA is also available in 2.5"), but you're definitely right and I've corrected the post!


The question in a lot of people's minds right now, though, is this. The previous iMac offered a BTO option of the 7600GT. Does the HD 2600 Pro beat that?


Possibly...
GPUReview.com - HD 2600 Pro VS 7600GT (http://www.gpureview.com/show_cards.php?card1=522&card2=385)

HD 2600 Pro:
Memory Bandwidth: 16 GB/sec
Shader Operations: 72000 Operations/sec
Pixel Fill Rate: 2400 MPixels/sec
Texture Fill Rate: 4800 MTexels/sec

7600GT:
Core Clock: 560 MHz
Memory Clock: 700 MHz (1400 DDR)
Memory Bandwidth: 22.4 GB/sec
Shader Operations: 6720 Operations/sec
Pixel Fill Rate: 4480 MPixels/sec
Texture Fill Rate: 6720 MTexels/sec
Vertex Operations: 700 MVertices/sec

The HD 2600 Pro thus ends up:
- 29% less Memory Bandwidth
- 47% less Pixel Fill Rate
- 29% less Texture Fill Rate
+ 1,071% more the Shader Operations (10.71X)
+ DirectX 10
+ Shader Model 4.0
+ Physics processing support

I would venture to guess these numbers are going to mean the 7600GT is definitely better for current games. But with that massive shader advantage, it could easily make up for the deficiencies in upcoming engines. Will it? We'll have to wait and see I guess.


Wait, this is one of those new cards with HD encoder/decoder chips on board, right? Does OS X utilize that?!?

I believe the answer to both to those is "Yes", but I'm just saying that from memory. If someone has links to back up or deny that, post them please!

[harveypooka]

Great post, Haoshiro.

I guess I was hoping for something a bit more revolutionary though...

[Eidorian]

I'd go with the 7600GT any day.

[Haoshiro]

Compared only the "RAW" processing power:
GF8600M GT - 91.2 Gigaflops
HD2400 XT - 56 Gigaflops
HD2600 PRO - 114 Gigaflops

So the HD 2600 Pro even beats the 8600M GT in raw power, interesting.

It's all going to come down to good drivers and engines. Shaders are becoming more and more important, and it looks like that is exactly where the HD 2X00 series really shines.

Well, that and video output. ATI has always won the "visual quality" award when it comes to 2D (images, movies), and with plenty of power to push HD DVD and Blu-ray (even on battery power no less), that's great to have.

[MacRumorUser]

Cough 'nerds' Cough :p





Great post H!

[Haoshiro]

Cough 'nerds' Cough :p

Haha, too true!

i'd like to thank you for putting the gpu issue into perspective. very helpful!!

It's nice to have a thread for clearing through the FUD.

Great post, Haoshiro.

Great post H!

Thanks for all the compliments, much appreciated! I definitely spent far too much time on it, lol...

[Chone]

So the HD 2600 Pro even beats the 8600M GT in raw power, interesting.

It's all going to come down to good drivers and engines. Shaders are becoming more and more important, and it looks like that is exactly where the HD 2X00 series really shines.

Well, that and video output. ATI has always won the "visual quality" award when it comes to 2D (images, movies), and with plenty of power to push HD DVD and Blu-ray (even on battery power no less), that's great to have.

Just a little point I'd like to make, we already have two massive shader-intensive engines out there, the Oblivion engine and the F.E.A.R. engine, if there is a place where the HD 2600 should shine is those games and while they perform quite nicely, the 8600 cards still outpace them.

Also, there were initially driver problems but those were corrected a LONG time ago, the current Cat 7.7 are more than adequate and developer for the HD cards' full potential.

Also it doesn't matter if the HD 2600 has the shader power to shine in games, if its already this limited in Oblivion then it will certainly be bottlenecked in other games (you see shaders are not everything).

Just a little thing I wanted to say, don't get your hopes up for the HD 2600, this is the performance you are getting today and the performance you'll get tomorrow. No hidden potential or driver issues or "shader intensive" engines we haven't seen. We've seen Oblivion, we've seen the Cat 7.7 and we know just what the HD 2600 is capable of.

Other than that, a really nice post but still, the HD 2400 in the $1200 iMac is WORSE than the X1600 it had before and the HD 2600 Pro is worse than the 7600GT the 24 incher had before and the HD 2600 Pro is not a big leap over the 7300GT and X1600.

If you are considering a 1200 iMac be sure you are not going to use 3D at all because springing up to the HD 2600 would be quite an upgrade.

[GFLPraxis]

I'd go with the 7600GT any day.

For current games, yeah, but he's right; the ATi card is WAY better for shader operations, and games like Crysis are very shader-heavy. I'd expect the ATi card to perform better for all DirectX 10-era games like Gears of War or Crysis.

[TheSilencer]

Hm, yes. But the DX10 performance is very low for all mid range cards, the fun starts with GeForce 8800GTS 640MB or ATi HD2900XT.

http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=3029&p=3

[Eidorian]

For current games, yeah, but he's right; the ATi card is WAY better for shader operations, and games like Crysis are very shader-heavy. I'd expect the ATi card to perform better for all DirectX 10-era games like Gears of War or Crysis.Err...have you seen the DirectX 10 benchmarks? Seriously?

There's a slim chance of slightly greater performance on native DX10 games but otherwise you're going to need an 8800 or HD2900 for DX10.

[Chone]

For current games, yeah, but he's right; the ATi card is WAY better for shader operations, and games like Crysis are very shader-heavy. I'd expect the ATi card to perform better for all DirectX 10-era games like Gears of War or Crysis.

Did you not bother to read my post directly above yours? :confused:

[harveypooka]

At the end of the day the iMac is not going to live up to Gears of War or Battlefield 2142's graphics.

If Rage is released anytime soon you'll need a Mac Pro to get some nice shiny graphics.

I hope, hope, hope Apple release a cut-down Mac Pro in the next few months.

[fblack]

Hey Haoshiro how about we quote some reviews?:)

Most reviews that I've read seem to agree that what are supposed to be midrange cards are pretty weak.

http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=3023&p=12

We had no problems expressing our disappointment with NVIDIA over the lackluster performance of their 8600 series. After AMD's introduction of the 2900 XT, we held some hope that perhaps they would capitalize on the huge gap NVIDIA left between their sub $200 parts and the higher end hardware. Unfortunately, that has not happened.

In fact, AMD went the other way and released hardware that performs consistently worse than NVIDIA's competing offerings. The only game that shows AMD hardware leading NVIDIA is Rainbow Six: Vegas. Beyond that, our 4xAA tests show the mainstream Radeon HD lineup, which already lags in performance, scales even worse than NVIDIA. Not that we really expect most people with this level of hardware to enable 4xAA, but it's still a disappointment.

Usually it's easier to review hardware that is clearly better or worse than it's competitor under the tests we ran, but this case is difficult. We want to paint an accurate picture here, but it has become nearly impossible to speak negatively enough about the AMD Radeon HD 2000 Series without sounding comically absurd.

Even with day-before-launch price adjustments, there is just no question that, in the applications the majority of people will be running, AMD has created a series of products that are even more unimpressive than the already less than stellar 8600 lineup.
...All we can do at this point is lament the sad state of affordable next generation graphics cards and wait until someone at NVIDIA and AMD gets the memo that their customers would actually like to see better performance that at least consistently matches previous generation hardware. For now, midrange DX10 remains MIA.

http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,1697,2151679,00.asp

Final Thoughts: Not for the Hardcore DX10 Gamer
It's hard to recommend the Radeon HD 2600 Pro. The $100 price seems attractive, but it comes at a cost. To get good performance out of even year-old games, you'll need to start cranking detail levels down, even at the conservative resolution of 1280x1024. Forget about DX10 stuff: So far, it all runs like molasses. To some extent, this is par for the course for $100 graphics cards. They just don't deliver a satisfying game-playing experience. It's unfortunate that this big shift in architecture that accompanied DX10 didn't change that.

http://www.tomshardware.com/2007/07/24/hd_2600_and_geforce_8600/page10.html

In essence, there isn't a real middle ground, only enthusiast high end, value and entry level product...Are the HD 2400, 8500 and 8400 series cards good for gaming? No, but for an HTPC they would be good.

When looking at the gaming results and the video playback figures, the HD 2600 and 8600 series are indeed a value proposition...They can play some existing games and will be able to play simple DX10 games in the future...All games going forward next year will most likely be DX10, so these should be able to play games like the next The Sims or children's educational programs, but in no way will they be able to handle graphically intense titles.

http://www.pcworld.idg.com.au/index.php/taxid;2136212627;pid;3779;pt;1

Although the hardware is not primed for serious gamers, offering fairly mediocre scores in our benchmarks, its passive cooler and less-invasive size will appeal to people looking to build a quiet, and possibly smaller form factor, PC that can handle media applications. In particular, it's good for watching DVDs or high-definition media such as Blu-ray or HD-DVD. According to ATI, all HD 2000-series graphics cards have ATIs UVD (unified video decoder) to handle video decoding, rather than offload it to the CPU, and they also include a DVI to HDMI converter in the sales pack. The HDMI output supports digital video and audio signals, so it's simple to hook up to your TV or amplifier.
In our benchmarks, the Sapphire HD 2600 Pro proved to be a bit of a slow coach. In our DirectX 9 tests, it barely scraped through as playable and in our DirectX 10 tests it really hit rock bottom.

http://www.guru3d.com/article/content/440/19/

Let's analyze, it's fair to say that both the 2400 and 2600 cards do not live up to our initial expectations from a 3D performance point of view, no sir. Also performance wise there's just a huge gap in between the 2900 and 2600 series. AMD has not been able to kick the current performance crown holder in the mid-range segment from its lofty chair. And that's annoying...

We've seen it happen with the HD 2900 XT and just like that 2900, what does AMD do? They lower the price significantly. And I have to agree here; that's the real trick to do it right as prices over the past few years have been shifted upwards by NVIDIA a lot. We're now at a level where people must pay 700 EUR for a high-end card (8800 Ultras) and for the best mid-range product we see prices of 220 EUR which is insane considering the performance you get out of it. Still for some reason we all consistently bend over and take it in the... well you know what I'm trying to say as really it's the monopolized situation we are currently in. This is why we need that hefty competition; to keep the product prices competitive and allow development to thrive in its endless evolutionary path of technology.

This is why I say that both the 2400 and 2600 series are refreshing. Unfortunately they are not the mid-range top performers we all have been hoping for, their 3D rendering capabilities are sufficient; sufficient for the money you have to pay for it. Realistically the HD 2600 XT compared to the GeForce 8600 GT gives NVIDIA a good lead...

http://www.hothardware.com/articles/ATI_Radeon_HD_2600_and_2400_Performance/?page=11

Overall, the new Radeon HD 2600 XT, 2600 Pro, and 2400 XT cards should make for quiet, low-power upgrades from any integrated graphics solution and offer a relatively low-cost of entry into the world of DirectX 10. These cards are obviously not geared to hardcore gamers, but at lower resolutions without high levels of AA and anisotropic filtering enabled they’ll be adequate for casual gaming. These cards are also well suited to HTPC applications where video playback performance and low-noise output are of the utmost importance.

http://www.pcper.com/article.php?aid=426&type=expert&pid=22

The performance of the Radeon HD 2600 XT, 2600 Pro and 2400 XT was more or less a letdown. In AMD documentation they were calling for the direct competition of the 2600 XT to be NVIDIA's 8600 GT card. Based on the estimated pricing from AMD and the pricing of NVIDIA's currently on sale cards though, we found that you could get an 8600 GTS for about the same price. When we added in the 8600 GTS, the performance of the 2600 XT looked less than stellar; but in fact in most cases the 8600 GT was able to outperform it anyway.

The Radeon HD 2600 Pro was in the same sticky situation: it was pitted against the NVIDIA 8500 GT in the AMD documentation though we were able to find 8600 GT cards for about $100 putting them in the same price level as the 2600 Pro. The 2600 Pro didn't really stand a chance against the 8600 GT card either, in much the same way the 2600 XT couldn't fight the 8600 GTS successfully.

The Radeon HD 2400 XT card was a different story - we didn't really compare it to anything of the same price because we didn't have it. At $79 MSRP, the 2400 XT definitely falls into the "budget" category. For most readers here, the gaming performance of an $80 video card isn't going to impress and we didn't find anything surprising in the 2400 XT in that regards.

I could quote more but why flog an already eviscerated corpse? :D

All the reviewers feel that these cards are good for HD playback, and for "simple" or "casual" gaming. Not for "graphically intense titles". These cards don't do so great in DX10 and some reviews suggest sitting out the 1st generation of DX10 cards.

To be fair to Apple there seems to be slim pickings in the midrange market of newer cards. The HD, a DX10 compatible card, and the low prices ($79 MSRP 2400XT cheaper for apple I'm sure) probably had a part to play in their decision to use these cards.

Still they could have opted for the 2600XT as a BTO which would have given comparable performance to a 7600GT in older games and an edge in newer titles.:(

[Haoshiro]

Sure, but these are still not reviews of Mobile chips versus other Mobile chips. :rolleyes:

Oblivion and FEAR don't count as new shader-heavy games, imo, either.

We'll see as time goes on, like said.

It's already been pointed out that the Mobility HD 2600 Pro has more raw power then even an 8600M GT, let alone the 7600M GT.

Why isn't this showing in the current crop of benchmarks? I'm sure there are plenty of reasons, and I've seen this happen plenty of times with video cards in the past - especially nVidia cards. My old 6600 GT started out pretty bad, and as time went on games and drivers caused the benchmarks to jump a lot.

I look at current benchmarks and reviews distrustingly, I'll see how things are after six months.

I'll be ordering another iMac soon, with the HD 2600, and will be sure to compare to my current 256MB X1600, as well as friends PCs (who have 7600 GS and GTs, as well as the 8600 GT)

[Chone]

Sure, but these are still not reviews of Mobile chips versus other Mobile chips. :rolleyes:

Oblivion and FEAR don't count as new shader-heavy games, imo, either.

We'll see as time goes on, like said.

It's already been pointed out that the Mobility HD 2600 Pro has more raw power then even an 8600M GT, let alone the 7600M GT.

Why isn't this showing in the current crop of benchmarks? I'm sure there are plenty of reasons, and I've seen this happen plenty of times with video cards in the past - especially nVidia cards. My old 6600 GT started out pretty bad, and as time went on games and drivers caused the benchmarks to jump a lot.

I look at current benchmarks and reviews distrustingly, I'll see how things are after six months.

I'll be ordering another iMac soon, with the HD 2600, and will be sure to compare to my current 256MB X1600, as well as friends PCs (who have 7600 GS and GTs, as well as the 8600 GT)

Raw power stands for theoretical peak performance and by those terms the HD 2900XT should be faster than a 8800 Ultra yet it can barely keep up with the 8800 GTS. Save your theory and "raw power" for another thread.

And why wouldn't Oblivion count as a shader intensive game? Take shaders out of that game and you end up with a crummy looking game a 9600 could run. Oblivion still brings 8800 Ultra cards to its knees and is one of the most demanding shader-intensive games out there, the HD 2600 had a pretty nice chance to flex its muscles in Oblivion, the drivers were already more mature because of the HD 2900XT and what did it achieve? It closed the performance gap but not enough to come on top of the 8600GTS and mind you I'm talking about the HD 2600XT not the severely crippled 2600 Pro in iMacs.

This talk about shaders reminds me of the video memory debate. Just as a 6200 can't use 512 of VRAM because at resolutions where that RAM will be useful the card will be limited by its other functions. Same here, the HD 2600 might have shader power but not nearly enough to compensate. Yeah it "shines" in shader-intensive games like Oblivion but not enough. And this brings me to another point, shading power is seen best in higher resolutions, resolutions the HD 2600 is simply too darn weak to run. At 1024x768 shaders don't make much difference. Excuse me, that would be 800x600 for the HD 2600 in the iMac and 640x480 for the HD 2400...

Now you make it sound as if Crysis is a game about us looking at a flat wall while the card applies shaders non stop...

Like I said earlier what you see is what you get, that shader power (which frankly isn't that much) isn't going to help the 2600 when the rest of it is so lackluster.

[Haoshiro]

No, the talk of raw power can stay right here in the thread, no need to save it for another time.

That was the point in fact, that's obviously not reaching it's full potential. Saying that it never will is a fools game, you don't know that, nor do I. We can argue until we are blue in the face, but we don't know.

My stance is simple, if it has untapped potential, there is a chance it will get tapped some time. That doesn't mean it will, but just because it hasn't yet doesn't mean it won't.

I have yet to see benchmarks of the Mobility HD 2600 Pro, nor have we seen how it does in OS X, Tiger or Leopard. There are plenty of unknowns, it doesn't help for people to come on and post as if they have the final word on something without even knowing all the facts - and acting as if they can predict the future.

And, btw, Shader Ops - as the HD 2X00 series is concerned, covers not only pixel shaders, but also texture and vertex.

[phillipjfry]

Sorry if this sounds out of place and just plain silly, but why are people comparing these cards to DX10 performance? Isn't that Vista only? Shouldn't we really only be concerned about OpenGL 2.0 performance and how Leopard will handle the new EA Games/ID games to be coming to the new kitty soon? :confused:

[contoursvt]

I was wondering that too but then I thought that maybe the more hardcore gamers might have vista installed on their machines as well and might play that way...

Sorry if this sounds out of place and just plain silly, but why are people comparing these cards to DX10 performance? Isn't that Vista only? Shouldn't we really only be concerned about OpenGL 2.0 performance and how Leopard will handle the new EA Games/ID games to be coming to the new kitty soon? :confused:

[GFLPraxis]

Sorry if this sounds out of place and just plain silly, but why are people comparing these cards to DX10 performance? Isn't that Vista only? Shouldn't we really only be concerned about OpenGL 2.0 performance and how Leopard will handle the new EA Games/ID games to be coming to the new kitty soon? :confused:


Actually, since the new EA games are using Cider, they're probably going to be running in DX10, I'd think...

[Eidorian]

Actually, since the new EA games are using Cider, they're probably going to be running in DX10, I'd think...Cider should translate DirectX APIs to OpenGL. I believe they did mention DX10 on non-Windows platforms would be available. :D

[fblack]

Sure, but these are still not reviews of Mobile chips versus other Mobile chips. :rolleyes:

Hey, I'm not trying to bash you here but I think you are sidestepping the issue. It is about the potential of the cards, the mobile versions are not going to be more powerful than the regular cards and if the regular cards are choking (both AMD and NVIDIA) you think the mobile version is going to do better?

Oblivion and FEAR don't count as new shader-heavy games, imo, either.

So what you are saying is that its perfectly ok that they run these games poorly? How about older titles like COD2, should I just stop playing them?


We'll see as time goes on, like said.

Why isn't this showing in the current crop of benchmarks? I'm sure there are plenty of reasons, and I've seen this happen plenty of times with video cards in the past - especially nVidia cards. My old 6600 GT started out pretty bad, and as time went on games and drivers caused the benchmarks to jump a lot.

I look at current benchmarks and reviews distrustingly, I'll see how things are after six months.

Fair enough. Drivers can make a difference. But in my experience no amount of driver tweaking is going to make a $79 card perform like a $400 card. At 1024x768 no AA, no AF the 2400 runs Oblivion at 6.2 FPS I think I saw the 2600pro at 19FPS and the 2600XT at 23FPS. They barely run COD2 better. Do you really expect to see an added 30-40FPS to these scores by driver tweaking?

My stance is simple, if it has untapped potential, there is a chance it will get tapped some time. That doesn't mean it will, but just because it hasn't yet doesn't mean it won't.

I have yet to see benchmarks of the Mobility HD 2600 Pro, nor have we seen how it does in OS X, Tiger or Leopard. There are plenty of unknowns, it doesn't help for people to come on and post as if they have the final word on something without even knowing all the facts - and acting as if they can predict the future.

That's fine, but believe it or not you are coming across as steadfastedly defending these cards, putting you clearly on that side. One has to make decisions based on the best info they have at the time. Right now the info I'm seeing is telling me that these cards are so-so.

I'll be ordering another iMac soon, with the HD 2600, and will be sure to compare to my current 256MB X1600, as well as friends PCs (who have 7600 GS and GTs, as well as the 8600 GT)

Great. I hope you post your impressions and then 6 months down the road we can see what updates and new drivers do for the performance then we can repeat this pow-wow.;)

[TheSilencer]

DirectX10 is for Vista only, yes, but the Shader 4.0 are available for OpenGL too via a OGL Shader4 bridge. So, you get the same effects, the same lighting, the same particles and so on for OGL as for DX10 and that is why you need a good DX10 card, not for Vista but for Shader 4.0.

[Mr. MacBook]

Yeah, businessweek did one too. I saw it through a google search, but i dont have the link.

Just go to www.businessweek.com (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7sK3AqFYAWQ&mode=related&search=) and search iMac refresh.

[oingoboingo]

Hey Haoshiro how about we quote some reviews?:)

...



Thanks for pointing all these reviews out. Ultimately, I believe real world game benchmarks are what counts. I spent the morning after the iMac announcement reading a lot of these articles, and unfortunately came to the conclusion that as much as I'd like a new iMac on my desk, it didn't make sense to pay ~ AU $2000 for a machine which can't run even older gaming titles at full native panel resolution at acceptable frame rates (when the occasional spurt of gaming was one of the things I would be buying the iMac for).

I haven't followed the graphics card market all that closely for the last couple of years, so it was a real eye-opener to see how poorly ATI's new low and mid-range GPUs were being rated. It's almost like it's ATI's turn to experience some of the pain that nVidia must have felt when it released the FX 5xxx series chips a few years back.

[fblack]

I haven't followed the graphics card market all that closely for the last couple of years, so it was a real eye-opener to see how poorly ATI's new low and mid-range GPUs were being rated. It's almost like it's ATI's turn to experience some of the pain that nVidia must have felt when it released the FX 5xxx series chips a few years back.

I think you're exactly right in your comparison. Several reviews stated that they were late to market with their chips. Also that there's a giant hole between their 2600 and 2900 offerings. Its just how technology works one company leapfrogs the other and so on. Not too long ago AMD was taking a bite out of Intel in cpu's, but now the tables have turned.

I dont think Apple had too many choices in regards to new mid-range gpus and might just have gotten a better deal from AMD/ATI. But maybe they will surprise us and offer a BTO option for a better card down the road. Being a mac fan means you always get to hope...:D

[Mac.Jnr]

I dont think the ATI HD2600 Pro is a mobile GPU. I believe it's the desktop version but still at the end of the day it sucks balls still.

[DoFoT9]

thanks so much for this post H-man. its now perfectly clear to me wat this card is about and where it performs best. people (including me) jumped to conclusions based on fony reviews i read and immediately posted bad comments. i now know tht its not a bad card for the newest games, some older games will not run anywhere near the best they could

once again thanks :)

[Haoshiro]

Hey, I'm not trying to bash you here but I think you are sidestepping the issue. It is about the potential of the cards, the mobile versions are not going to be more powerful than the regular cards and if the regular cards are choking (both AMD and NVIDIA) you think the mobile version is going to do better?

No, I don't. My points have largely been simply that there is uncertainty until we see what these do specifically in Macs, and specifically the Mobile version of the chips with Apple's drivers, etc.

Mobile chips have always been worse in my experience, but can often also be different architecture. nVidia has done this in the past, used old technology rebranded. I imagine the same is possible in reverse as well, if a mobile version comes out after the original, it could have refined architecture, but not necessarily higher specs.

If you look at my original post, you'll see that I myself link to comparisons that are for the desktop class chips since mobile comparisons weren't available.

But the reviews, and especially benchmarks, that were posted are different. These are PC tech sites comparing PC graphics cards on high-end gaming systems most of the time. And I felt that is where it gets unfair to toss the iMac into that.

Like I said in the OP, iMacs are essentially "desktop laptops", and if you want to know how an iMac compares to others in it's class, it needs to be pitted against laptops and mobile-class chips. You pit a HD 2600 Pro versus an 8600 GT and you'll have different results then if you put a Mobility HD 2600 Pro versus an 8600M GT.

So we can look at relative technical differences in the full desktop class chips, but when it comes to lengthy reviews and benchmarks, that isn't going to translate over right. The mobile chips from nVidia are not up to par with their desktop cousins, there could easily be a smaller gap between them and ATI's offerings in the mobile arena.

Therein lies the problem so many people have when they think of the iMac, they act as if these machines are the standard mid-sized tower PC, when they aren't. I tried to make that clear in the OP.

iMacs are aimed at being efficeint, quiet, low-power, all-in-one solutions for general computing and media use. They are great as what they are.

If people want to complain, like I said, complain there is no consumer level Mac Pro. Don't bash the iMacs just because they don't compete with your huge PC tower.

The truth is an iMac could play games before they were updated and they still can. It's never been a power-house for gaming and never will be. People are acting as if these new iMac gpus are the end of the world, as if they are the worst iMac ever. That isn't true, they should easily out class the previous offerings (minus that 2400 XT).

I switched to an iMac from my 3-yr old gaming PC and have loved it. I even ended up with better gaming performance! But I knew what I was getting when I bought it, I wasn't silly enough to think an AIO solution like an iMac was going to be full of desktop-class hardware.

Playing the latest and greatest games - especially at high settings - was always something the gamers with endless pockets got to enjoy. If you didn't want to fork over for a new card every 6 months, the only games you were likely to run at max settings + max resolution were 3 years old, maybe.

Fair enough. Drivers can make a difference. But in my experience no amount of driver tweaking is going to make a $79 card perform like a $400 card. At 1024x768 no AA, no AF the 2400 runs Oblivion at 6.2 FPS I think I saw the 2600pro at 19FPS and the 2600XT at 23FPS. They barely run COD2 better. Do you really expect to see an added 30-40FPS to these scores by driver tweaking?

Actually, what I found interesting about that, was even at those low framerates, the HD 2600 Pro was still beating out the 7600GT! Oblivion at 14.1 FPS on the 7600 GT, compared to 16.9 FPS on the HD 2600 Pro. Neither are good framerates, and it makes me wonder if Oblivion just has a horrible engine!

Of course, I probably won't be running any games beyond 1280x768, which should perform better then 1280x1024 they are using to benchmark. And these framerates... are they just showing averages? Interesting, none the less.

[takao]

Therein lies the problem so many people have when they think of the iMac, they act as if these machines are the standard mid-sized tower PC, when they aren't. I tried to make that clear in the OP.

iMacs are aimed at being efficeint, quiet, low-power, all-in-one solutions for general computing and media use. They are great as what they are.

If people want to complain, like I said, complain there is no consumer level Mac Pro. Don't bash the iMacs just because they don't compete with your huge PC tower.

i said it in 2003 and i say it today: apple needs a small consumer level mac with user replacable graphics card, accessable ram slots and 1-2 harddisks (no extra pci card slots or so) with no built in screen

is it so difficult to create ? looking at how much money/devs apple is throwing at gadgets like phones,p3players, apple tv etc. i'm still worried that apple ignores a market where money can be easily made with less effort

in 1,5 to 2 years i want to replace my g4 mac mini (with whom i'm quite happy except it's crappy performance at anything 3d and it's problems with large resolution LCDs through dvi) and so far i'm rather split... on the one side i would love an apple desktop to replace my mini and my windows computer but going with the minimal configuration (mac pro since macm ini is veryl ikely be discontinued/no replacable graphicscard/single screen) i would start at more than 2290 €, which for me is not feasable since it would be cheaper to get a macbook with crappy 3d performance and a gaming PC with better 3d performance which would be again annoying

seriously apple's ignorance towards people who happen to want 3d performance is staggering only topped by their "let's lock them in on one model which is highly priced and total overkill in anything besides graphics cards which he have to upgrade for hundreds of dollors on top of it" way of marketing

[Haoshiro]

I think that's because they are really just going after the casual user and the Pro user.

That middle-range is where a lot of the home PC system builders are. I just don't think it's a market Apple wants to be in. We're talking about people who, by and large, want to buy a cheap mac they can run Windows on and swap their GPUs out to there hearts content.

Even though Mac-compatible GPUs aren't in huge abundance, are they? More support costs, more hassles for Apple. People who want to open their machines and tinker with them, and expect everything to work... then call Apple when they break something (by, say, installing a PC-only GPU).

As a consumer I might love to have something like that, but it just doesn't seem like a great idea on a business level. Those people can go to newegg and tinker all they want, they can have their Windows and their $600 hardcore gaming GPUs.

I just don't think that is what Apple is about, nor who Macs are for. They are trying to make an encompassing experience that is far better for the majority of users (the every day non-geek), and satisfy the needs of professionals at the same time.

Who complains about this "gap" in their lineup anyway? Gamers. A small subset of Gamers who also want to be Mac users in their own way.

As more and more of my friends get older, they seem to be wrapped up in hardware less and less. Several of my hardcore gaming friends are planning on moving to Apple soon, and having a Low to Mid range GPU is something they've decided is worth it... they don't have as much time to sink into these and a lot less pride to care if they can max out the settings or not.

A couple are like me, who decided to switch the majority of my gaming time to consoles. It's worked out great so far! :D

[TheSilencer]

Well, the base of this discussion is the announcement of games for mac. Now people ask for which Mac they announced it? Only the the PRO Series and PRO customers? That is the real question behind all this. If they really want games back on Mac, they have something to give for it IMO, because now only the Mac Pro is a option for their games like Command and Conquer 3 - if it comes out before Duke Nukem Forever :D - and NFS Carbon, not to mention the upcomming NFS Pro Street or other games this year like ET Quake Wars.

[takao]

well i also like strategy games and thus consoles only is out of question

so apple would have extra hassle because of replacable graphics cards ? they already _have that_ on the mac pro

and what sense does it make that stock harddisks/RAM works but stock graphics cards don't ... more difficult for apple but i as a customer want to do something like that ... for me it would be the same like os x only working with models from 1 printer vendor

personally i want to have a mid range GPU anyway... a mid range desktop GPU with normal amount of VRAM for the year 2007
with apple that means 2500+ with a mac pro

_that's_ why there is only a _small_ subset and not a _bigger one_ ... it's not the customers fault ...

personally i know 4-5 who would buy an apple desktop if they could upgrade graphics cards/harddrives to their needs below a 1200-1500 price point

i don't care about maxing out settings either.. i want to run new games "ok" 2-3 years down the line, which you simply can't with an entry level cards

also about gamers being a small subset is that seriously coming from somebody owning a mac ? ;) .. believe it or not macs have a huge draw _especially_ from nerds... nowhere are you going to find as many macbooks here than on university in a computer science course...

also gaming folks are willing to spend more money on hardware than the average user which would be ... guess what: i too know more (3) console/pc-gamers too who bought macs additionally (especially laptops) than other casual computer users... of which _all_ (5) without exception rejected the idea of a mac when proposed to them by me
in fact i know easily 4 guys who dropped the idea of buying a mac just because of the "no good graphics card below 1500" problem

edit: oh and you talked about "media use": personally i consider games also media just like movies

[Barham]

Ok, this thread has become a lost cause IMO, but I think it's important that I say this.

We are forgetting something very important here about what Apple has done to the iMac line. Last rev, apple made it possible for us to have a low-mid-midplus-high end iMac. It seems to me that Apple has now cut our options (low-mid-high).

What I'm saying is that we should be comparing the 2400 to the old 17" which had integrated graphics. So, in that light, the new iMacs are a huge upgrade.

Now as for the 24", we have more of an arguement.


Apple still has the same problem they always have: too much resolution for the GPU's that are available to the iMac form factor.

What confuses me, is that they parade EA around at WWDC and then refuse to give us a "Gamer's Mac". We could run around that topic forever building possible configs, but it seems as though Apple is determined to stick with Consumer and Pro in their desktops, leaving the Prosumer (read: Gamer) out of the equation.

[aliquis-]

Uhm, isn't both vertex and pixel "shaders"? And in that case what does the other graphics cards use if not shaders?

I doubt it will be much faster than 8600GT aswell.

Also OS X won't have usage for modern gpu technologies until their opengl stack is updated I guess.

Are you sure that they will offer more shader performance? What are the base for that claim? I hope it's not only the number of stream processors because clockrate and what they do each time matters aswell.

[Eidorian]

Also OS X won't have usage for modern gpu technologies until their opengl stuff is updated I guess.Just like DirectX 9 doesn't benefit when run on a DirectX 10 video card, am I right?

[aliquis-]

Just like DirectX 9 doesn't benefit when run on a DirectX 10 video card, am I right?I don't know how it works actually, obviously Direct X 9.0 games (shader model 3?) works on dx 10 cards so the unified shader model seems to work anyway, but say you wrote a game for dx 7 which didn't had support for sm3.0 and all the functions in the graphics card, only because you bought a new card or updated dx to dx9.0 you wouldn't get better graphics, you need to have the game use them aswell.

And in the case of os x games and their opengl functions I've read earlier that Apple is slow in updating their opengl versions and that it's also quite slow so therefor I would assume that it doesn't make use of all the "tricks" on the most modern graphics cards and that some things (say lightning) can get better later once they start using the new better functions for it.

[Eidorian]

I don't know how it works actually, obviously Direct X 9.0 games (shader model 3?) works on dx 10 cards so the unified shader model seems to work anyway, but say you wrote a game for dx 7 which didn't had support for sm3.0 and all the functions in the graphics card, only because you bought a new card or updated dx to dx9.0 you wouldn't get better graphics, you need to have the game use them aswell.

And in the case of os x games and their opengl functions I've read earlier that Apple is slow in updating their opengl versions and that it's also quite slow so therefor I would assume that it doesn't make use of all the "tricks" on the most modern graphics cards and that some things (say lightning) can get better later once they start using the new better functions for it.Actually you can force new tricks onto old games. They're limited to anti-aliasing and anisotropic filtering from what I've seen though.

x16 AA & x16 AF make old games look a little better.

[fblack]

No, I don't. My points have largely been simply that there is uncertainty until we see what these do specifically in Macs, and specifically the Mobile version of the chips with Apple's drivers, etc.

I'm ok with you saying there's uncertainty and maybe wanting some benchmarks specifically using the new iMac. I think that's perfectly fine. Overall I think this is a good thread because if people were looking to these macs as a gaming alternative they may pause and wait a few weeeks to see some benchmarks.:)

However, I just want to point out that you did not seem to be operating from uncertainty at the begining of this thread. I might have mistaken the tone, but it sounded to me to be future positive about what these cards can deliver. Like in your next statement:

Mobile chips have always been worse in my experience, but can often also be different architecture. nVidia has done this in the past, used old technology rebranded. I imagine the same is possible in reverse as well, if a mobile version comes out after the original, it could have refined architecture, but not necessarily higher specs.


That sounds to me like hoping for an outcome that could be a long shot. You also stated in the begining of the thread:performance is almost garaunteed to improve as both drivers and game software matures. Uncertainty works both ways it may be good, it may be bad. Your position seemed to me to be generally positive and that is why I responded with the reviews that it may not be all positive and it really depends on what you want to do with your iMac gaming included.

But the reviews, and especially benchmarks, that were posted are different. These are PC tech sites comparing PC graphics cards on high-end gaming systems most of the time. And I felt that is where it gets unfair to toss the iMac into that.

If the cards don't do well on machines with faster specs, how do you think they will do on an iMac? I think the reviews have value in helping us determine if its a good investment for casual or hardcore gaming. I think this is different than when people try to match the iMac up against a gaming rig and then say it bites. That is of course like you said unfair, an iMac is more of a family machine not made solely for gaming.

Like I said in the OP, iMacs are essentially "desktop laptops", and if you want to know how an iMac compares to others in it's class, it needs to be pitted against laptops and mobile-class chips. You pit a HD 2600 Pro versus an 8600 GT and you'll have different results then if you put a Mobility HD 2600 Pro versus an 8600M GT.

I like your term and I think its reasonable to compare to an iMac to laptops. I'm not saying compare it to a high end gaming rig, what I'm saying is if the 2600 gets 16.9FPS vs an 8600's 12FPS they both bite and if we get this in regular cards can we expect better out of mobile? Should we not be cautious in our praises?

If people want to complain, like I said, complain there is no consumer level Mac Pro. Don't bash the iMacs just because they don't compete with your huge PC tower.

I am not bashing the iMac. I like the new look, heck I kind of like the new keyboard (not the BT one). I think its a good machine, I am just skeptical of the GPU. I've been a long time mac user and I love them, but GPU selection hasn't ever been great. I mean 7300 on the Macpro? 2years of the same Radeon 9700 on the G4 powerbooks? In contrast the 7600GT BTO at the time was one of the better offerings I've seen from apple.

I wish there was a consumer tower I'd get in line to buy one.

The truth is an iMac could play games before they were updated and they still can. It's never been a power-house for gaming and never will be. People are acting as if these new iMac gpus are the end of the world, as if they are the worst iMac ever. That isn't true, they should easily out class the previous offerings (minus that 2400 XT).

Absolutely. It just depends on what you want to play and at what settings. But it would be nice to have choices, no? A BTO would help alot. Say, anybody done a poll on what people consider satisfactory FPS? I know GFLPraxis said in another thread 60 FPS, low-to-medium settings. I'd be curious what most people would say.

Playing the latest and greatest games - especially at high settings - was always something the gamers with endless pockets got to enjoy. If you didn't want to fork over for a new card every 6 months, the only games you were likely to run at max settings + max resolution were 3 years old, maybe.
I absolutely agree with you there. I'm happy running games at 1024x768 as long as I get decent frame rates.

Actually, what I found interesting about that, was even at those low framerates, the HD 2600 Pro was still beating out the 7600GT! Oblivion at 14.1 FPS on the 7600 GT, compared to 16.9 FPS on the HD 2600 Pro. Neither are good framerates, and it makes me wonder if Oblivion just has a horrible engine!

LOL. What I find interesting is Apples game page:
http://www.apple.com/games/hardware/
The iMac is listed for intermediate gamers and under suggested games you find Rollercoater Tycoon, The Movies, Sims2:Pets, Ratatouille. Be still my beating heart!:D

Strategy gamers should take heart tho, CIV4 and StarWars Empire at War are listed.

[GFLPraxis]

I absolutely agree with you there. I'm happy running games at 1024x768 as long as I get decent frame rates.

Exactly; I've always been in the camp willing to turn down some settings if I get a good framerate and don't have to spend ridiculous amounts of money for it. :)

My old CRT was 1600x1200 but I usually gamed at 1024. Everyone called my card horrid on the internet (Geforce FX 5200, 128 MB) but with a 20% overclock and medium settings I could run new releases just fine (like when Star Wars Battlefront came out, I picked it up day one and had medium settings, 1024x768, perfect).

Heck, I game on a GMA950 Macbook now w/2 GB of RAM. Of course, no Oblivion, but I'd be perfectly happy with Oblivion at Medium settings on this new iMac.

[Eidorian]

Exactly; I've always been in the camp willing to turn down some settings if I get a good framerate and don't have to spend ridiculous amounts of money for it. :)

My old CRT was 1600x1200 but I usually gamed at 1024. Everyone called my card horrid on the internet (Geforce FX 5200, 128 MB) but with a 20% overclock and medium settings I could run new releases just fine (like when Star Wars Battlefront came out, I picked it up day one and had medium settings, 1024x768, perfect).

Heck, I game on a GMA950 Macbook now w/2 GB of RAM. Of course, no Oblivion, but I'd be perfectly happy with Oblivion at Medium settings on this new iMac.That would be fine on a CRT but this is LCD land.

[contoursvt]

Thats why I've held on tightly to my 22" Trinitron monitors :) Sure they will break my back but I love them.

That would be fine on a CRT but this is LCD land.

[Eidorian]

Thats why I've held on tightly to my 22" Trinitron monitors :) Sure they will break my back but I love them.High Five!

I have the exact same monitor! 76 lbs. of joy and stupid high resolutions over VGA.

[aliquis-]

HD 2600 Pro:
Shader Operations: 72000 Operations/sec
7600GT:
Shader Operations: 6720 Operations/sec
+ 1,071% more the Shader Operations (10.71X)But it's hard to compare cards on specs alone, so only real FPS numbers will tell you the truth, and in this case the unified shaders only work with one pixel at the time where the old methods worked with four components each time if I remember things correctly, that might mean that in comparable shader operations the 7600GT did 6720*4=26 880 operations, which is still almost just 1/3 as much but much more than your original claim anyway.

I guess stuff as:
Pixel Fill Rate: 4480 MPixels/sec
Texture Fill Rate: 6720 MTexels/sec
Vertex Operations: 700 MVertices/sec

Explains why it's hard/stupid to go by specs alone.

Anyway the card is probably a similair performer as the old x1600, but it supports dx10 and more importantly for Apple hd-decoding, and that is probably why they switched. (Also it's newer, why would they stay with an old generation of gpus?)

[contoursvt]

Well mine are the Dell units which I had purchased used like 4 years ago but they still work fantastic (knock wood) and right now I run both at 1600x1200 (on two seperate machines). I think I tried 1800x something once but man things started getting kinda small :)

Anyway they are not as sharp or bright as LCD monitors but I actually find them pretty easy on the eyes and amazing colour quality so when I work with my digital photos I have no issues at all.

Oh and of course gaming rocks on them :)


High Five!

I have the exact same monitor! 76 lbs. of joy and stupid high resolutions over VGA.

[DoFoT9]

High Five!

I have the exact same monitor! 76 lbs. of joy and stupid high resolutions over VGA.

hope you dont die young with all those radiation waves coming at you!!!:p

[aliquis-]

Hm, yes. But the DX10 performance is very low for all mid range cards, the fun starts with GeForce 8800GTS 640MB or ATi HD2900XT.

http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=3029&p=38600GT is better all over in both dx9 and dx10 there.

I think it's decent framerates anyway, more than I expected and makes me a little more confident that sc2 might really play. I guess they had more vram than 128MB thought, **** you Apple one more time ;D

[aliquis-]

Sorry if this sounds out of place and just plain silly, but why are people comparing these cards to DX10 performance? Isn't that Vista only? Shouldn't we really only be concerned about OpenGL 2.0 performance and how Leopard will handle the new EA Games/ID games to be coming to the new kitty soon? :confused:But Nvidia have always been better with opengl haven't they? So if we does the 8600gt will become even better.

[Dont Hurt Me]

Fact is current benches show this 2600 Pro is a very Ho Hum card. Maybe one day it will be worth a ...... but all these mobile componets make iMac a laptop that sits on your desk. Apple must hate Gamers, Prosumers, and their Developers. Crippling throughout all models below MacPro seems so silly.

[fblack]

I think that's because they are really just going after the casual user and the Pro user.

That middle-range is where a lot of the home PC system builders are. I just don't think it's a market Apple wants to be in. We're talking about people who, by and large, want to buy a cheap mac they can run Windows on and swap their GPUs out to there hearts content.

Even though Mac-compatible GPUs aren't in huge abundance, are they? More support costs, more hassles for Apple. People who want to open their machines and tinker with them, and expect everything to work... then call Apple when they break something (by, say, installing a PC-only GPU).


I think your right they don't want to be there. I don't think its a support issue tho. I mean there are no 3rd party alternatives, no ASUS, no XFX, no Sapphire,etc. They don't have to worry about that. As far as the main 2 ATI and NVIDIA we've never gotten much after market choices. And Apple could find ways to just limit the choices of upgrades in order to control support issues. Heck they've done that with the imac haven't they?

I think they don't want something that may steal sales from the iMac. Especially if that something does not have the same iconic power that the iMac has. It wouldn't just steal sales, it might lose Apple some of its mystique particularly if a consumer tower was just another "box".

I mean I'm happy with the cpu's they got in the iMacs, give me that in a tower, with some choice of GPUs, and choice of screen size and I'm happy.

I just think that offering some choices (like a BTO or is it CTO now?) can make people feel empowered and that can also create brand loyalty. I think Apple may at times forget this...

Hmmm...I'm not to sure about the glossy screens, I'm gonna have to look at them in person...

BTW I think Barham had a really good point about the low end iMac, for about $200 more we are getting a bigger screen 20 vs 17 and a graphics card over the integrated intel graphics. If you dont care about gaming, and you find the mini lacking, this is not a bad choice.

What I'm saying is that we should be comparing the 2400 to the old 17" which had integrated graphics. So, in that light, the new iMacs are a huge upgrade.

[panzer06]

I'd go with the 7600GT any day.

Here, here!!

Me2

[contoursvt]

hope you dont die young with all those radiation waves coming at you!!!:p

Hope you know that the radiation levels from the front of the monitor are so low that its probably even less harmful than having a cellphone on your desk from that distance away. Now just dont be standing right behind the CRT because that area is not so good...so dont ever work in a place where the person right behind your head has a monitor who's back side is less than a foot or two away.

[DoFoT9]

Hope you know that the radiation levels from the front of the monitor are so low that its probably even less harmful than having a cellphone on your desk from that distance away. Now just dont be standing right behind the CRT because that area is not so good...so dont ever work in a place where the person right behind your head has a monitor who's back side is less than a foot or two away.

hahahah yes i know that. i do have some intelligence!!

is it just me or wen you look at crt monitors does it kill your eyes after a little while?? i must jsut be used to LCD, im sure you would get used to crt.

[contoursvt]

:) I'm probably just used to the CRT. I use them at home and LCD at work. I'm fine with both in that situation but I cannot do LCD at home because my computer is not in a bright room at home so I find LCD monitors TOOOO bright and when I try and tone it down, it tends to lose too much colour quality no matter how I set it. I usually run at 1600x1200@75Hz at home.



hahahah yes i know that. i do have some intelligence!!

is it just me or wen you look at crt monitors does it kill your eyes after a little while?? i must jsut be used to LCD, im sure you would get used to crt.

[unclefudgly]

Whew!!!

Thanks.. Some great posts which have allyed my fears somewhat as to the integrity of the GPU on the new iMac...
now if I can just get round the Glossy Screen thing!!

[Haoshiro]

I think your right they don't want to be there. I don't think its a support issue tho. I mean there are no 3rd party alternatives, no ASUS, no XFX, no Sapphire,etc. They don't have to worry about that. As far as the main 2 ATI and NVIDIA we've never gotten much after market choices. And Apple could find ways to just limit the choices of upgrades in order to control support issues. Heck they've done that with the imac haven't they?

Yeah, you are probably right about that. It's also true they do the same with the Mac Pro, but it's price keeps it away from the average tinkering consumer (which are support nightmares).

It might be picking back up, but I was definitely under the impression that PC gaming has been on the decline the last couple years, with console use on the rise. That could be a tell tale sign that it's not as important of a market for Apple as people think.

People do want to be able to play games, and it does effect switchers. But many of those were won over simply knowing they can dual-boot into Windows now. The truth is, most of even those people will probably be spending more time in OS X when all is said and done.

So while I don't think it would be bad for Apple to come up with another computer for their lineup that can target this other audience, I also don't think it's as important as other do.

The iMac covers the general consumer / mass-market, and when you factor in all the top quality software, is an excellent deal. The Mac Mini covers people who are very casual users and want to switch cheaply, and people who just want to test the waters. The Mac Pro is their for the serious professional user who needs more then even most gamers care for (even if they snag a few gamers with it). Those other people, by and large, are probably over estimating their needs.

What Mac Gaming needs, IMO, is not iMacs with better GPUs or another desktop product, but studios that focus on making Mac-specific titles. That's unlikely without more Gaming support and push by Apple - regardless of GPU.

Just like you have studios making games for Nintendo Wii exclusively (a system known to be "under powered"), that's also what we need for Mac Gaming. Developers that tailor the games to the GPUs in macs (X1600, HD 2400/2600, etc). If that was happening, it wouldn't matter that their is something better out there.

So in the end, people's complaints seem to be geared towards playing Windows Games on a Mac - why should that be Apple's problem?

BTW I think Barham had a really good point about the low end iMac, for about $200 more we are getting a bigger screen 20 vs 17 and a graphics card over the integrated intel graphics. If you dont care about gaming, and you find the mini lacking, this is not a bad choice.

Yeah, that is exactly what I thought when I saw the new lineup "Nice! The low-end model has a dedicated GPU now!" a great improvement over the GMA950, even if low-end.

[mattraehl]

Supposedly these chips can decode and encode H.264. I am really interested to see if Leopard makes use of this, and if Apple makes it available to third party developers.

[Chone]

What Mac Gaming needs, IMO, is not iMacs with better GPUs or another desktop product, but studios that focus on making Mac-specific titles. That's unlikely without more Gaming support and push by Apple - regardless of GPU.

Just like you have studios making games for Nintendo Wii exclusively (a system known to be "under powered"), that's also what we need for Mac Gaming. Developers that tailor the games to the GPUs in macs (X1600, HD 2400/2600, etc). If that was happening, it wouldn't matter that their is something better out there.

So in the end, people's complaints seem to be geared towards playing Windows Games on a Mac - why should that be Apple's problem?

Yeah, that is exactly what I thought when I saw the new lineup "Nice! The low-end model has a dedicated GPU now!" a great improvement over the GMA950, even if low-end.

Optimization can only take you so far and most Mac developers are keen on just slapping cider on their games. So while developers optimizing for those GPUs might alleviate the situation (though it might also yield worse looking games) its just too much to ask and not enough to have all these great games on Mac on time and not have them stripped of features.

The performance is weak on windows games on a Mac but when you try to play them on Mac OS X then its even worse, THAT is WHY its Apple's problem. Especially when they mention the word "game" so much in their iMac descriptions.

And for the last time, there was never an integrated GPU on the iMac, only on that $999 model that was geared towards education markets (no apple remote, no ded. graphics, etc). The $1200 iMac has ALWAYS had a dedicated GPU, in fact, last $1200 iMac had a X1600, which is much better than the HD 2400 XT on the new $1200 iMac coupled with the 17" screen and suddenly the previous generation iMac is a MUCH MORE versatile solution for gaming (yes even casual gaming) than the new iMac. This issue fades on the HD 2600 Pro 20" models but it resurfaces on the 24" model. So isn't this something to complain about?

The truth is I'm not liking the way Apple is taking the iMac but I've always hated all-in-ones, especially the mobile component geared one. It has got to be the most stupid computer form factor mankind has ever idealized though I have to admit Apple has done wonders with the iMac, its still an deficient design.

[Haoshiro]

Optimization can only take you so far and most Mac developers are keen on just slapping cider on their games. So while developers optimizing for those GPUs might alleviate the situation (though it might also yield worse looking games) its just too much to ask and not enough to have all these great games on Mac on time and not have them stripped of features.

The performance is weak on windows games on a Mac but when you try to play them on Mac OS X then its even worse, THAT is WHY its Apple's problem. Especially when they mention the word "game" so much in their iMac descriptions.

And for the last time, there was never an integrated GPU on the iMac, only on that $999 model that was geared towards education markets (no apple remote, no ded. graphics, etc). The $1200 iMac has ALWAYS had a dedicated GPU, in fact, last $1200 iMac had a X1600, which is much better than the HD 2400 XT on the new $1200 iMac coupled with the 17" screen and suddenly the previous generation iMac is a MUCH MORE versatile solution for gaming (yes even casual gaming) than the new iMac. This issue fades on the HD 2600 Pro 20" models but it resurfaces on the 24" model. So isn't this something to complain about?

The truth is I'm not liking the way Apple is taking the iMac but I've always hated all-in-ones, especially the mobile component geared one. It has got to be the most stupid computer form factor mankind has ever idealized though I have to admit Apple has done wonders with the iMac, its still an deficient design.

I don't even think you get it, if you do, you're just ignoring my comments and repeating what you've already said.

I'm not talking about games "optimized" for the iMacs. I'm talking about games developed exclusively for Mac, specifically targetted at iMacs.

This is the same concept as a developer developing exclusively for a Wii or GameCube. No, that's not going to yield the same results as going exclusive for 360/PS3, no arguement their. These games would run optimally on Mac machines, there is no reason that has to compromise anything but some visual fidelity.

You act as if the poly count on a game is going to effect how good or fun it is, as if you're being cheated if you can't get a game that is capable of taxing the latest PC graphics cards. That's not true, and I think you know that.

As for the $1200 iMac, the old one was also 17". The old models had a Low end, and so do the new models. It just so happens that the old low end was a 17" GMA950 system, and the new low end iMac is a 20" HD 2400 XT. It's $200 more, but what do you expect with a bump in screen size?

There's also a bump in the other specs for these models, for example every system past the Low end now has a 256MB GPU stock.

[Chone]

I don't even think you get it, if you do, you're just ignoring my comments and repeating what you've already said.

I'm not talking about games "optimized" for the iMacs. I'm talking about games developed exclusively for Mac, specifically targetted at iMacs.

This is the same concept as a developer developing exclusively for a Wii or GameCube. No, that's not going to yield the same results as going exclusive for 360/PS3, no arguement their. These games would run optimally on Mac machines, there is no reason that has to compromise anything but some visual fidelity.

You act as if the poly count on a game is going to effect how good or fun it is, as if you're being cheated if you can't get a game that is capable of taxing the latest PC graphics cards. That's not true, and I think you know that.

As for the $1200 iMac, the old one was also 17". The old models had a Low end, and so do the new models. It just so happens that the old low end was a 17" GMA950 system, and the new low end iMac is a 20" HD 2400 XT. It's $200 more, but what do you expect with a bump in screen size?

There's also a bump in the other specs for these models, for example every system past the Low end now has a 256MB GPU stock.

Like I said, that kind of optimization is not something developers are willing to do, maybe (just maybe) id with their tech 5 engine but most developers are just happy with cider ports or half assed ports. When was the last time you saw a decent OSX port? And no, that situation is not going to change soon, its just too much too ask from the developers. And no, its not the same as optimizing for a console.

And no I don't mind getting slightly worse graphics for an enjoyable experience but you know well developers are never going to commit to Macs that way. For now we should be grateful we get near-PC performance with cider.

And consumers don't care about the word low-end, they care about price, if there was a $1200 iMac before and a $1200 now then you should compare those two, not the $999 iMac with the new $1200, honestly I don't know why you are even arguing about this.

[Haoshiro]

Like I said, that kind of optimization is not something developers are willing to do, maybe (just maybe) id with their tech 5 engine but most developers are just happy with cider ports or half assed ports. When was the last time you saw a decent OSX port? And no, that situation is not going to change soon, its just too much too ask from the developers. And no, its not the same as optimizing for a console.

And no I don't mind getting slightly worse graphics for an enjoyable experience but you know well developers are never going to commit to Macs that way. For now we should be grateful we get near-PC performance with cider.

And consumers don't care about the word low-end, they care about price, if there was a $1200 iMac before and a $1200 now then you should compare those two, not the $999 iMac with the new $1200, honestly I don't know why you are even arguing about this.

So what if that's what happens and will continue to happen? That's not even what my post was about. I said that, imo, it's what Mac Gaming needs.

And that has nothing to do with just "optimizations", we're talking tech, engines, and games designed by studios for the Mac platform specifically.

id Tech 5 is obviously being designed that way, to support Mac "out of the box", what that means in terms of quality and performance we don't know, nor do we know if developers will take advantage of that for Mac games or if they'll just toss it out.

As for the $1200 iMac, it's not even the same as the old $1200 model, the only thing that makes your comparison valid is the price point. This new model has advantages over both 17" models, barring the GPU if the "upper" 17" class.

[fblack]

It might be picking back up, but I was definitely under the impression that PC gaming has been on the decline the last couple years, with console use on the rise. That could be a tell tale sign that it's not as important of a market for Apple as people think.

I'm not sure if its picking up or not. The thing is I don't want a wii, an xbox, a mac, and a PC box sitting in my living room to play different games and do work. Its a bit expensive and the clutter is too annoying. I want one machine. A mac can be all of that if we have the games and some of the hardware.

What Mac Gaming needs, IMO, is not iMacs with better GPUs or another desktop product, but studios that focus on making Mac-specific titles. That's unlikely without more Gaming support and push by Apple - regardless of GPU.

Just like you have studios making games for Nintendo Wii exclusively (a system known to be "under powered"), that's also what we need for Mac Gaming. Developers that tailor the games to the GPUs in macs (X1600, HD 2400/2600, etc). If that was happening, it wouldn't matter that their is something better out there.

So in the end, people's complaints seem to be geared towards playing Windows Games on a Mac - why should that be Apple's problem?

This always turns into a sort of the chicken or egg scenario, which comes first the hardware or the games? Its more than hardware vs software issue.

The thing is that it also comes down to market share. Should we develop for the smaller mac market, and out of that market how many people play games? Then out of those people who only plays specific genres like casual, strategy, and shooters. If more people in general play shooters and not just to shoot, but because of the eye candy (eye candy in strategy IMHO is not as important to gamers) then that's where we might be interested in going. Eye candy is going to sell. Look at all the junk that sells at movie theatres, sometimes with the thinnest pretense of a plot.

We might not make a ton of money because its a smaller market. What we need is a big title with alot of eye candy that will motivate that smaller market share to go out and buy! But wait how dificult is it to develop on the mac? Well, its gotten easier with the move to Intel, but we need better GPUs for the eye candy. Uhh, doesn't sound good. Can we talk to steve and see if we can work with them? We called steve and he says you must first kiss his chimichanga. Hmmm...might have to rethink this gaming on the mac thing.

It is Apple's problem if they want to grow market share and keep it. College students with all those macbooks, they would like to play games too. It's one way of getting them and keeping them as customers. Game developers for years had problems getting any help from Apple. Apple wanted to be taken seriously, and not as a toy. This was before Jobs came back and even afterwards. Developers that did develop games for the mac without much apple support did so because they loved the system and thought they could make some money.

Its not only the hardware and software, but you need the will from Apple to support games. They've been slow to recognize it, and maybe they will make a bigger push now but their track record is spotty at best.

[Haoshiro]

Software comes first. That's just how it will need to be. PCs didn't used to have games, they were business machines (moreso then early macs, actually).

id Software started out with a couple guys making a PC version of Super Mario Bros. with CGA graphics. They tried to pitch it to Nintendo, and were turned down flat 'Gaming on PCs will never take off', so they refit the game and release the classic Commander Keen.

Time goes on, more and more developers are releasing episodic shareware games, growth continues and after awhile, Microsoft finally takes notice. Eventually, around DirectX 6, DX finally establishes itself in PC gaming.

Point is, it took a long time for good support to come to Windows and the software came first - which showed Microsoft it was a worthwhile investment. The same is need on the Mac, imo. Mac users just have not been gaming that much, and Apple has probably been comfortable with their sales numbers, so there was no real "push", no underground gaming movement that Apple could capitalize on.

Eye candy is great, but it only sells a game so far. A really great AAA exclusive game could definitely help things, and some talented garage developers are probably going to need to step up (Valve started off like this, Project Offset, etc).

Mac market share is growing, so I believe now is probably the best time in Mac history to start making games on Mac.

The GPUs in even the iMacs, for the most part, are capable of making some impressive visuals if a developer were to cater specifically to the systems, and then it needs to sell, and Mac gaming needs to expand greatly in popularity... and that needs to happen before Apple makes a hardware change based on gaming.

They pacified the first complaints of people (that there were no games), by making Boot Camp. Now people complain about GPUs. I guess you can please some of the people...