Intel iMac Impressions

[dwd3885]

So I've been messing around with the new iMac Core Duo 2ghz that I got this morning. I have the 512mb RAM in it and it seems a bit choppy. But any system will experience that with just 512MB RAM.

I got myself an experimental copy of Handbrake for the intel macs and ripped Once Upon a Time in Mexico from DVD into the ipod video format. This process took 38 minutes. Not sure how long it takes G5s/Dual Core G5s, but this is really good IMO. Averaging 60fps.

Front Row is awesome. I've never used it before but it is so smooth and is just a really cool program. I didn't know you can even use the remote to put the mac to sleep and wake up. That is a nice feature when I want to listen to music while going to bed or watch a movie. Then you can use it to operate normal stuff in Quicktime and what not.

I then wanting to see how iTunes works and I converterd 14 songs at 54.3mb to mp3 160kbps (high quality) and it took 2min 04sec. I did this while Handbrake was still encoding. So that skews both tests, but I really wanted to see the Dual Core in action.

With Handbrake still encoding, I imported 1100 photos of 1.53gb into iPhoto. This process took 6min 05sec. Remeber, while encoding with Handbrake still.

If there is anything I need to do to improve those tests, LMK. Anything you'd like to test? LMK and I'll do it when I get home tonight around 10:30CT.

[jhero]

Make a video of it runnin fast guuy!

If you can :D pics too!

[savar]

I got myself an experimental copy of Handbrake for the intel macs and ripped Once Upon a Time in Mexico from DVD into the ipod video format. This process took 38 minutes. Not sure how long it takes G5s/Dual Core G5s, but this is really good IMO. Averaging 60fps.

Were you using H-264? I remember somebody with a dual-G5 saying they could rip at about 80% of real-time, so if you can rip 50% of real-time into H-264 then that is a really impressive Mac. Does Handbrake use both cores? Did you perform 2-pass encoding? I can't wait to see a quad-core PowerMac.

[dwd3885]

Were you using H-264? I remember somebody with a dual-G5 saying they could rip at about 80% of real-time, so if you can rip 50% of real-time into H-264 then that is a really impressive Mac. Does Handbrake use both cores? Did you perform 2-pass encoding? I can't wait to see a quad-core PowerMac.

I did not use H.264. Though I heard H.264 is the only part of Handbrake that is intel ready. So I encoded in mp4 but in theory it was using Rosetta, unless that part IS intel ready. I did not do 2-pass encoding, I did 700kbps bit rate.

If handbrake uses both cores I'm not sure, but I was ripping in iTunes and importing in iPhoto WHILE i did the Handbrake test, so it would be even faster if I did not. I'll do that later tonight.

I have to go now, I'll respond to all the posts later tonight. Thanks!

[powerbook911]

That is a *very* fast rip in Handbrake. Nice. :)

[BornAgainMac]

That is close to a G5. I have a dual 2 ghz Powermac and it does about 83 frames per second at 200 kbps. I know my kbps is low but I use that number when creating a director's commentary version of my movie when I don't need quality and at 320x200. I have the full quality version using H.264 at full resolution at 1000 kbps and those are perfect copies of the DVD in my eyes. It takes about 6 hours for every 2 hours using the 2-pass encoding method for H.264 on average. Very painful to wait.

Next year the Intel laptops along with some optimized Intel code will spank my Powermac G5. So much for the faster bus speed and 9 fans and air cooling case design.

[sw1tcher]

Could you also give us your impression on how well the Intel iMac runs programs such as Photoshop, Illustrator, Word, Excel, and Dreamweaver (if you have any of those programs)?

Wondering whether I should cancel my MBP order and get a G4 PB instead if it runs dog slow under Rosetta.

[irock]

GOD... I need another 1GB RAM for this Intel iMac. Granted, it's fast overall... but everything in Tiger is RAM-hungry.

- FireFox (PowerPC) is about 30% slower (subjective numbers)

- HandBrake is not as fast as I thought, but reckon it has something to do with unoptimized codes. To put this into perspective, my PowerBook 1.33Ghz can pull around 10-12fps in H.264 while my new iMac beats the laptop by 20fps. I'm expecting iMac to encode at 50fps.

- Boot up time doens't really concern me b/c I only reboot once a week.

[Lancetx]

I just tested HandBrake performance on both my new 17" Core Duo iMac and my girlfriend's Dual 2.5 Power Mac G5. Both were run using the exact same settings (320x240, H.264) and I was stunned to see that the iMac actually ran neck and neck with the Dual G5. I am thrilled with the performance so far and this is with only 512MB of RAM (because I haven't been able to find RAM for this machine locally yet). I've attached a screenshot from the iMac while HandBrake was encoding.

[Texas04]

Wow that is amazing, cant wait for the MBP's, im using handbrake on a 800MHz~ PPC iMac with 256MB of ram, and its at 5.38fps... :eek: )

[brogers]

I don't have any "offical" results, but I played with one at the Charlotte, NC Apple store this weekend and it was wicked fast. It was the 20" model. Just opened various applications like all the iLife stuff. I bought the new iMac with built in iSight for Christmas and the Intel iMac just felt faster. My wife was watching and she said "That one is so much faster than yours"....:(

Oh well, I love my iMac and it is great for me. Just my 2 cents.

[Texas04]

I don't have any "offical" results, but I played with one at the Charlotte, NC Apple store this weekend and it was wicked fast. It was the 20" model. Just opened various applications like all the iLife stuff. I bought the new iMac with built in iSight for Christmas and the Intel iMac just felt faster. My wife was watching and she said "That one is so much faster than yours"....:(

Oh well, I love my iMac and it is great for me. Just my 2 cents.

Yeah, I used the new iMac's two, from the universal apps, to Office, to even the mouse seemed like it ran faster, I was using a 17" model though

[thestaton]

I have a 20" intel iMac with 2gigs of ram & the 256 video card upgrade and this thing is lighting fast! Is there some soft of benchmarking I can run to compare to the orignal poster to see how much the extra ram can benefit?

[NewbieNerd]

I have a 20" intel iMac with 2gigs of ram & the 256 video card upgrade and this thing is lighting fast! Is there some soft of benchmarking I can run to compare to the orignal poster to see how much the extra ram can benefit?

Good to hear, good to hear!! You have my exact system, which was last in the Philippines.

[BakedBeans]

I have a 20" intel iMac with 2gigs of ram & the 256 video card upgrade and this thing is lighting fast! Is there some soft of benchmarking I can run to compare to the orignal poster to see how much the extra ram can benefit?

Same config. here - fast, fast, fast

[jhero]

If it's worth anything, I got to play ut2004 on a 30" display this weekend on a dc 2ghz PM with only 512mb of ram. God was that a slideshow haha; but my eyes! They have never witnessed so much shear awesomeness of huge :eek: Opening google led to a whole lota wasted space :D

anyways, more impressions are needed ^^ pics/vids/mooore

[Joshua53077]

I'm seriously debating buying a 20 inch iMac so I went down to my local apple store (Roosevelt Field) to do a hands on test on it. I was totally impressed. I have a 1.8 Ghz Rev. A iMac G5 and this system seemed to blow it away. The finder was much snappier and applications almost almost immediately (it had the stock 512 megs of ram). I played a few trailers at 1080p and it played them without a hitch. The difference in screen real estate between a 17 inch and a 20 inch is huge by the way. The only disappointment I found was that in iTunes the visualizer was only displaying about 11 fps, which I think must be because it isn't optimized yet. Web pages opened almost immediately (though I'm sure the internet connection at the apple store is a T1 or something). I also opened excel to see how rosetta behaves and it opened at almost the same speed it would on my computer at home. To me, there was a substantial speed gain on the intel iMacs which justifies an upgrade from the Rev. A iMac. I don't use the "pro" apps much so it doesn't really matter to me. The benchmarks that i have seen, which are certainly "Real world," can't take into account the overall feel of this computer, which brings the finder back into the usability realm that I haven't felt or seen since OS 9. I consider myself your average, non-professional user and to me it makes a huge difference.

As an aside, the Apple Store was PACKED yesterday, the line to pay was about 20 deep and the Genius Bar was more crowded than my local bar. People were everywhere! Suddenly I don't feel like I'm "Thinking Different" when I choose Apple.

[heaven]

If it's worth anything, I got to play ut2004 on a 30" display this weekend on a dc 2ghz PM with only 512mb of ram. God was that a slideshow haha; but my eyes! They have never witnessed so much shear awesomeness of huge :eek: Opening google led to a whole lota wasted space :D

anyways, more impressions are needed ^^ pics/vids/mooore

I can imagine that! I have always been fascinated by the 30" displays at the apple stores. I ll get one, trust me, no matter how long i will have to safe for it :cool:

[Epicurus]

As an aside, the Apple Store was PACKED yesterday, the line to pay was about 20 deep and the Genius Bar was more crowded than my local bar. People were everywhere! Suddenly I don't feel like I'm "Thinking Different" when I choose Apple.

Once Apple opens 5 stores within 30 minutes of you, then we can start complaining! All the older Mac users just need to dig into the UNIX underground so we can maintain superiority over the new wave. :D

I hope we see this sort of acceptance of the new PowerMacs to drive interest in the new platform for the Pro-level apps. Here's hoping we see Pro/E, AutoCAD, ChiefArchitect, Matlab, LabView, 3DS Max, Avid, etc. get some renewed interest in the Mac. If Apple can bring 'em in in droves for the PowerMacs, this might just happen.

[MacRumorUser]

Damn I've been fooled. I thought there was going to be some iMac impressions on this thread.... Oh well here goes...



Booooonnnnnggggggg



That's the imac starting up... :D Don't know if I got the 'accent' right...

[ortuno2k]

I have tested an Intel iMac 20" recently. I ran Word, Excel, PP and Entourage and it flies.
I think it even loaded faster than my 2.0 G5 iMac. It feels faster and more responsive.
Of course, the rest of the programs run very fast as well. I timed a fresh, cold start-up from the second I hit the power button 'till I was in the desktop at just 25 seconds.
Very impressive.
I have yet to see other programs running Rosetta on it.

[jhero]

You are all lucky, no intel imacs here yet :(

[nph]

I just tried Photoshop under Rosetta at the Applestore in Willow Bend.
It was slow as molass trying to run some filters on a large JPEG.
Everything else more or less flew but for heavy applications like PS under Rosetta you have to have some patience. It was slower than my current imac 800MHz G4...

Btw, they are totally out of the imac G5 that I was asking about, hoping to see some discount!

Just be aware.

/Peter

P.S. Still thinking to get one to replace my G4 that is getting a lot of reboot screens lately despite reinstalled systems.

[NeuronBasher]

How much RAM was in the one you tried the Photoshop experiment on? If it was the base 512mb model, I could see it crawling while manipulating large images....

[kainjow]

I timed a fresh, cold start-up from the second I hit the power button 'till I was in the desktop at just 25 seconds.
Very impressive.
Bah, that's nothing. My DP 1.8Ghz PM G5 booted up in 12 seconds a few times. Hasn't happened since then, but these G5s are fast too.

[Edge100]

My wife was watching and she said "That one is so much faster than yours"....:(

Not to drag this thread into the gutter, but I get this all time from my wife...only its usually "bigger" rather than "faster"....;)

[nph]

The RAM on the imac I tested with Photoshop had 1 Gig, actually most of the display ones had 1 Gig.

-Peter

[nagromme]

Also how big an image, and which filters?

People doing posters for print will have trouble, but what about people just working with images from a 3-5 MP digital camera? I'm thinking that could be useable, since my lowly 1.25 G4 handles those images fine. Especially since I mainly do Curves and cloning and copy/paste stuff on them -- time-consuming filters aren't the ones I generally need.

Thanks for the reports!

(I'm thinking more about a MacBook personally.)

[Lincoln]

Has anyone tried Diablo II on the new intel imacs?

I contcted Blizzard about this game and got the following reply:

"At this time we have not announced plans to release a Universal Application update for our older titles to natively support Intel Macs. All existing titles that natively support Mac OS X (StarCraft and later) will run on Intel-based Macs via the Rosetta binary translator included with Mac OS X.

Diablo II and StarCraft players will need to use the Mac OS X Native Installer to install and play the game on Intel-based Macintosh computers. Recent shipments of Diablo II and StarCraft include a Mac OS X Native Installer on the installation discs. However, players without a Native Installer on their installation disc may need to download the installer from our website at the following links:

-Diablo II: (http://ftp.blizzard.com/pub/diablo2/patches/Mac/Diablo_II_Installer.dmg).
-StarCraft: (http://ftp.blizzard.com/pub/starcraft/patches/Mac/StarCraft_OS_X_Installer.dmg).

Currently, the following titles cannot run on Intel-based Macs since a Native Installer or Universal Application update is not available:

-Diablo
-Warcraft: Orcs and Humans
-Warcraft II: Tides of Darkness
-Warcraft II: Beyond the Dark Portal
-Warcraft II: Battle.net Edition

If you are interested in a Universal Application update to our existing software, feel free to suggest this in the Suggestions forum at - (http://www.battle.net/forums/board.aspx?ForumName=suggestions)."

So it looks like it will install and run, but no clues as to how fast.

[shrimpdesign]

I just got my iMac today. It's pretty sweet, much faster than my MDD Dual 1Ghz G4. Halo is really nice and plays fairly well, but I want a universal binary of Halo just to see how fast it can go.

I'm still transferring Photoshop from my old computer.

I tried opening all the applications in the application folder, I heard it would be pretty fun on the new Intel Macs. After about 30-45 seconds everything seemed to be running okay. I used Exposé and it showed all the Windows, and Photobooth was still displaying a live feed even with everything running! Pretty awesome.

It seems to run things pretty fast, but I am thinking about adding RAM. Because RAM always helps.

[nagromme]

So it looks like it will install and run, but no clues as to how fast.
Don't know--but the developer of Alice for Mac said that Quake 3 engine games (even more recent, detailed ones like Alice) ran great in Rosetta on the old developer kit Macs--which didn't have the nice GPU that the real Intel Macs had.

Also, I've seen two major reviews now claiming that Doom 3 runs at close to the speed it did on the old G5s: about 85% framerates. That's not good enough for most people since the old iMac G5 wasn't stellar for Doom 3. However, it does suggest that the faster GPU in the new iMacs goes a long way toward helping compensate for Rosetta, even in a really complex modern game. (Doom 3 is expected to have a Universal Binary soon of course.)

So I'm thinking that older (non-Classic) Mac games should run great in Rosetta, depending on just how CPU intensive they are. Remember that they were meant to to run on G4s, and not the latest G4s either. So they may not demand more speed than Rosetta can deliver.


I just got my iMac today. It's pretty sweet, much faster than my MDD Dual 1Ghz G4. Halo is really nice and plays fairly well, but I want a universal binary of Halo just to see how fast it can go.
Good to hear. I imagine a Universal patch for Halo is expected (I know it is for UT2004 and Doom 3) but I haven't noticed anything official being said.

[cr2sh]

This thread is interesting. I get a feel that any Apple software is going to blaze but the stuff I'm really interested in (dreamweaver, photoshop, fireworks) may be hurting.

I'd love to see some head to head benches on the g5 and intel on programs that really matter!

[avensis087]

i purchased an iMac G5 a few weeks before Steve's keynote and after the announcement of the new Intel Core Duo iMac I frantically called my local Apple Store (The Woodlands) to see if an exchange was possible. The WONDERFUL store manager said that it would be no problem to exchange even though I was past my 14 day return period. Now I'm running a 2GHz Core Duo with 1.5 GB of RAM. Woooonderful machine, and a definite speed increase compared to the G5 I had on my desk no more than a week ago! Just thought i'd share!

[wpwj40e]

Had a friend over tonite helping me set up my wireless lan on my old pc - has been relegated to being a print/file server....

While he was there I was ripping a concert dvd to ipod format(using handbrake), downloading a 180 meg hd movie trailer, playing music on tunes, creating a keynote presentation, had a game going on, 11 safari windows open, several widgets, transfering files from my pc(over my wireless network), running an automator script - changing sizes of photos and converting them...and then was bouncing through a number of apps showing him the software on the iMac.

He was stunned to see this. No hesitation, everything worked smoothly and the beat went on...(pun intended:))

Whats funny is that I have been doing this for the past week - well not quite as much - but when I have had the time to sit down - have literally been working the heck out of the iMac. I have gotten used to doing so many things at once - I forget how amazing it is. BTW - This is with 1 gig of ram. Have monitor running and clearly am in desperate need of more ram. Am on backorder. This machine LOVES memory.

But...I have been able to do more in the short amount of time I have to devote to getting stuff done than I ever was on my old PC - which was not a slouch either.

It truly is a different experience - yea - hardware has alot to do with it - but so do the apps.

I don't know how "fast" a machine has to be - but at the moment I can't keep up with my iMac:)

Therese

[bigfib]

Its funny....

When I first set up my intel 17" (stock 512) it seemed a bit clunky, particularly with rosetta...
But its actually getting a bit faster with each day that passes... and this isn't just an impression, i've benchmarked it.
Maybe osx does some kind of optimisation as it goes along???
Anyway I have an extra gig arriving later this week so it should really fly.
Overall though, I am well pleased.

[jhero]

The secret inner workings of os x

<.<

>.>

O.O

[jacobj]

Had a friend over tonite helping me set up my wireless lan on my old pc - has been relegated to being a print/file server....

While he was there I was ripping a concert dvd to ipod format(using handbrake), downloading a 180 meg hd movie trailer, playing music on tunes, creating a keynote presentation, had a game going on, 11 safari windows open, several widgets, transfering files from my pc(over my wireless network), running an automator script - changing sizes of photos and converting them...and then was bouncing through a number of apps showing him the software on the iMac.

He was stunned to see this. No hesitation, everything worked smoothly and the beat went on...(pun intended:))

Whats funny is that I have been doing this for the past week - well not quite as much - but when I have had the time to sit down - have literally been working the heck out of the iMac. I have gotten used to doing so many things at once - I forget how amazing it is. BTW - This is with 1 gig of ram. Have monitor running and clearly am in desperate need of more ram. Am on backorder. This machine LOVES memory.

But...I have been able to do more in the short amount of time I have to devote to getting stuff done than I ever was on my old PC - which was not a slouch either.

It truly is a different experience - yea - hardware has alot to do with it - but so do the apps.

I don't know how "fast" a machine has to be - but at the moment I can't keep up with my iMac:)

Therese


Your claims are so extraordinary that I am inclined to disbelieve.... but I want to believe...

[TBi]

Its funny....

When I first set up my intel 17" (stock 512) it seemed a bit clunky, particularly with rosetta...
But its actually getting a bit faster with each day that passes... and this isn't just an impression, i've benchmarked it.
Maybe osx does some kind of optimisation as it goes along???
Anyway I have an extra gig arriving later this week so it should really fly.
Overall though, I am well pleased.

Rosetta is supposed to save translated code and optimise as time goes by. I believe that initially it does enough translation to get the app running, then the more you use the app it does optimisation to make it run better plus it has already been translated.

[thefunkymunky]

Rosetta is supposed to save translated code and optimise as time goes by. I believe that initially it does enough translation to get the app running, then the more you use the app it does optimisation to make it run better plus it has already been translated.

Wow. Thats seems pretty neat. I use PS, Illustrator, Acrobat, Quark daily and would be interested to see how these apps run under Rosetta. Due to upgrade our MDD Dual 1.25GHz PM's to some shiny new Intel iMacs. Will the apps running under Rosetta be faster than the PM's? :confused:

[terigox]

Has anyone tried Diablo II on the new intel imacs?

I contcted Blizzard about this game and got the following reply:

...

So it looks like it will install and run, but no clues as to how fast.

I have been reading through the forums for a while, and really haven't until now had an opportunity to buy a Mac, but here I am!! Still debating on whether to wait longer on order my MacBook... but that's beside the point.

I was writing to see what the opinions are of the 128mb x1600 vs the 256mb x1600 on the new macs. I'm hoping to do a little bit of gaming, maybe some FPS like UT, but some Blizzard games as well, WoW specifically.

I'm trying to decide if I really _need_ the 256mb of vram. Any opinions or thoughts on that portion of the iMac, or people's experience or benchmarks at the difference it would make?

Thanks everyone :)

[Blue Velvet]

Here's my impression of the new Intel iMacs.

<click, whirrr... shhhh, hummmmmmm>







Not bad, eh? :p

Can't wait to have a go at an impression of a MacBook Pro.
May have to get more (un)hinged.

[TBi]

Here's my impression of the new Intel iMacs.

<click, whirrr... shhhh, hummmmmmm>







Not bad, eh? :p

Can't wait to have a go at an impression of a MacBook Pro.
May have to get more (un)hinged.

You forgot the *BONG*

[Blue Velvet]

You forgot the *BONG*

That was one coming out of sleep... :o
Need more practice.

[mkrishnan]

<click, whirrr... shhhh, hummmmmmm>

Ahhh, BV.... :eek:

And I thought the *real* iMacs were sexy! :D

[jsfpa]

I just tried Photoshop under Rosetta at the Applestore in Willow Bend.
It was slow as molass trying to run some filters on a large JPEG.
Everything else more or less flew but for heavy applications like PS under Rosetta you have to have some patience. It was slower than my current imac 800MHz G4...

Btw, they are totally out of the imac G5 that I was asking about, hoping to see some discount!

Just be aware.

/Peter

P.S. Still thinking to get one to replace my G4 that is getting a lot of reboot screens lately despite reinstalled systems.



I've played around with Photoshop on my iMac. With 1.5 gig of ram it seems to run ok. I'd say at least as well as my G5 1.8 (single) with 2 gig of ram. I was play with files froma 8 megapixle camera. I'm not a heavey user of Photoshop so for what I do, I'm pleased with it's performance.

[wpwj40e]

Your claims are so extraordinary that I am inclined to disbelieve.... but I want to believe...


Well...Don't know how to "prove" my claims:) Maybe becasue my iMac has been running for a week - it got the "Im getting faster bug" or because most of the stuff I was doing was not running under Rosetta...

Maybe because none of the things I was doing were "pro tasks" using "pro apps". Really can't say - but as I am typing this am ripping the Elton John in concert DVD's(one at a time...), have a Neil Young concert I ripped incorrectly the first time (too big) playing in a Quick time window, have VPN'd into work and have ppt and excel running as I am working on a project - only have 6 safari windows open, am downloading two apps - printing a first draft of a white paper I am working on - have word open also....I am noticing a bounce to two when I open a new app - like when I opened word to print. But short of that - simply amazing!

Therese

[cr2sh]

But short of that - simply amazing!Therese

What machine was your old mac? I mean, did you go from a B&W G3 to this machine... or did you have like a 1GHz G4? Or a 1st gen g5?

Give us something to compare your amazement to!

:)

[Peace]

Ok..Here's an impression on the new iMac.

I'm a member of the Apple Developer Connection.So there are things I can't say in specific.

I had the DTK for 6 months.Also have a rev b.dual G5 2.3 Powermac w/4 gigs ram,a rev a. single G5 1.6 Powermac with 2 gigs ram and a rev a. aluminum G4 1.0 15" Powerbook..

I did some encoding of various video and audio formats..
The relative time to do these on my G5 2.3 dual Powermac was around 5 minutes.
The relative time to do these on the iMac 17" dual 1.83 w/512 megs ram was around 5 minutes..
About the same..

I have found ( so far since yesterday ) the iMac to be stable,consistant and very quiet..

The ONLY thing bad I could say would be the screen contrast is too low on the 17".Not sure about the 20"..

I'll be putting in 2 1gig sticks today and putting it through more rigorous tests..

Until then I'd say people that are complaining about the power/speed of the Intel iMac..Well..they have some kind of problem..what it is I don't know.

I do have a request of the Intel iMac owners.Could you please tell me what version of OS X is installed on your system ? including build number.
To find out click on the Apple icon on the top and select about this Mac then the more info.
In the system profile go down to software and it will tell you the version there.
Thanks!!

[wpwj40e]

What machine was your old mac? I mean, did you go from a B&W G3 to this machine... or did you have like a 1GHz G4? Or a 1st gen g5?

Give us something to compare your amazement to!

:)

Never had a MAC before. Actually did have a mini (speed bumped one) that I played with before giving to my parents for the Holidays. This is night and day different than that.

My WIN PC - P4 3.2 - 800mhz. 200 gig HD,400 GIG external. 2 gig ram, ati 800 256 graphics, 16x Pioneer DVD r/w external - dual, installed dvd r/w - unknown. Running under XP and firewalls and spyware and..and..., tweaked weekly - which helps.

If I ripped a dvd using dvd decrypter then nero or videora - my machine pretty much came to a halt. Downloading(programs/files etc) and ripping a DVD ensured that was all I would be doing. If I attempted to play a cd or music under iTunes and ripped and had excel/ppt open and downloaded...I could literally take a break between key strokes and music playback could get choppy. Although I was able to copy/burn a cd faster than on the iMAC if that was the only task I was doing. The iMac seems to max out at about 16x copying cd's over to iTunes - however that is with other stuff running. Doesn't seem to make alot of diffference - think the hold up must be the optical drive on the iMac - maybe it being sideways has something to do with it. Don't know - but it is faster on my PC if that is the only task my PC is doing.

Games like WOW/Halo - I do not play my kids do - so have them loaded really for "testing" and having them play around with them - used to be on my PC all the time til they got their souped up machines(all built). Anyways - games are faster with better frame rates on my PC than on the iMac - again once you start doing multiple tasks the PC bogs down and becomes comparable. In non-games - the kind of stuff I do - the iMac seems to handle multiple tasks MUCH better/faster and more handily.

Of course - I blame XP and the other garbage loaded on windows for causing my machine to act slow - hardware wise it is fine.

Anyways - gives you some perspective on where I come from...

:)
Therese

[wpwj40e]

I do have a request of the Intel iMac owners.Could you please tell me what version of OS X is installed on your system ? including build number.
To find out click on the Apple icon on the top and select about this Mac then the more info.
In the system profile go down to software and it will tell you the version there.
Thanks!!

Here ya go...
Mac OS X 10.4.4 (8G1165)
Kernel Version: Darwin 8.4.1


Therese

[TBi]

My WIN PC - P4 3.2 - 800mhz. 200 gig HD,400 GIG external. 2 gig ram, ati 800 256 graphics, 16x Pioneer DVD r/w external - dual, installed dvd r/w - unknown. Running under XP and firewalls and spyware and..and..., tweaked weekly - which helps.

<snip>

Anyways - games are faster with better frame rates on my PC than on the iMac - again once you start doing multiple tasks the PC bogs down and becomes comparable. In non-games - the kind of stuff I do - the iMac seems to handle multiple tasks MUCH better/faster and more handily.

Of course - I blame XP and the other garbage loaded on windows for causing my machine to act slow - hardware wise it is fine.


You have to remember that your iMac is dual processor while the P4 isn't, which would explain the slowness while running multiple tasks. It has hyperthreading but this is no where as fast as real dual processor.

Otherwise i agree with what you see, although i only have slow mac's they both seem to run faster than my main PC. The interface seems a lot faster but this could be because my PC is loaded down with GiG's of files whereas my apples don't have much. I know that for processor intensive applications the 4400+ wipes the floor with my mac's they still seem faster. Or maybe i'm just expecting less from them.

[Peace]

Here ya go...
Mac OS X 10.4.4 (8G1165)
Kernel Version: Darwin 8.4.1


Therese

Thanks!!

Here's a quick benchmark :

I moved a 3 gig zipped file from a DVD to the desktop.Took about 4-5 minutes.
I then unzipped it.Took about 2-3 minutes ( approx ).These were 180 minutes worth of .WAV files.14 total files.

I opened iTunes and set the default import to AAC high quality 128kbps.
Then I dragged the files into iTunes.Took about 2 minutes.
Lastly I converted the .WAV to the AAC 128kbps.

180 minutes worth of audio.14 songs.
This took 10 minutes and averaged 20.3X.


And to the person that was talking about games :
First off I'm impressed that they even played.
If they did they were running under Rosetta because the Universal apps arn't out in final release yet that I know of.

[Fabio_gsilva]

Not to drag this thread into the gutter, but I get this all time from my wife...only its usually "bigger" rather than "faster"....;)


Hahahahahahahaha!!!

Best thread of the month!!

Thanks for making my holyday funnier!!!

Fábio!!

[Fabio_gsilva]

Your claims are so extraordinary that I am inclined to disbelieve.... but I want to believe...

I think it's a matter of expectations...

You know, before my Mini 1.42, 1gb Ram, my first Mac, I always used PC's and my previous was a p3 700mhz with 128mb ram, sharing 8mb, all on board...

Even Word, when printing, was sluggsh...

Now, I do a lot of things together and i'm really pleased with my mini performance...

You, in US, have acces to a lot of good things and put high expctations on everything... for me, I'm sure that I would be blown away with happiness with an iMac intel...

[Peace]

Thanks!!

Here's a quick benchmark :

I moved a 3 gig zipped file from a DVD to the desktop.Took about 4-5 minutes.
I then unzipped it.Took about 2-3 minutes ( approx ).These were 180 minutes worth of .WAV files.14 total files.

I opened iTunes and set the default import to AAC high quality 128kbps.
Then I dragged the files into iTunes.Took about 2 minutes.
Lastly I converted the .WAV to the AAC 128kbps.

180 minutes worth of audio.14 songs.
This took 10 minutes and averaged 20.3X.


And to the person that was talking about games :
First off I'm impressed that they even played.
If they did they were running under Rosetta because the Universal apps arn't out in final release yet that I know of.


Ok I just did the exact same thing only using my rev.b dual G5 2.3 w/4 gigs ram..

Transfer from DVD to desktop : 7m30s.
unzip : 4m45s
drag to iTunes : 3m
Convert : 6m42s 30X

You be the judge.

[jaw04005]

GOD... I need another 1GB RAM for this Intel iMac. Granted, it's fast overall... but everything in Tiger is RAM-hungry.

- FireFox (PowerPC) is about 30% slower (subjective numbers)

- HandBrake is not as fast as I thought, but reckon it has something to do with unoptimized codes. To put this into perspective, my PowerBook 1.33Ghz can pull around 10-12fps in H.264 while my new iMac beats the laptop by 20fps. I'm expecting iMac to encode at 50fps.

- Boot up time doens't really concern me b/c I only reboot once a week.

Gosh I know! I had to remove all of my Dashboard Widgets because I needed the small amounts of RAM they were taking up. The Intel iMacs are really RAM hungry. I have the 20" iMac Core Duo.

[jsfpa]

Dual screen works great.

[shrimpdesign]

Dual screen works great.
I agree, I have a 19" hooked up to my my iMac. It's beautiful.

http://static.flickr.com/17/91709011_4b3036d8b3_m.jpg
(http://www.flickr.com/photos/shrimpdesign/91709011/)

Only, the iMac's display is so bright, my 19" looks a little dull in comparison. I've created so many color profiles for it.

[plinden]

Well, I've gone a whole day now with my new Intel iMac, and I'm still loving it. Perhaps it's because I've used several other OSs in the past (MS-DOS, Wins 95, NT 2000, XP, Solaris, HPUX, various shades of Linux etc) but it took me no time to get used to OS X.

With the trouble I had with Windows on my Dell desktop, I had decided to try out Linux again, and I was playing around with it the day before this arrived, thinking that it was good enough to use. After a few hours with the iMac, I moved the old desktop to the basement. I might use it again in a few weeks, as a file server, but right now, I'll stick to the Mac.

So the impressions I have:
1. I have to consciously think about the menu items on the menu bar - the first time I opened iPhoto and wanted to import my photos, I searched around on the top of the window rather than look to the top of the screen. I'm learning quickly though.

2. The screen is bright and clear, no dead pixels as far as I can tell, but I'm little concerned about the colour. Watching an episode of Dora the Explorer with my 3 year old, the colours looked off slightly compared to TV. But I'm not dependent on a good colour screen, and it's better than my Dell 17" LCD, which has a definite yellowish tone in comparison.

3. This is so silent. I can just about hear a faint hum if I listen hard, but when I have my external HD or Dell laptop running, I can't hear anything from the iMac. I'm used to spending half my waking life listening to fans whirring.

4. Installing apps by dragging them to Applications and uninstalling them by dragging to Trash is so natural it's pure genius. I wonder why no one thought of it before ... oh, Apple engineers did, four or more years ago. A couple of nights ago I installed Firefox on the Linux machine, and to make it accessible outside of a terminal, I had to right click the menu and type in the label and location of the app executable and its icon.

5. Speaking of right clicking, some or many of you will be surprised to hear that I haven't yet configured the Mighty Mouse for two button use. I haven't had to. I haven't even had to use Ctrl-click much.

As someone who learned programming using a text editor on a Vax mainframe, I've always used keyboard shortcuts more than the mouse. I consider every second with my hand on the mouse is half a second wasted. So I'm learning the keyboard shortcuts and finding that one button use is a perfectly natural way to work. I know I'm not typical, but I like this.

6. I'm a little pissed though, that they don't use the standard Ctrl-A. Ctrl-C, Ctrl-X and Ctrl-V for select all, copy, cut and paste - well, just something else I have to bear in mind.

7. FrontRow is pretty good, but I never had any other multimedia type program to compare it too. My 3 year old loves Dora and the photo slideshow, and the cosmic screensaver, although she insists there's something wrong with the "computerer" when it switches to screensaver.

8. Java performance is tremendous - a 1.83 GHz CPU is 53% faster than a Pentium-M 2.26 GHz laptop at compiling the same code. That works out that the iMac is twice as efficient per clock cycle as the Windows laptop. With X11 and Tomcat installed, I can do all my Java development work on this.

9. Access privileges are implemented well. This is something I missed on my Windows PCs, trying to limit users' privileges usually ended up making the account unusable. I have two daughters who are not yet old enough to use a computer, but I set up a managed account just to see, and the parental controls seem pretty decent.

10.I think I found a bug last night while playing around with accounts and user switching. I've enabled root access, and an account "System Administrator" showed up in the account list on the top right. I logged into this using the root password, and it just displayed the background, no Finder running. I couldn't get a way out short of pulling the plug. That account is not present in the list now.

11. Setting up printers is a pain. I have a Netgear print server for network printing, but the iMac doesn't seem to work with it. However, the Dell laptop doesn't work with it either (although a desktop and IBM Thinkpad did at the same time as the Dell didn't). So I now have the printer attached directly to the iMac.

But the printer preference page is odd - I don't know if it's a bug, but when go to System Preferences/Print and Fax, it doesn't always show the printer that's attached ... well it does now ... I'll watch out for similar behavior.



Overall, I'm highly impressed. I only wish I'd done this much earlier in my life.

[mkrishnan]

2. The screen is bright and clear, no dead pixels as far as I can tell, but I'm little concerned about the colour. Watching an episode of Dora the Explorer with my 3 year old, the colours looked off slightly compared to TV. But I'm not dependent on a good colour screen, and it's better than my Dell 17" LCD, which has a definite yellowish tone in comparison.

Have you calibrated? You should definitely, definitely do it. You may have to do it more than once too, to be satisfied. I did it once on my iMac G5, and right now I still feel that my iBook's color is better, and that I need to do it again. In case you're not familiar, calibration is done in system preferences -> display -> color. Turn on expert mode, and just follow the prompts. :) It'll basically ask you to adjust a bunch of pictures with sliders, and tell you how to do it. I've printed photos out for framing and I've been very, very pleased that my iBook's colors are honest to print. My iMac doesn't seem perfect at the moment, but I think if I take another pass, I should be able to get it. :)

The brightness is lovely, on the other hand. :)

[BakedBeans]

2. The screen is bright and clear, no dead pixels as far as I can tell, but I'm little concerned about the colour. Watching an episode of Dora the Explorer with my 3 year old, the colours looked off slightly compared to TV. But I'm not dependent on a good colour screen, and it's better than my Dell 17" LCD, which has a definite yellowish tone in comparison.

Go to systempreferences>displays>colour>adobe rgb 1998

that will make your colours nicer.


[quote[6. I'm a little pissed though, that they don't use the standard Ctrl-A. Ctrl-C, Ctrl-X and Ctrl-V for select all, copy, cut and paste - well, just something else I have to bear in mind.[/quote]

erm... it does just use the  key instead of the CTRL key (its easier)

[plinden]

Go to systempreferences>displays>colour>adobe rgb 1998

that will make your colours nicer.
I'm at work at the moment, but I think I tried that, and it made everything look too washed out and blue. I seem to remember the default setting was my favourite. I may be wrong though, I played around with all the preferences yesterday so can't really remember. I'm at work now, so will have to wait till I get home.


erm... it does just use the  key instead of the CTRL key (its easier)
It uses the apple key, yes. But I keep going for Ctrl. I'm only a little pissed, I'll get used to it. If that's the only thing that annoys me, I'll be very happy.

[johnnybluejeans]

It uses the apple key, yes. But I keep going for Ctrl. I'm only a little pissed, I'll get used to it. If that's the only thing that annoys me, I'll be very happy.

When I first made the switch to a Mac it annoyed me too, now I'm used to it. Of course, now I'm annoyed when I go to one of my PCs because I keep accidently hitting Alt. ; )

[SiliconAddict]

I just tried Photoshop under Rosetta at the Applestore in Willow Bend.
It was slow as molass trying to run some filters on a large JPEG.
Everything else more or less flew but for heavy applications like PS under Rosetta you have to have some patience. It was slower than my current imac 800MHz G4...

How much RAM is in the thing? I'm going to keep railing on people about this until we get Photoshop benchmarks on systems with 2GB of RAM. Rosetta does not function like your everyday average application it is going to eat a crap load of RAM and if it’s the default 512MB I expect it to be a heck of a lot slower then 1GB or 2GB.

[plinden]

How much RAM in the thing? I'm going to keep railing on people about this until we get Photoshop benchmarks on systems with 2GB of RAM. Rosetta does not function like your everyday average application it is going to eat a crap load of RAM and if it’s the default 512MB I expect it to be a heck of a lot slower then 1GB or 2GB.
I have 2GB RAM but no Photoshop. I could download the free 30 day trial (all 310MB of it) but I wouldn't know where to start testing ... any hints? But then, I also don't have a G5 to compare to.

[robbieduncan]

It uses the apple key, yes. But I keep going for Ctrl. I'm only a little pissed, I'll get used to it. If that's the only thing that annoys me, I'll be very happy.

As a terminal using programmer you will soon appreciate that command-C is copy and ctrl-C still works as an interrupt. It really makes sense when you think about it. Ctrl is for control characters and Command is for issuing commands :)

[samanthas]

I'm using the Adobe RGB 1998 color profile for my iMac and it looks great. Just wanted to say that. :p Now that I''ve been using this when I go back to the iMac color profile (just to test) it looks terrible.

Adobe on the left, iMac default setting ont he right:
http://i1.tinypic.com/n2mudk.png

I'm super bored. Sorry.

[bigfib]

GOD... I need another 1GB RAM for this Intel iMac. Granted, it's fast overall... but everything in Tiger is RAM-hungry.

- FireFox (PowerPC) is about 30% slower (subjective numbers)


You can get the Intel version of Firefox here ;-)
http://josh.trancesoftware.com/mozilla/firefox-1.5.intel.mac.dmg

[plinden]

As a terminal using programmer you will soon appreciate that command-C is copy and ctrl-C still works as an interrupt. It really makes sense when you think about it. Ctrl is for control characters and Command is for issuing commands :)
Yeah, I see your point. I have more than once accidentally interrupted a process by having the wrong terminal in focus when trying to copy some text, though not often.

[plinden]

2. The screen is bright and clear, no dead pixels as far as I can tell, but I'm little concerned about the colour. Watching an episode of Dora the Explorer with my 3 year old, the colours looked off slightly compared to TV. But I'm not dependent on a good colour screen, and it's better than my Dell 17" LCD, which has a definite yellowish tone in comparison.
So I calibrated my screen and it looks much better now - but I didn't like the adobe rgb 1998 calibration. Do you all really think that's better than the default?

8. Java performance is tremendous - a 1.83 GHz CPU is 53% faster than a Pentium-M 2.26 GHz laptop at compiling the same code. That works out that the iMac is twice as efficient per clock cycle as the Windows laptop. With X11 and Tomcat installed, I can do all my Java development work on this.
I did one more benchmark. I compiled the same Java project while importing the same CD (Tom Waits, Small Change) into iTunes on PC and iMac.

On the Windows laptop, the compile time went from 20 seconds to 2m 40s.

On the iMac, the compile time also increased ....

















... from 13 seconds to 15 seconds.

Man, I love the dual cores.

[nutmac]

I'm using the Adobe RGB 1998 color profile for my iMac and it looks great. Just wanted to say that. :p Now that I''ve been using this when I go back to the iMac color profile (just to test) it looks terrible.

Yeah, iMac profile is horrible (looks too washed out). Although Adobe RGB (1998) is an improvement, you are better of calibrating one yourself. It will take just few minutes and kinda fun actually.

[jaw04005]

Some of the claims on this forum seem to be slightly exaggerated. After almost two weeks with the Intel iMac (20"/2Ghz Core Duo/2GB RAM), I can say in my experience that it is not as fast as my Power Mac G5 (2Ghz Dual Processor/2GB RAM). It feels around 20-30% slower than my G5 in most applications including the iLife 06 suite and QuickTime. However, I'm sure for those with G4 processors, the Intel iMac will be a huge upgrade. But for those of us with recent Power Macs, there is no reason to go upgrading just yet.

I also found that Safari, the Finder and iPhoto are extremely buggy. I've had to force restart at least three times over the past two weeks because of freezing.

Overall, it's a great consumer machine, and I'm sure with the next Mac OS X update and future UB software the future of the Intel iMac is bright.

[plinden]

I just wanted to share this ... my brother turned up at our door yesterday (without letting us know he was coming :rolleyes: ). When he saw my new iMac (just one week old now and working flawlessly) he said how cool it was - he liked the Apple style.

Then he looked behind it and on the floor and asked "where's the rest of it?"

This is someone who works as a senior engineering manager (one step below VP level) for a software company and who dabbles in amateur photography, and who had been hearing about Macs from me for at least 18 months. I guess there's still a lot of education needs to be done.

By the way, I think he's tempted to get his own ...