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Benchmarks of new iMac on macworld.com

I would "advise" you to use spell check. Sorry I'm a bit of an e-snob at times, I know. That being said hear is my rant.

I don't know who is more out of touch - Loyola, the author of that horrendously confusing and misleading article, or the peanut gallery of posters in the comments section after that horrendously confusing and misleading article.

Macworld usually does their homework and writes accordingly but this comment, in my own testings and experience, just is not true.... " Interestingly, the old 2.8GHz 24-inch iMac, with its 256MB ATI Radeon HD 2600 Pro graphics card posted a Call of Duty frame rate that was faster than both the new 2.93GHz (256MB GeForce GT 120 graphics) and the 3.06GHz iMac (512MB GeForce GT 130)".

It may be so vs the GT120 unit ( I have no experience with the 120 machine) but the new 3.06 GHz iMac with GT130 card runs circles around the older 2.8 GHZ iMac with the RAdeon 2600. In Call of Duty, in every day tasks/apps, in everything. Maybe this will help many of those wondering what imac to get. The current best high end iMac that you can go buy - today - as in it's ready and available at most VAR and Apple retail stores and Apple online is the 3.06GHz with the GT130 graphics card. This machine as of this post date is the best/highest end/fastest overall iMac ever made. Of course this is all subject to change ( or not? ) once the ATI 4850 units start shipping, supposedly in about 4 - 5 weeks or so. We won't know the whole story of the latest round of iMacs until the gt130 model is directly compared to the ati 4850 model, but chances are the ATI 4850 model will then become the "best of the best" as far as iMacs go, with the GT130 model not far behind.

Then come just about end of year ( maybe even around November?) in a move to not have back to back dismal 4th quarters on their books, Apple will drop the i7 iMacs and these current best of the best models will be hand me downs. 😱
 
Thanks for posting this! I've been waiting for it. My 3.06GHz iMac comes today, and I'm quite impressed with the photoshop results. Glee!

If I were you, I'd get the 130 anyway. Just because of the 256mb of extra dedicated memory. And if you do get it, you'll never think you should've gotten the better one - whereas with the 120, every blip you'll feel regret. However, it's your money!
 
itommyboy said:
I would "advise" you to use spell check. Sorry I'm a bit of an e-snob at times, I know. That being said hear is my rant.
Click to expand...

I'm not an e-snob, but couldn't help but point out that your use of "hear" is incorrect. It would be correct if you typed either "hear my rant", or "here is my rant"... Unless of course you were being sarcastic and misused "hear". Although I guessing you didn't... 😉

BTW, it's "iMac", not "Imac".
 
I'd agree with bvk. Since the iMac isn't a machine you're just gonna pop open and throw a new video card in, I'd get the GT130 over the GT120 for the 512>256 memory upgrade, for future peace of mind.
 
Can someone explain to me how it's possible that the HD2600 beat these other cards????

EDIT: I'm seeing they used a 1024x768 resolution on Quake 4. That seems very low. Would the newer cards be better at higher resolutions? Or if the HD beat them in Quake 4 at lower it would also beat them at higher resolutions?
 
Mike in Kansas said:
I'm not an e-snob, but couldn't help but point out that your use of "hear" is incorrect. It would be correct if you typed either "hear my rant", or "here is my rant"... Unless of course you were being sarcastic and misused "hear". Although I guessing you didn't... 😉

BTW, it's "iMac", not "Imac".
Click to expand...

Wow what a harsh lesson I've learned. Never again will I call anyone out on such a silly matter. Yes those who live in glass houses. 😛 I won't even edit/repair my post so all can LOL at me on this one - as I'm man enough.

PS - are you SURE you're not an e-snob Mike?
 
ucla95 said:
Can someone explain to me how it's possible that the HD2600 beat these other cards????
Click to expand...


If you look around the net a bit more (or better yet are in a position to run your own direct comparisons) you'll find that the 2600 does not beat out the new GT 130.
 
itommyboy said:
If you look around the net a bit more (or better yet are in a position to run your own direct comparisons) you'll find that the 2600 does not beat out the new GT 130.
Click to expand...

It showed a better fps in COD4! Did you read the article? And it's not like COD4 is an old game!
 
itommyboy said:
Wow what a harsh lesson I've learned. Never again will I call anyone out on such a silly matter. Yes those who live in glass houses. 😛 I won't even edit/repair my post so all can LOL at me on this one - as I'm man enough.

PS - are you SURE you're not an e-snob Mike?
Click to expand...

The only time my e-snobbery shows is when a poster calls another poster on a spelling/grammar error, and then processed to make one him/herself. Pot. Kettle. Black. [edit - see? I misspelled "proceeds"!]

Other than that, I don't get too rankled by spelling mistakes or grammar errors. I know I've made more than my fair share in the past, as pretty much anyone on online forums has. Most of us type stream-of-conscious anyway, so you'd expect some mistacks alone the weigh... 😉

(the last few words were obviously in jest)
 
Mike in Kansas said:
The only time my e-snobbery shows is when a poster calls another poster on a spelling/grammar error, and then processed to make one him/herself. Pot. Kettle. Black.

Other than that, I don't get too rankled by spelling mistakes or grammar errors. I know I've made more than my fair share in the past, as pretty much anyone on online forums has. Most of us type stream-of-conscious anyway, so you'd expect some mistacks alone the weigh... 😉

(the last few words were obviously in jest)
Click to expand...


I truly don't get rattled much by them either and meant the whole comment more as a ha ha ha (calling myself a snob) than coming down on anyone's spelling. Although intentions are hard to read on the interwebz. 😛
 
ucla95 said:
It showed a better fps in Quake 4! Did you read the article?
Click to expand...


Yeah I read it and it's wrong. Did you read my article? Now you know that just because you read something does not mean it's without a doubt true.

That being said anyone who knows benchmarking knows that it is subjective. That is to say there are many variables that can effect scores from one machine to the next, or even on the same machine from one week to the next. You could get one score one day and different set of scores a week later on the same computer. They are for the most part estimates.

I understand not many people have the time or the means to do a "side by side" test of computers. I myself have (just sold my old iMac today in fact) been able to run the 2600 model right next to the new GT130 model for 4 days. I ran a few benchmarks on each of them in which the new model won out easily, but more importantly to me, I simply just used them. I did what I do every day on my computers - ran itunes, photoshop, email, web, iWork and some minor gaming ( WoW, Fable and COD4 lately) and it was clearly obvious that the gt130 is superior to the old 2600 card.
 
Mike in Kansas said:
I'm not an e-snob, but couldn't help but point out that your use of "hear" is incorrect. It would be correct if you typed either "hear my rant", or "here is my rant"... Unless of course you were being sarcastic and misused "hear". Although I guessing you didn't... 😉

BTW, it's "iMac", not "Imac".
Click to expand...


Way To Go, Mike! ROFL!
 
Wait a minute...

'Although I guessing you didn't...' or 'Although I'm guessing you didn't...'?

I keed, I keed.

Mike in Kansas said:
I'm not an e-snob, but couldn't help but point out that your use of "hear" is incorrect. It would be correct if you typed either "hear my rant", or "here is my rant"... Unless of course you were being sarcastic and misused "hear". Although I guessing you didn't... 😉

BTW, it's "iMac", not "Imac".
Click to expand...
 
gmanrique said:
'Although I guessing you didn't...' or 'Although I'm guessing you didn't...'?

I keed, I keed.
Click to expand...

Yeah I saw that as well but didn't have the heart to call him out on it. As I said I'm never calling anyone out like that again. In mikes defense he was only correcting me because I was being a wise @$$ 🙂
 
Interesting to note that the new memory does make a bit of a difference. Im not selling my new imac 3.06 (older model) because of the great price I got on it. ABSOLUTE BARGAIN
 
gmanrique said:
'Although I guessing you didn't...' or 'Although I'm guessing you didn't...'?

I keed, I keed.
Click to expand...

Like I said in the rest of that post, I make typing mistakes all of the time. I don't go around pointing out the typing mistakes of others, unless of course THEY point out others' mistakes while making some of their own.

I guess this topic has exhausted all of its use.
 
Back on topic guys! (Btw, I'm neither from UK or USA, but I've been to UK on holiday a few summers ago, so feel free to flame my English, but not in this iMac benchmark topic).

The conclusions I've come to after MWs review is that the GT120 and the GT130 is inferior to the 8800GS. I was hoping we could compare the GT130 with the 8800 and not the 2600, which was a huge disappointment when came out.

It's nice to have quite a few gfx-cards to choose among, but for me it seems that the difference between GT120 and GT130 shouldn't be enough to justify a 150$ premium.

Unless Apple does underclock/volt the 4850 it should be a real upgrade from the 8800s in the previous gen iMac, for only slightly more than the GT130 upgrade.
 
itommyboy said:
Macworld usually does their homework and writes accordingly but this comment, in my own testings and experience, just is not true.... " Interestingly, the old 2.8GHz 24-inch iMac, with its 256MB ATI Radeon HD 2600 Pro graphics card posted a Call of Duty frame rate that was faster than both the new 2.93GHz (256MB GeForce GT 120 graphics) and the 3.06GHz iMac (512MB GeForce GT 130)".

It may be so vs the GT120 unit ( I have no experience with the 120 machine) but the new 3.06 GHz iMac with GT130 card runs circles around the older 2.8 GHZ iMac with the RAdeon 2600. In Call of Duty, in every day tasks/apps, in everything. Maybe this will help many of those wondering what imac to get. The current best high end iMac that you can go buy - today - as in it's ready and available at most VAR and Apple retail stores and Apple online is the 3.06GHz with the GT130 graphics card. This machine as of this post date is the best/highest end/fastest overall iMac ever made. Of course this is all subject to change ( or not? ) once the ATI 4850 units start shipping, supposedly in about 4 - 5 weeks or so. We won't know the whole story of the latest round of iMacs until the gt130 model is directly compared to the ati 4850 model, but chances are the ATI 4850 model will then become the "best of the best" as far as iMacs go, with the GT130 model not far behind.
Click to expand...

I like how sometimes people can get so arrogant and irrational. How could you speak your opinion, which contradicts the result Macworld gets, without providing further evidence to back it up, and expect people to believe you? (I refer to how you replied ucla95 in other post) Simply say the benchmark Macworld gets is wrong doesn't make them wrong, nor make you right. As you said there, benchmarking is subjective, (I am still trying to figure out how it is so, since you run a benchmark program to obtain it, not like you run it and manually assign a mark to that test according to how fast it feels to you, now that would be subjective.) ever think you could also be the one wrong?

Your main argument is that "the new 3.06 GHz iMac with GT130 card runs circles around the older 2.8 GHZ iMac with the RAdeon 2600. In Call of Duty, in every day tasks/apps, in everything." If you take your time and read the article again, you will notice that Macworld states the same thing except the Call of Duty part. They agree that "new iMacs show speed boost." (See article title) However, that statement doesn't suddenly make the bizarre result that ATI Radeon HD 2600 Pro runs faster than Geforce GT120 and GT 130 in the case of COD 4 wrong. Macworld also feels the needs to test it further and post the complete result. Why would you say they're wrong and you're right? Can you back them up? Otherwise, please just say it's your opinion. Thanks.
 
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