Macworld's 2012 iMac results

Mac_i_Am · Jan 12, 2013

Macworld printed the results of the new BTO 27" iMac (27-inch iMac/3.4GHz Core i7 1TB Fusion Drive, 16GB RAM).

Is it me or is the new imac not as fast as it should be. Or is the 15" MBP-r a real beast? (How can a laptop perform so close to a desktop??)

Kinda disappointing in the results since I have a nearly identical imac coming my way. Now i'm tempted to get the MBP + a proper monitor (esp. with the screen issues)

LINK: http://www.macworld.com/article/2025145/lab-tested-new-27-inch-imac-speed-results.html

what say yall?

FlatlinerG · Jan 12, 2013

Mac_i_Am said:
Macworld printed the results of the new BTO 27" iMac (27-inch iMac/3.4GHz Core i7 1TB Fusion Drive, 16GB RAM).

Is it me or is the new imac not as fast as it should be. Or is the 15" MBP-r a real beast? (How can a laptop perform so close to a desktop??)

Kinda disappointing in the results since I have a nearly identical imac coming my way. Now i'm tempted to get the MBP + a proper monitor (esp. with the screen issues)

LINK: http://www.macworld.com/article/2025145/lab-tested-new-27-inch-imac-speed-results.html

what say yall?

I think the reason that the two perform so closely is based on the footprint. There really isn't much room behind the monitor on the new iMacs, so much so that they are starting to mimic hardware in portables.

Mac_i_Am · Jan 12, 2013

FlatlinerG said:
I think the reason that the two perform so closely is based on the footprint. There really isn't much room behind the monitor on the new iMacs, so much so that they are starting to mimic hardware in portables.

That sounds about right.
Guess the imac is but a laptop with a bigger screen.. even the 27". :shake-head:

Oh, the $1799 (2.9GHz) imac was quite a bit faster then the (3.2GHz) $1999... haha this is getting sad.

WilliamG · Jan 12, 2013

That's just silly. First, the hard drive difference seemed to affect all their testing. My i7 iMac came with the Seagate, so it seems to be a lottery as to what drive you get.

Second, they didn't even get an iMac with the high-end 680MX 2GB card.

Third, all these systems are VERY fast, so who cares anymore?

Guess what? The rMBP has a very small screen in comparison to the 27" iMac.

Mac_i_Am · Jan 12, 2013

WilliamG said:
That's just silly. First, the hard drive difference seemed to affect all their testing. My i7 iMac came with the Seagate, so it seems to be a lottery as to what drive you get.

Do i understand you correctly that not all imac have the same hard drive? Well then that is plain silly (read: sad) b/c arent all the buyers paying the same to get the same machine?

Second, they didn't even get an iMac with the high-end 680MX 2GB card.

I assume they didn't test the MBP w/ the high-end card.
Oh wait, it only comes with one option.

Third, all these systems are VERY fast, so who cares anymore?

B/c one (rightly) assumes a bigger computer is also faster.

Guess what? The rMBP has a very small screen in comparison to the 27" iMac.

One consolation is the MBP-r is damn expensive!

forty2j · Jan 12, 2013

FlatlinerG said:
I think the reason that the two perform so closely is based on the footprint. There really isn't much room behind the monitor on the new iMacs, so much so that they are starting to mimic hardware in portables.

You DO know that the iMac uses desktop CPUs, right?

The rMBP is able to compete due to the full SSD.

turtlez · Jan 12, 2013

By lab test do they mean their grade 2 classroom?

Anyone who thinks the laptop is faster than the desktop is bonkers

FlatlinerG · Jan 12, 2013

forty2j said:
You DO know that the iMac uses desktop CPUs, right?

The rMBP is able to compete due to the full SSD.

Of course I do.

Also to say that the reason is due to the SSD isn't quite complete either. There are many tests that show Fusion drives performing almost on par with SSD's. Are they as good, no. Are they pretty close, yup.

beeinformed · Jan 12, 2013

I am quoting from a paragraph from the Macworld article:

"Both iMacs include 7200-rpm, 1TB SATA-3 hard drives, but the drives in these two iMacs we received are not identicaland neither were their performance scores. Our $1999 iMac has a Western Digital WD10EALX Caviar Blue drive with 32MB of cache. Our $1799 iMac has a Seagate Barracuda ST1000DM003 hard drive with 64MB of cachetwice the cache of the WD, and the advantage of the larger cache is evident in our test results."

According to this article, the $1799 iMac's hard drive has 64 MB of cache as compared to the $1999 model, whose hard drive has 32 MB of cache.

I wondering why Apple would this choose type of faster hard drive in the less expensive ($1799) version? Any thoughts?

pubjoe · Jan 12, 2013

Apple use drives from either Seagate or WD in all imacs. It has nothing to do with which model it is. I don't know why the reviewer bothered benchmarking (and focusing so much on) the HDD to be honest. It just causes confusion.

The Seagate drive is an excellent HDD, but it's luck if you get one or not. Then again, it won't be very noticable in real world use - even less so if you have a fusion drive.

Void review.

bdbolin · Jan 12, 2013

I'll say this:

I couldn't be happier with my iMac. For an all in one, it's the fastest desktop computer I've ever used. I use heavy website design/dev applications daily and it runs like a beast. I had a MBP 2010 I believe it was. No comparison.

3tb. Epic. Fusion. Epic. 27" Epic. i7 Epic. 680MX Beyond Epic!!!

WilliamDu · Jan 12, 2013

beeinformed said:
I am quoting from a paragraph from the Macworld article:

"Both iMacs include 7200-rpm, 1TB SATA-3 hard drives, but the drives in these two iMacs we received are not identicaland neither were their performance scores. Our $1999 iMac has a Western Digital WD10EALX Caviar Blue drive with 32MB of cache. Our $1799 iMac has a Seagate Barracuda ST1000DM003 hard drive with 64MB of cachetwice the cache of the WD, and the advantage of the larger cache is evident in our test results."

According to this article, the $1799 iMac's hard drive has 64 MB of cache as compared to the $1999 model, whose hard drive has 32 MB of cache.

I wondering why Apple would this choose type of faster hard drive in the less expensive ($1799) version? Any thoughts?

If MacWorld's facts are widely true . . .

Same reason the 21" is closed to adding RAM, and other disappointing stuff:

Apple rushed this one;

or a senior decision maker had his head where the sun don't shine;

or Apple may, just may be slipping a tad

formel1 · Jan 12, 2013

I also have the Seagate in the 27" iMac.
But it runs on 3 Gigabit....why not as 6 Gigabit

The SSD runs at 6 Gigabit....

EPiCDiNGO · Jan 12, 2013

formel1 said:
I also have the Seagate in the 27" iMac.
But it runs on 3 Gigabit....why not as 6 Gigabit

The SSD runs at 6 Gigabit....

I am so upset about this Apple :apple:

need to fix this ASAP!

WilliamG · Jan 12, 2013

formel1 said:
I also have the Seagate in the 27" iMac.
But it runs on 3 Gigabit....why not as 6 Gigabit

The SSD runs at 6 Gigabit....

EPiCDiNGO said:
I am so upset about this Apple need to fix this ASAP!

Seriously? Why are you upset about this? It's not as if the drive can even saturate a SATA II / 3 Gigabit connection anyway! e.g. I had an OCZ Vertex 120GB in my 2009 iMac (SATA II), and I got around 225MB/s read and around 200MB/s writes. The Seagate gets what... 170MB/s read/write? Why do we need SATA III for it?

People will find anything to complain about.

A more valid complaint is the random nature of the 1TB drive in these iMacs. I'm fortunate enough to have gotten the 1TB Seagate model in my 2012 27" i7 iMac, and not the slower Western Digital.

FreemanW · Jan 13, 2013

pubjoe said:
Apple use drives from either Seagate or WD in all imacs. It has nothing to do with which model it is. I don't know why the reviewer bothered benchmarking (and focusing so much on) the HDD to be honest. It just causes confusion.

The Seagate drive is an excellent HDD, but it's luck if you get one or not. Then again, it won't be very noticable in real world use - even less so if you have a fusion drive.

Void review.

Maybe the reviewer was practicing for Huffington Post reviews?

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Macworld's 2012 iMac results

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