Benchmarks for 27 i5 with 680MX?

[trent75]

Could you try it on bootcamp?

 

[AndiS.]

i played civ v for a few turns with settings maxed out. strangely, the game set a few settings to low forcibly.. it ran really smoothly.. but the game ended up crashing out pretty soon after, so i decided to give it a rest.. sigh, the mac version is.. not.. stable

I will check it out under Windows, saw it for $29.99 on Steam I think. How is the game? I've only played the first Civilization when I was a kid.

 

[trent75]

Any updates on it?

 

[AndiS.]

Any updates on it?

Not yet, I first want to watch a review to see if that game is really for me, but after looking around there should be no problem, given that people are playing that game on MacBook Air and pretty much every iMac and MacBook of the last few years ; )

 

[seanm9]

Do you mean the slightly higher clock? I just googled it and found this http://www.techspot.com/review/320-civilization-v-performance/page12.html
Looks like an i7 doesn't make a difference in comparison to an i5, with the same clock speed?

Edit: Could you please post links showing which strategy games would actually have a benefit from an i7 and how big of a difference it would be? I couldn't find anything on the topic.

But they don't have the same clock speed, and the turbo boost widens the gap, that being said the i5 should be fast enough for most everyone, but for some the 200 MHz (300 MHz turbo) speed bump will be worth the upgrade price (especially if they buy the Mac thru the educational channel)... and for apps that use hyperthreading the upgrade will be well worth it.

 

[AndiS.]

But they don't have the same clock speed, and the turbo boost widens the gap, that being said the i5 should be fast enough for most everyone, but for some the 200 MHz (300 MHz turbo) speed bump will be worth the upgrade price (especially if they buy the Mac thru the educational channel)... and for apps that use hyperthreading the upgrade will be well worth it.

Agreed on the clock speed, I actually asked in my post if that's what he was referring to. But in games that seems to hardly make a difference (see the links in this thread), hence no real gap in my eyes.

As for other applications that make use of the i7, there are probably many, none of which I personally have use for. Those are programs where users with special applications can gain an advantage.

The small clock boost wasn't worth the price to me, given my personal ise of my iMac. I wouldn't have gained any advantage or noticeable speed that way. Honestly, before I got my Mac two days ago and when I was reading through the 680MX thread, where everyone went with the i7 I got some really irrational doubts myself, even though I had read a lot about i5 and i7 and was even hoping I wouldn't have to switch. Fortunately, the i5 delivers the same gaming results as far as I can tell, and that's where it counts. Resell value and future proofing never were up for discussion in that regard, because it does not make a difference whether I invest 2500 and sell for 1800 or buy for 2700 and sell for 2000 - not exact numbers, obviously ; ). Of course, if somebody wants an i7 for a good reason or for no reason at all, I won't give any unsolicited advice on whether they should or should not ; )

 

[SomeSwede]

Interesting thread, it answered my questions. Will most likely replace my 2007 iMac with a 27" iMac with the i5 and the upgraded GPU.

Will probably take time getting used to not having an optical drive, but i got a couple of pc:s with blurays and might share dvds over the network. I just hope they do not make a new Mac Pro too awesome, i might get buyers remorse

But waiting for Mac Pros takes more patience than i have.