Comparing Different iMacs To Buy

[Poptartmonkey24]

Here's the deal: I'm buying an iMac...done and done.

I'm debating between the two middle tier iMacs. They appear to have the same exact stock specs, just one's got a bigger monitor. Is there any performance difference between them since the graphics card has more work to do on the bigger one?

Secondly, say I get the 21.5" 1TB iMac, is it worth the extra $200 (or $180 with education pricing ) to upgrade to the i7 processor?

I don't have a specific need...I will do programming and some work in Logic Pro and will unfortunately have to run Parallels a lot. I can't decide if I should just get the 1 TB 21.5" stock, upgrade it to the i7, or just get the low end 27" iMac.

What do you think? I'd prefer actual stats if you have them laying around...

 

[obsidian1200]

Here's the deal: I'm buying an iMac...done and done.

I'm debating between the two middle tier iMacs. They appear to have the same exact stock specs, just one's got a bigger monitor. Is there any performance difference between them since the graphics card has more work to do on the bigger one?

Secondly, say I get the 21.5" 1TB iMac, is it worth the extra $200 (or $180 with education pricing ) to upgrade to the i7 processor?

I don't have a specific need...I will do programming and some work in Logic Pro and will unfortunately have to run Parallels a lot. I can't decide if I should just get the 1 TB 21.5" stock, upgrade it to the i7, or just get the low end 27" iMac.

What do you think? I'd prefer actual stats if you have them laying around...

Personally, I'd choose the processor instead of the bigger monitor because my most frequently used applications can take advantage of the i7 processor.

In your case, you should see how many applications you know you'll want to run will take advantage of the i7's hyperthreading capabilities. If the applications can't take advantage of them, then there's no reason to bother with the upgrade; that $180 could be better put toward some new after market RAM.

 

[Poptartmonkey24]

Parallels (ugh), Xcode, Logic Pro, and iChat (just kidding) are the big power houses I'll be using.

Should I care about the programs that I'll be running on Windows in Parallels to check their ability to utilize an i7 processor? Or does having Parallels as middleware take care of all of that... I'll be running several programming/CAD tools in Windows (GROSS)..

Thanks

 

[obsidian1200]

Parallels (ugh), Xcode, Logic Pro, and iChat (just kidding) are the big power houses I'll be using.

Should I care about the programs that I'll be running on Windows in Parallels to check their ability to utilize an i7 processor? Or does having Parallels as middleware take care of all of that... I'll be running several programming/CAD tools in Windows (GROSS)..

Thanks

Ohhh, iChat might break you kidding. Logic Pro and Parallels (I think...) would take advantage of the hyper-threading. I'm not sure about Xcode.

What version of Windows are you running? If you're using Windows 7, which if you're using CAD, it's possible you want XP, you'd get better performance using bootcamp instead of Parallels. If you are running XP or Vista, then Parallels would be your best option since the newer machines don't support XP (and maybe vista, I haven't heard one thing or another) through bootcamp. That doesn't mean it can't be done, but it'd be much more trouble than it's worth. Also, if you're running XP or Vista, even if using Parallels, then you do not need to worry about hyper threading, as I doubt the OSes support it.