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Confused about Haswell chips

Mikebike125

Mikebike125

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Mar 25, 2007
410
65
I watched the Apple developer conference and heard them say that they now have the Haswell processors in the Macbook Air. I will be buying a new iMac in the near future and are just waiting for the next speed bump. How can I tell if the iMac's get the Haswell processor? I know when looking at the iMac specifications, the chip is not called Haswell but i5 or i7 and so many Ghz. What is and what is not this new Haswell chip?

I'm just a little confused :confused:
Thanks
 
Mikebike125 said:
I watched the Apple developer conference and heard them say that they now have the Haswell processors in the Macbook Air. I will be buying a new iMac in the near future and are just waiting for the next speed bump. How can I tell if the iMac's get the Haswell processor? I know when looking at the iMac specifications, the chip is not called Haswell but i5 or i7 and so many Ghz. What is and what is not this new Haswell chip?

I'm just a little confused :confused:
Thanks
Click to expand...
When the iMac is updated, they may or may not mention the Haswell chip directly, but someone here will know. It'll probably be in the front page article here for that matter.

And I would expect any updates to the iMac at this point would have a Haswell chip in it.

The real question is how soon will the update be. And most guess are anywhere between now and October with a lot of people leaning towards September at the earliest. But you never know.
 
"Haswell" is a code name from Intel, referring to the 4th generation of chips using their current "Core" architecture. When a chip is called, say, the "Core i5", that doesn't tell you anything; the real chip number will be something like "Core i5-4600". The "4600" is the important part - the 4 means 4th generation (Haswell), and the 600 is a SKU number that means a certain number of cores, GHz, etc. Current iMacs use chips code named "Ivy Bridge", which are Core i5/i7-3XXX (3rd generation).

The primary improvements in Haswell are integrated graphics capabilities and power consumption. Both of these are fantastic improvements for the MacBook Air, as they directly contribute to performance and battery life. The iMac uses discrete graphics units that are already more powerful than those in Haswell, and does not have a battery, so the improvements are meaningless for iMacs. While the next iMac, when it's released, will certainly have a Haswell chip, that doesn't make it something to look forward to if you are looking for a performance bump. The CPU performance increase in this generation is negligible.
 
the next imac the only bump that you will see are: maybe the retina display, wifi ac, geforce 7xxMx, and probably fusion drive with the 256ssd+1T hdd combo
 
forty2j said:
When a chip is called, say, the "Core i5", that doesn't tell you anything; the real chip number will be something like "Core i5-4600". The "4600" is the important part - the 4 means 4th generation (Haswell), and the 600 is a SKU number that means a certain number of cores, GHz, etc. Current iMacs use chips code named "Ivy Bridge", which are Core i5/i7-3XXX (3rd generation).
Click to expand...
I looked at the 27" iMacs and didn't see the 4600 type number you were referring to. Is there a place that Apple shows that on their website? I understand what you are saying about it not really helping the iMacs but I just want to know how to identify when they make this change.

Thanks
 
Haswell benefits mobile more than anything else, so if the CPU is whats you holding back, don't bother waiting for the iMac update. The biggest things we can expect will be changes to thunderbolt, updated GPUs, and switching from SATA SSDs to PCIe SSDs.
 
forty2j said:
...
The primary improvements in Haswell are integrated graphics capabilities and power consumption. Both of these are fantastic improvements for the MacBook Air, as they directly contribute to performance and battery life. The iMac uses discrete graphics units that are already more powerful than those in Haswell, and does not have a battery, so the improvements are meaningless for iMacs. ...
Click to expand...
Power consumption does affect an iMac. Anything that improves battery life on a laptop means it is using less electricity in general. If the processor in the iMac uses less electricity, that lowers the cost of operation and reduces the amount of heat it generates.

It probably won't amount to enough to be really noticeable, but every little bit helps.

mentaluproar said:
Haswell benefits mobile more than anything else, so if the CPU is whats you holding back, don't bother waiting for the iMac update. The biggest things we can expect will be changes to thunderbolt, updated GPUs, and switching from SATA SSDs to PCIe SSDs.
Click to expand...
We might not see Thunderbolt updates in the next iMac, unless you think the next iMac won't happen until next year some time.
 
Mikebike125 said:
I looked at the 27" iMacs and didn't see the 4600 type number you were referring to. Is there a place that Apple shows that on their website? I understand what you are saying about it not really helping the iMacs but I just want to know how to identify when they make this change.

Thanks
Click to expand...

One place to find it is on the Wikipedia page:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IMac_(Intel-based)

They're on this other site, too: http://www.everymac.com/systems/apple/imac/index-imac.html

I haven't been able to find a place on Apple.com where they tell you.
 
you should wait for the update of iMac, i guess will happen early next year, and you will have retina, better GPU, next generation wifi chips, better hdd and probably better Ram
 
for now and in the early future i don't think there is any better dedicated graphic card better than 680mx, or i am wrong?
 
Serban said:
you should wait for the update of iMac, i guess will happen early next year, and you will have retina, better GPU, next generation wifi chips, better hdd and probably better Ram
Click to expand...
I think our timeframe will get us into a new iMac in Aug/Sept this year. There is always something better next year but compared to my 2007 iMac, one from 2 years ago will run circles around what I currently have. Maybe the update your talking about will come then... or at least part of it.
 
Serban said:
trust me...you should wait...retina and for the future of wifi ac it is worth
Click to expand...

FWIW, I expect Retina to be a stand-alone separate model, mid-next year, and run at least $1000 over a standard iMac price. If someone really wants Retina, and has the money, yes, they should wait to see if it comes in 2014.. but otherwise, there's no discernible difference for most uses between buying the 2012 model and buying the 2013 that will come in a few months.
 
I doubt Retina is coming anytime soon, though we might see a BTO 27" model with a 4K display (assuming Apple releases a 27" 4K Thunderbolt 2 Display with the Mac Pro).

I am not waiting for Haswell, but I am waiting for PCIe SSD-based Fusion Drive, 802.11ac and a better dedicated AMD GPU before I update my 2011 27" i7 SSD model.
 
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