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Core i7-Based 27" iMac Benchmarks Show Significant Improvements

Very nice improvements. I have the 3.06 21.5 C2D. To me, the difference isn't worth nearly $700 from what I have, but it's worth it to many people and it's about time Apple put quad in its iMacs.
 
neiltc13 said:
I never said that. I said a decent monitor is £200.
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but your "decent" monitor is nowhere near comparable to the 27" screen in the iMac, so you are comparing Apples and oranges.

The only reason we're considering 27" monitors is because you cannot buy the i5 or i7 iMacs from Apple without one.
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uh-huh? I'm thinking of getting the 27" iMac for my next computer. Why? Because I gave learned that you can't have too much screen real-estate. i7 us a nice bonus though and well worth the extra.

There are lots of people running dual screens as we speak (like myself), and they would obviously find value in screen like the one found in the iMac

so if you want to compare "value" then compare similar machines, as opposed to machines with inferior specs and proclaiming "this self-built machine costs way less!". And comparing OEM to self-built is a flawed comparison to begin with, even if we ignore the dissimilar specs.

If you need a decent monitor for work then the likelihood is that you already have one, or will buy a decent one standalone.
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if you want to proceed with this comparison, then drop that "decent" weasel-word. Or maybe I should start laughing at your computer, because I could build a "decent" computer for a lot less money...
 
Thanks for the stats MacRumors. My 2.4GHz C2D iMac GeekBenches at 3406 & my Phenom II 940 PC gets 5408. The i7 is quite a jump.

Very tempting...
 
I'm loving mine! I haven't had a chance to do the benchmarks but I'm pleasantly surprised with the results. The realwod difference isn't e er going to be that noticeable, but it is nice to have the synthetic difference. Not that I needed to justify why I went i7, but it is always nice to see benchmarks.

Re: the why iMac thing, here's my take. When I was more PC at home, I always built my own super systems. I've had Mac laptops and the Mac mini but have lusted after a Mac Pro. But I also lust for a cinema display. For me, this was the perfect compromise. I get this incredible 27" screen that I never could justify buying for what I do (I almost bought the 24" ACD earlier this year -- glad I didn't) and a machine that is about as powerful as a lowend Mac Pro, with the tradeoff being my upgrade options are about as limited as they are on my MacBook or Mac mini. Yeah, upgrading the hard drive is harder on the iMac, but I have a NAS and externals to supplant the 1TB drive.
 
willdenow said:
There is no doubt that both the core i5 and core i7 represent significant values. However, these are SYNTHETIC benchmarks that treat hyperthreading cores the same as the physical cores in the core i7 cpu. Thus, the 35% boost over the core i5 is not surprising. One should be aware, however, that in most real life situations, the additional computing power provided by hyperthreading is often only marginal, at best 5-7% beyond what can be achieved by the four physical cores, and this requires programs that operate in a highly parallel fashion, such as video encoding. For many applications, there is simply no difference and for some, there is actually degradation because the instructions provided by the application cannot be executed in parallel and result in the stalling of the physical cores. This is not a problem in PCs because hyperthreading can be turned off in the BIOS if one finds this effect or if the hyperthreading is causing the chip to overheat, which does happen. From what I have read so far, it would appear that there may not be any way to accomplish this in the iMac. Thus, one should consider carefully the type of software to be run before deciding. Bigger is not always better.

Also, do not be confused by Intel's naming protocols. The 2.8 GHZ core i7 on offer is NOT a Nehelem chip, but rather uses the same Lynnfield architecture of the 2.6 core i5 chip. Both use dual channel memory controllers (as opposed to the faster tri-channel memory for Nehelem chips), are capable of only half the video bandwidth of the Nehelem chip and also utilizes a higher latency, slower interconnect bus than the Nehelem core i7's. On the plus side, the energy efficiency of these Lynnfield chips is much better than the first generation Nehelem chips. They use much less electricity both on idle and at load than the Nehelem chips, which is probably why Apple waited for them to be released. Nevertheless, the 2.8 core i7 chip with hyperthreading will run significantly hotter and draw mopre power than the core i5. So if heat and/or power consumption are a concern, stick with the i5.

If you plan on purchasing the 27 inch iMac, avoid the entry level 3 GHZ core 2 duo model if your budget permits. Even though the clockspeed is as much as 20% greater than the i5, the core 2 duo chips are in fact much slower overall, both due to the fact that they have only two cpu 2 cores, and to the fact that the core i5/i7 architecture has been significantly optimized in its re-engineering. The real world difference is probably greater than the Geekbench bar graph would indicate. The extra $300 needed to move up to the core i5 can truly worth it in terms of both performance and energy efficiency.

Finally, there are numerous sites across the web that have benchmarked the two quad core chips currently on offer in the 27 inch iMac using real world software and parametrics. None of the ten or so reviews that I've seen shows any program or group of programs benefiting from a 35% increase in speed when using the 2.8 GHZ i7 Lynnfield versus the 2.6 GHZ i5 Lynnfield. In fact, the most I have seen runs 7 to 10%, with most programs showing only a negligible increase. It is likely that you will derive more oomph from your system by adding more RAM, particularly if you run Windows or Linux in a virtual machine or if you run many programs at once. Given current prices for RAM, you should be able to easily double the amount of RAM in your system to 8 GB for less than $100. The remaining $100 or so would go along way toward the purchase of Apple Care (not a bad idea given that this is a brand new machine design), a Time capsule, a 1.5 TB external hard drive or perhaps the purchase of an iPod or Apple TV.
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I just have to say that the above is one of the most useful, knowledgeable and well written posts I've ever read here. Thank you.:)
 
al2o3cr said:
No, get over it. Did you own a machine before LCDs? Pretty much all CRT monitors were glossy.
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I know I did, and that is what contributed to my eye deterioration in the first place!! Then I always bought Sony screens because they had an anti-glare coating that helped but still wasn't good enough. Then for years I had a "hood" around the screen as well. Matte LCD screens saved my career.

al2o3cr said:
And anyways, a matte screen film kit will run you <$60 from places like Photodon....
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Which gives you a screen with about half the brightness of a good native matte screen and further distorts color accuracy. Unfortunately it is a very bad option.
 
wizard said:
Frankly I wish I was in a position to buy as the new iMacs are an excellent deal!! :)

In any event people need to realize that performance advantage is with todays software. As apps and the OS take greater advantage of GCD the results will just get better. At least for stuff that can be excellerated via parallel processing.

Dave
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If you're going to go iMac, go i7. :cool:


...but will it run Flash? :D
 
neiltc13 said:
Remind me again why these systems are "very good value"?
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The value is relative to the iMac models Apple is selling, not to what you can piece together. Also, as applications start to take advantage of the newest technologies in OS X then spending the extra money to get the Core i7 will pay off in the long run.
 
Is it only me who isn't that impressed by these scores? :eek:
The Mini 2.66 GHz I bought few weeks ago is getting over 4000 in geekbench score, and that machine is still pretty slow. The geekbench score of the i7 is about twice as much.

Twice as fast as the low end Mac doesn't sound like impressive to me. I will still buy the i7, it seems to be a nice machine eventough it's not that fast :)
 
AAPLaday said:
:eek: your impressed with a machine that Apple offers? I must be seeing things :D
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Why ? I've commented many times that the Mac Pro and Mac Book Pro are great machines.

My issue with Apple has always been the extremely limited hardware options, gaping holes in their product line at affordable price points and absence of features found on budget PCs costing half as much.

Before I quit selling Macs and PCs our store passed the local Apple store in Mac unit sales and we did it with 1/4 the sales people and 1/16 the sales space.
 
neiltc13 said:
This is a stark contrast to my experience since installing Snow Leopard. Applications crash on me every single day and I have had to endure a "kernel panic" no less than five times, all when doing different things.
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I have had one Kernel panic in the last FIVE YEARS. While I will agree with you that strange, bizarre things have crept up in not only 10.6, but 10.5 as well, we still have come a long, long way over the past few years. As for Windows 7, I am eager to see how it is (it's on it's way now). Still, I simply prefer the feel of the Mac, how it is set up, and some subtle UI points. Rather than go on about those, I'll leave it simple to say: some people prefer what they prefer, and are willing to pay the price for that. You can't make logical arguments about that.
 
neiltc13 said:
Nonsense! I just built a computer for a friend for £600. It has a Core i5 2.6GHz, 1GB ATi 5770 graphics card, 4GB RAM and a 500GB hard drive. Let's assume a decent monitor is another £200 on top (he had one already).

For the same level of performance from Apple, it costs me £1600. You end up paying double the price and get no better performance, an inability to upgrade, a significantly worse graphics card and in my opinion a worse operating system.

Remind me again why these systems are "very good value"?
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We are talking about the average consumer here, not someone who can build their own (if you build your own house, that will also cost a lot less than if someone else builds it for you).

For the record, you can build a Dell on the UK site with similar specs to the iMac i5 for £1000 MORE than the iMac (including a 2560X1600 IPS monitor, a printer equivalent to Apple's free printer promo, 64-bit Windows 7, wireless keyboard/mouse and cheap speakers).
 
petsk said:
Is it only me who isn't that impressed by these scores? :eek:
The Mini 2.66 GHz I bought few weeks ago is getting over 4000 in geekbench score, and that machine is still pretty slow. The geekbench score of the i7 is about twice as much.

Twice as fast as the low end Mac doesn't sound like impressive to me. I will still buy the i7, it seems to be a nice machine eventough it's not that fast :)
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These are synthetic benchmarks. They provide just a rough guide to performance. My early 2006 1.83GHz C2D iMac scores 2335 in Geekbench, while my late 2008 2.4GHz MBP scores just over 3000, but while encoding DVDs using Handbrake, the MBP is 2-3 times faster (partly due to my running a 64bit up-to-date snapshot version of Handbrake on it). Compiling code is about 2x faster.

Compiling on an i7 quad iMac with "make -j8" would fly.
 
greatcaffeine said:
My Core i7 iMac shows significant signs of DOA... now I'll probably have to wait another month to get a replacement. :mad:
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I'm confused. Your iMac is either DOA or not, not one or the other. Also, what makes you think that Apple will take a month to replace it? They usually send a replacement within 24-48 hours, perhaps maybe 72 hours given the backlog/popularity of the latest iMac.

Have you even talked to Apple Customer Care, or are you just on here to troll?

Bryan
 
35% speed increase on Geekbench is not gonna reduce itself to 5% increase on real world. You will still get close to 30% increase from hyperthreading on general multicore tasks. At least that's what tests have shown happened on Mac Pro line.
 
what are the chances of the i7 coming to the mbp in the next update which i assume would be after the holidays?
 
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