Dilemmas on buying a new IMac

[Kiscokid]

I currently have a pc and a 15" G4 powerbook which is rigged up to a 20" Apple Cinema Display.

The PC I use for gaming - the Mac for making music, general surfing and portability.

I am selling the PC to a friend for £250. It is a Dell Dimension 8300 - 3ghz with a 256mb Radeon 9800Pro. It is coupled with a Dell 19" screen.

Am I being a fool?

I thought that I would look to buy a new intel mac so that I could do gaming on it and also sync the 2 computers effectively and be more efficient by using OSX on both systems.

However having looked at the specs of the IMAC - the 20" isn't going to be much better than my PC for gaming is it? I don't know how the X1600 measures up against the Radeon 9800 - but is it possible that it could be worse??

Therefore is the 24" going to be the only option here? I'm worried that having it sat next to the 20" widescreen is going to overwhelm it. Does anyone know if the quality of the screen on the imac is the same as the apple cinema display??

I would go for a mac pro but that would leave me with only one monitor - not good for when the wife and I are working and need the screen space.

Any tips or thoughts on the graphics capability of the 20" imac greatly appreciated. I generally play WOW - but also like some of the simulation games like FM2006. Cheers.....

 

[dmw007]

Either the 20" or the 24" iMac should be a great system for you. They both offer much, much faster cpus and comparable, if not faster, gpus. But, since you seem to want to use the iMac for gaming, I would recommend that you get the 24"er with the 7600GT video card.


As far as the quality of the iMac's built-in display, they are of exceptional quality in my opinion. I am typing this post from a 17" iMac C2D in a computer lab at college and the screen is absolutely beautiful.


If you are really concerned about how the different flavors of the iMac C2D perform, check out some of these benchmarks:

Link #1

Link #2

 

[miles01110]

I don't think the iMac will be THAT much better for your games, but I don't think it will be worse. I wouldn't think twice about buying one.

 

[Kiscokid]

dmw = thanks for the links - I guess the x1600 doesnt perform too badly in those tests....

I agree with the reviewer in that I think apple have missed a trick with not giving the Geforce 7600 as an option in the 20" though. I'm really not sure that I want to go for a 24" screen to work on - it seems a little bit oversized and its a fair few ££'s more.

 

[skunk]

I would caution you that the iMac speakers (at least on the 24", so they're probably worse on the others) are complete crap, not to put too fine a point on it. Allow for a set of decent ones.

 

[madog]

I would caution you that the iMac speakers (at least on the 24", so they're probably worse on the others) are complete crap, not to put too fine a point on it. Allow for a set of decent ones.

That's just your opinion

My opinion [ though nobody cares ]? Even though the OP didn't mention anything about sound, the iMac 24" internal speakers are actually quite impressive on there own, and are much better compared to any other previous Mac's int. speakers. Obviously it's no 2.1 or 5.1 surround system but they are great nontheless.

Also, as far as graphics go, I think the top of the line cards in new Macs are still middle of the line cards avaliable for PC's. They are still great cards, but much better ones are out for PC's. And unless ATI/nVidia [or some new company] begin developing solely for the Mac, I think it's always going to be "us" getting their hand-me-downs.

So far I've read that the 7600 is the way to go and with most games [even some of the intense Windows games] run well at the 24" inch's native resolution with high settings and no FSAA.

 

[miles01110]

Internal speakers are pretty bad by default, no matter what the system.