Few questions regarding 27"

[craigyy]

Hi all,
So I've been waiting a long time for the 2016 mbp and the longer I've been waiting the more I've been wondering if an imac is the better option. I will be using the machine for a lot of video converting with handbrake and also some light-mid gaming.
Is now a good time to buy the imac? It says in the buyers guide that we are approaching the end of the cycle but as it already has skylake chips what is the next upgrade likely to be?
The othere thing holding me back is the rumors that popped up more recently of a apple display with integrated egpu is this likely to be more powerful than the graphics performance of the imac?
thanks in advance!

 

[PatriotInvasion]

I think if you can hold out a few more months, it'll be worth the wait:

1.) The iMac's design is long overdue for an update. The current case design is pushing 4 years old, and aside from the thinner back, the front-face of it has gone unchanged since 2009.

2.) The shift away from legacy USB 2.0/3.0 and Thunderbolt 1&2 ports (based on the miniDisplayPort connector) is happening this year. USB-C is taking over along with Thunderbolt 3 equipped USB-C ports.

The combination of these two factors makes it very likely Apple will introduce a brand new iMac design later this fall that will incorporate USB-C and Thunderbolt 3. That machine would be worth the wait both aesthetically and functionally given that USB-C is the future for desktop computing peripherals.

Last thing you want to do is drop $2K on an iMac that will be the old body style with legacy ports in just 4-6 months. Assuming that would bother you.
[doublepost=1465069554][/doublepost]The Thunderbolt Display rumors are interesting, but the talk about the eGPU is likely not related to building some gaming powerhouse, but more so as a work around to the fact that driving a 5K resolution is a monster task for today's tech.

From a port standpoint, even Thunderbolt 3 can't transmit 5K at 60Hz over a single stream because it uses DisplayPort 1.2 instead of the 1.3 standard due out next year that can. So any solution this year would require multi-stream transport (which isn't ideal) and the eGPU would just be an added boost of graphics horsepower to accomplish the 5K task.

If you go with an iMac what will you use for portability? An iPad may be sufficient for most, but if not, you'll need to consider a MacBook like I did, which may end up being close in cost to buying a Thunderbolt Display and a MacBook Pro down the line.

 

[zorinlynx]

I'm considering buying a 27" iMac very soon, and here's why.

They are using an AMD GPU at the moment. Historically, and still even today, OS X has had far better AMD drivers than Nvidia. I've always had nagging performance issues with Nvidia GPUs in Mac OS X, that aren't there with AMD GPUs. When I run Windows on these SAME machines, there are no problems, so it's definitely a driver optimization issue. My current home iMac is a 21.5" with the NVIDIA GeForce GT 650M.

Apple tends to flip flop between AMD and Nvidia with every product release. I suspect the next released iMac will have an Nvidia GPU with the usual mediocre drivers. It's a bit of a gamble, and I just got a 27" 5K iMac on my desk at work and absolutely LOVE its performance.

So for me it's a tough choice. It's a lot of cash!

 

[maflynn]

Is now a good time to buy the imac?

If you need one now, I'd say go for it. I really don't expect to see Apple roll out a new iMac at WWDC.

but as it already has skylake chips what is the next upgrade likely to be?

The 27" models are on Skylake the 21" are still Broadwell. Kabylake is the natural next step, but that chipset is not a huge improvement over Skylake. With that said, people are hoping for a better GPU, USB-C and TB3, so the changes for the 27" iMac may be small improvements.

As for a possible redesign, I have no idea, Apple does tend to hang on to a design for their macs for a very long time, but in the absence of a any true upgrades coming in 2017, perhaps they'll do that instead.