Go for the 24"? Does Windows on the iMac slow down OS X at all??

[CadenZ15]

Hi, I'm probably gonna be getting a new iMac in the next week or two. I am also a Windows convert, yes I've finally seen the light for Apple
However, I would like to get a Mac confidently, knowing I made the right choice.
I'd personally like to get the 24" with the nVidia 8800 GS, because I like to play games, such as Command & Conquer, and I'd like to get Crysis, Bioshock, etc. But than again, maybe the 20" is a better investment?
Which brings me to my question, as you saw in the games I mentioned they are all for Windows, so I think I'm going to get Vista Home Premium to play these games. But will Windows slow down the Mac itself at all?? I really really don't want Leopard to suffer because of Windows...

 

[disdat]

I am not an expert on the subject, but if you are running Windows through Bootcamp (which is probably the best way for high end games) then it shouldn't even affect your Mac partition. They are kept totally separate on separate partitions.

Running it through Parallels could slow things down though if you are running intensive games.

From what I read the 20inch iMac has a pretty bad LCD screen. The 24inch is much better

 

[AppleMatt]

Why would a 20" be a better investment? Computers tend to perform very poorly as investments, considering they depreciate as soon as you open them.

Joking aside, I went through the same decision making process a few weeks ago, and went for the 24". My advice would be:
- Windows Vista will reside on a different partition, and doesn't affect Leopard in any way. In fact, out of the box Leopard can only read from and not write to an NTFS file-system (which, IMO, is a benefit).
- The 24" screen has better specs than the 20".
- If you compare them in a PC shop side-by-side, it's very noticeable, especially brightness.
- No matter what upgrade to the 8800, it's the biggest improvement you can give the iMac.
- Subjectively, the 24" has a real 'wow' factor. Put simply, it's very very impressive. I'm much more happy with this machine than my Mac Pro (with a 20" Apple Cinema Display).

AppleMatt

 

[CadenZ15]

K thanks
I know the 20" doesn't have better specs, but I just wanted to justify getting the 24", and I really wanted to get the 8800, so I guess my decision is pretty much made

Thanks again

 

[thegoldenmackid]

Why not use XP?

 

[TheLordsServant]

Well, I run Boot Camp with XP Home, and it doesn't slow down OSX at all, but if you run something like VMWare Fusion or Parallels, which runs them both simultaneously, then yes, you'll see some slow down, I imagine, but I think if you use Boot Camp, you'll be just fine

 

[whooleytoo]

The only way the Windows could affect OSX performance that I can think of is that the Windows partition will (obviously) reduce the size of the OSX partition - if the OSX partition gets near full performance will tank. But if you keep a few gigs free it's a non-issue.

Having said that, I started a thread here on a weird Boot Camp crash (machine resets sometimes when you hit the brightness keys), and it messed up the graphics - specifically, the colour palette - in OSX. So no, the Windows and OSX environments aren't 100% isolated.

 

[fishcove]

Hi, I'm probably gonna be getting a new iMac in the next week or two. I am also a Windows convert, yes I've finally seen the light for Apple
However, I would like to get a Mac confidently, knowing I made the right choice.
I'd personally like to get the 24" with the nVidia 8800 GS, because I like to play games, such as Command & Conquer, and I'd like to get Crysis, Bioshock, etc. But than again, maybe the 20" is a better investment?
Which brings me to my question, as you saw in the games I mentioned they are all for Windows, so I think I'm going to get Vista Home Premium to play these games. But will Windows slow down the Mac itself at all?? I really really don't want Leopard to suffer because of Windows...

I got my 2.8 GHz 24" with the 8800 GS about 3 weeks ago. I am running Windows XP under Boot Camp and it works flawlessly. Since it's dual boot, neither OS affects the other. If you were to run Windows in a virtual environment ie Parallels or VMWare, you might see some performance degradation, especially 3D, but in Boot camp you're getting native performance.

RE: 20" vs 24" - in addition to the 8800 option, the 24 is a better quality screen. Throw in the faster CPU and it's no contest as far as I'm concerned.

 

[fishcove]

The only way the Windows could affect OSX performance that I can think of is that the Windows partition will (obviously) reduce the size of the OSX partition - if the OSX partition gets near full performance will tank. But if you keep a few gigs free it's a non-issue.

Having said that, I started a thread here on a weird Boot Camp crash (machine resets sometimes when you hit the brightness keys), and it messed up the graphics - specifically, the colour palette - in OSX. So no, the Windows and OSX environments aren't 100% isolated.

Wouldn't that be a problem with Apple's Boot Camp keyboard driver?

 

[CadenZ15]

As for XP opposed to Vista, I just want something a little different. I've been using XP for years upon years. I figure even though it uses a lot of resources, I think it would be interesting to try, and I would get the advantage of DirectX 10.

Speaking of Vista, has anyone here used that little backdoor of using the upgrade version of it instead of the full one to install it with BootCamp? I'm under the impression that it can be done on a Mac.