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Late 2013 rMBP vs mid 2011 iMac

Z

Z28McCrory

macrumors regular
Original poster
Jan 20, 2014
117
54
Indiana
Im on the fence about buying a late 2013 15" rMBP to replace my mid 2011 iMac.

My main reasons for considering the switch is the added mobility. Not only working on the go, but Im a photographer and would like to be able to shoot tethered with my D800.... and the iMac isn't feasible to take on location.

80% of what I do is photo editing, and 20% is video editing. My current setup is the 2011 27" iMac plus 2 27" thunderbolt displays. If I purchased the MacBook, while I was at my desk it would be connected to the 2 27" displays, plus a mouse and keyboard so that is effectively became a desktop.

If I purchased the MacBook, I would likely sell my iMac because I dont think I would need both.

What im trying to decide is how the two would compare in performance.

My iMac is:
Mid 2011
3.1ghz i5
16gb Ram
SSD
1gb nVidia 6970m graphics

The rMBP im looking at is:
Late 2013
2.3ghz i7
16gb Ram
SSD
2gb nVidia 750m graphics

On paper, the Macbook seems like it wouldn't be a step down, and with TurboBoost to 3.5ghz it may even be a step up for most tasks. It would have a faster SSD, a better graphics card, and the addition of USB 3 would open up more doors for affordable external storage. The only place I can see a potential step down is during heavy rendering tasks in Premiere where multiple cores are being used for long periods of time.... the lower clock speed of the MacBook may show?

Opinions are greatly appreciated. Im getting ready to travel for about a week, and if I can make up my mind I may go buy it tomorrow so that I can take it with me.

Thanks in advance.
 
I currently have a mid 2011 iMac, and would also like to get my hands on the latest 15" rMBP (either late 2013 or a newer model with better specs once it gets released) once I save enough money for it.
 
Geekbench only measures CPU performance. The MBPs seem to be quite a bit faster - I wouldn't say twice as fast, but up to 50% faster probably.

The GPU is a different story, since the 6970M was a high-end card. If you trust notebookcheck it is still about 10% faster than the 750M in the new rMBPs.

Overall I would say the 15'' MBP is a very good replacement for the iMac, with improvements in most areas and only a minor downgrade in graphics performance (possibly an upgrade depending on what you use the GPU for).

The iMac might be more quiet when working on heavy jobs.
 
thundersteele said:
Geekbench only measures CPU performance. The MBPs seem to be quite a bit faster - I wouldn't say twice as fast, but up to 50% faster probably.

The GPU is a different story, since the 6970M was a high-end card. If you trust notebookcheck it is still about 10% faster than the 750M in the new rMBPs.

Overall I would say the 15'' MBP is a very good replacement for the iMac, with improvements in most areas and only a minor downgrade in graphics performance (possibly an upgrade depending on what you use the GPU for).

The iMac might be more quiet when working on heavy jobs.
Click to expand...

Notebookcheck's benchmarks for the GT750M is inaccurate as it's only for the GDDR3 variant.

Apple only uses the GDDR5 variant of the 750M, which is far faster.

For GDDR5 750M benchmarks, look for benchmarks for the GT 755M instead (which is only available in the GDDR5 variant). It's insignificantly faster than the GDDR5 GT750M.

The GDDR5 GT750M also outperforms the GTX 660M.

So the GDDR5 GT750M variant is faster than the Radeon 6970M in the iMac.
 
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