New iMac graphics disappointment

[jonnyb]

Only slight disappointment, that is. I got my new 20 inch 2.4Ghz Alu iMac yesterday, It has 4GB RAM and I did an archive and install for Leopard and yet, while it's generally very quick, graphical effects like genie and expose don't seem as smooth as they do on my 3 year old Powerbook. The transitions happen quickly, but there don't seem to be very many frames of animation occurring, leading to a jerky movement.

What are other peoples' experiences of this?

 

[DonaldLynd]

I have no past experience expose with another mac other than the MBP 2.33 w/ 2gb ram that we use at my studio (we have other mac, just never used that feature). I would say my "graphics" speed is as fast as that when I use expose. So if you are lagging, maybe an issue with yours...? BTW, mine has froze, but only a few time... been a while too.

 

[atl27426]

Only slight disappointment, that is. I got my new 20 inch 2.4Ghz Alu iMac yesterday, It has 4GB RAM and I did an archive and install for Leopard and yet, while it's generally very quick, graphical effects like genie and expose don't seem as smooth as they do on my 3 year old Powerbook. The transitions happen quickly, but there don't seem to be very many frames of animation occurring, leading to a jerky movement.

What are other peoples' experiences of this?

I would think thats more Leopard then your iMac. People talk about the 2600pro being a poor choice but really when it comes to most applications its going to do the job very well, gaming excluded.

I don't expect Leopard to be function well until 10.5.3 at the very least. Of course my idea of "well" is going to be different from others.

If a 2600pro can handle anything in Vista then Leopard should be fine once its been tweaked correctly. Just my opinion.

 

[IBitePrettyHard]

Try running a benchmark with Xbench to see how it matches up to my 24" AL iMac. http://www.xbench.com/

Make sure you restart your computer first, and only have Xbench open when running the test. I have gotten a score of around 128.00 to 138.00 lately, and I haven't had any slowdown when using OSX.

You may find a difference if you're running Leopard though, I'm still using Tiger.

 

[booksacool1]

I would think thats more Leopard then your iMac. People talk about the 2600pro being a poor choice but really when it comes to most applications its going to do the job very well, gaming excluded...

...If a 2600pro can handle anything in Vista then Leopard should be fine once its been tweaked correctly. Just my opinion.

I have to agree. While the 2600pro isn't a gamers card (sorta like the old 7600 or 7800gt), it really should handle OS stuff fine.

Probably some setting/driver problem. I'd think the hardware's fine.

 

[risc]

Try running a benchmark with Xbench...

Xbench is pointless at best.

The drivers Apple ship for the 2600 are horrible! Case and point 120+ FPS in Quake 4 at 1920x1200 in Windows Vista, 19 FPS in OS X... http://barefeats.com/imacal3.html

 

[AlexisV]

People talk about the 2600pro being a poor choice but really when it comes to most applications its going to do the job very well, gaming excluded.

People talk about the 2600pro being a poor choice but really when it comes to most applications its going to do the job very well, gaming excluded.

The poor GPU you refer to seems to run the most demanding PC game available pretty well: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wlwmP9kp7m0

 

[jonnyb]

Well, that's odd. After a restart or two, everything seems to be very smooth now. Genie effects are 'glidey' and smooth as is exposé.

Not that I'm complaining!

Incidentally, isn't the iMac a lovely machine to use? I got mine with the wireless keyboard and mouse and I'm sitting here feeling like I've travelled into the future. Woo!

 

[mos6502]

I was in the apple store yesterday, playing with the 24'' iMac and I noticed that when you drag say a finder window around quickly the redrawing is kind of jerky. My friend's G5 powermac doesn't exhibit this behavior even under Leopard. I hope driver updates fix this because since the freezing fix I've been wanting to pull the trigger and get an iMac!

 

[risc]

when you drag say a finder window around quickly the redrawing is kind of jerky

My iMac 24" 2.4 GHz, 4 GB RAM doesn't do that at all. The Finder window flies around the screen without any redrawing.

 

[decksnap]

It's kinda strange... we've got iMacs, MacPros, Powermacs, Macbooks and eMacs at the office. The ones with the most buttery smooth docks are the G4 eMacs. Very strange.