New MBP Quad or wait for iMac Update

[mashinhead]

What do you guys think i should do? The new MBPs are amazing but what is the likely hood of the iMac update being as huge, will it go octo-core?

 

[alust2013]

I'd say a rather small chance of it being 8 core, possibly 6 though. More than likely, just faster quads, and bigger improvements on the low end.

 

[AppleNewton]

I say get whatever fits your needs today. I'm not betting on the new iMacs to be octo-cores but who knows.
I was debating it myself a few weeks ago but ended up selling my old mac for a great price and picked up the 15" quad and am getting a display for it soon. So that will have two high-res screens essentially and double as a powerful portable machine (basically like taking the current/prev gen iMacs with you) which in the end I preferred having more mobile needs.

I dont think youll regret whichever choice you make but i'm happy with the 15"

 

[toxic]

single-processor 8-cores won't be coming until next year.

if you want a desktop, wait. if you don't care, you can buy now. the performance gains for Sandy Bridge desktop CPUs were nowhere near as dramatic as for mobile CPUs, so there probably won't be a large differential in processing power between the high-end iMacs and the 15/17" MBP's.

 

[Yebubbleman]

What do you guys think i should do? The new MBPs are amazing but what is the likely hood of the iMac update being as huge, will it go octo-core?

Do you want something stationary with a maximum of 16GB of RAM, a hard drive with anywhere from 500GB to 2TB and a larger built-in display, or something portable topping at 8GB of RAM (16 unofficially) with no larger than a 750GB hard drive? If you chose the former, go iMac, if the latter, go MacBook Pro. Either way, I'd say that it's a safe bet that the iMacs will have Thunderbolt and Sandy Bridge CPUs in tow, thereby making them as radical of an update for their product line as this crop of MacBook Pros are for theirs.

Note: The iMac is by far, the most un-upgradable Mac in the entire Mac line, in case future hard drive upgrades are something you'll definitely want to do down the line. (You'd need two strong suction cups to do the procedure. It's sketchy unless you're an Apple Authorized Service Provider. The same is not true of the MacBook Pro.)

 

[wacomme]

Note: The iMac is by far, the most un-upgradable Mac in the entire Mac line, in case future hard drive upgrades are something you'll definitely want to do down the line. (You'd need two strong suction cups to do the procedure. It's sketchy unless you're an Apple Authorized Service Provider. The same is not true of the MacBook Pro.)

Will Thunderbolt make this problem obsolete to the extent that external drives will be fast - where external SSD may be a viable option?