So... should I buy an iMac?

[Lankyman]

I would prefer to go back to non-bonded screens and user upgradeable parts. If this doesn't happen then I will keep my current iMac until there's no life left in it and move back to a Windows box.

I have no intention of being dictated to by Apple nor will I pay the ridiculous price of the BTO upgrades. Windows 10 looks like it has the makings of a very nice OS and I quite like the look of many of the small form factor Windows units on offer currently.

 

[vixenite]

$4,500? Where do you live?


At that price, no it’s not worth it for gaming.

I'm from Australia. And actual price would be A$4,389.00 for the specs I mentioned in my OP.

If you're a serious gamer, ... gaming performance has always been one of the Mac's weaknesses, when compared to beastly PCs.

Ah....the iMac is not a gaming system even with the m295x. And from what I've read, heats up pretty quick when playing games.

I can get only to $3500 with a fully loaded 27" 5k model. Typo? Regardless, an iMac is a great machine for those of us who need/want the all-in-one design with desktop power but, in many ways, under the hood it's more akin to a high-end laptop than a true desktop.

For that sort of money you should be looking at a Mac Pro. However, as has been said, Macs aren't great for gaming, which is why you need to install Windows too. So, unless you're dead set on an iMac for some reason other than "just coz", there's really no point in you paying up to get one when a Winbox will be much better value for you.

Personally, I stopped gaming after I got my iMac. Reason being that it was becoming a chore booting into Windows 7 whenever I wanted to game and then booting back to OS X for everything else. I also found that my entry level 27" iMac's graphics card was insufficient for pushing games at native 2k resolution. I had to run most of my games in 1080p windowed format.

I think this will be your biggest problem - that the 5k iMac is not going to be able to support decent gaming performance at that resolution. You will likely want to do your gaming in 2560x1440 resolution upscaled to 5k.

http://arstechnica.com/apple/2014/10/the-retina-imac-and-its-5k-display-as-a-gaming-machine/

According to this article, the 5k iMac should game just fine. I can't comment as to whether it is worth your money though.

Yeah, this is all pretty much why I've decided a PC is a much better fit for me.

NO ITS NOT.

I got an iMac 5K 8GB m290X 1TB Fusion model from Best Buy a couple of weeks ago for $1900 including tax. That is a bargain. I spent another 150 for 16GB more memory fro OWC. You could buy 2 for what you want to spend.

The iMac 5K is the finest workstation I have ever owned. You don't need the BTO model.

I live in Australia, hopefully that explains the ridiculous price tag.

 

[vixenite]

Thanks for all the replies, guys.
I think I had a bit of temporary lapse of sanity. I got drawn in by the pixels.

You're all quite right - obviously a PC is a much better fit for me.
I'd rather spend that extra money on a nice 4K screen, and still have a build under/close to $2000AU.

... I can't say I won't ever invest in a refurbished MacBook at some point though.

 

[Lankyman]

Thanks for all the replies, guys.
I think I had a bit of temporary lapse of sanity. I got drawn in by the pixels.

You're all quite right - obviously a PC is a much better fit for me.
I'd rather spend that extra money on a nice 4K screen, and still have a build under/close to $2000AU.

... I can't say I won't ever invest in a refurbished MacBook at some point though.

Wise man/woman and a wise move. Least you have been big enough to admit the mistake. I think W10 looks like it may be pretty good.

 

[Abazigal]

Thanks for all the replies, guys.
I think I had a bit of temporary lapse of sanity. I got drawn in by the pixels.

You're all quite right - obviously a PC is a much better fit for me.
I'd rather spend that extra money on a nice 4K screen, and still have a build under/close to $2000AU.

... I can't say I won't ever invest in a refurbished MacBook at some point though.

Let it just be out on record that I am quite happy with my iMac. I felt it was fairly priced back in 2011 when 2k monitors were still quite pricey (but sadly, the price of iMacs has not changed to match the cheaper pricing of displays), though in hindsight, I really should have sprung for a better graphics card. My computing requirements aren't that heavy (no video editing and the like), but I do appreciate the larger display and the all-in-one form factor which makes my desk less cluttered.

2k on a 27" screen is a bit of a mixed blessing though. The default text is comically small, and OS X doesn't support scaling all that well for non-retina displays. I actually suffered from eye-strain for the first 2 weeks I owned the iMac, but thankfully got used to it eventually.

The iMac is definitely not for everyone. Which is a pity, since it is the closest thing to a proper desktop PC offered by Apple.

 

[apropos12]

Thanks for all the replies, guys.
I think I had a bit of temporary lapse of sanity. I got drawn in by the pixels.

You're all quite right - obviously a PC is a much better fit for me.
I'd rather spend that extra money on a nice 4K screen, and still have a build under/close to $2000AU.

... I can't say I won't ever invest in a refurbished MacBook at some point though.

I would like to say that based on what you are looking for in a computer, I agree with previous posters and yourself--you likely will get better mileage out of a PC/Windows.

I will however put my plug in for the iMac. I have owned mine for a little less than a year now, and cannot say enough good things about it. I am somewhat of a power user--do a significant amount of website and content database work along with marketing and design (Adobe CC), but I have never found this computer to suffer in the face of gaming. Albeit I have not tried too many different games on this computer, I have used it almost daily for this purpose, and have yet to see a problem with the types I am playing.

I must reiterate earlier statements that I really enjoy the fact that the computer is all-in-one, both in terms of design but also functionality.

While the iMac was right for me and others, it certainly isn't for everyone. Best of luck!

 

[Lankyman]

The iMac is definitely not for everyone. Which is a pity, since it is the closest thing to a proper desktop PC offered by Apple.

I like my iMac, though what about the Pro or the Mini as Desktops? I really liked my Mini whilst I had it, paired with a 24" monitor, which I thought was the absolute sweet spot size wise.

Although it's been said many times before, the iMac it could be argued is a different form factor Laptop. Certainly when I put an SSD in my daughters a couple of weeks ago I was struck by the similarities to the innards of a Laptop.

I will readily admit that putting in an SSD alongside the original HDD in my daughters 2011 iMac has totally transformed it. When my nerves have recovered from the experience I'm considering doing the same with mine, which is the same model and year.

Definitely not a job for the faint of heart though.

 

[Abazigal]

I like my iMac, though what about the Pro or the Mini as Desktops? I really liked my Mini whilst I had it, paired with a 24" monitor, which I thought was the absolute sweet spot size wise.

Although it's been said many times before, the iMac it could be argued is a different form factor Laptop. Certainly when I put an SSD in my daughters a couple of weeks ago I was struck by the similarities to the innards of a Laptop.

I will readily admit that putting in an SSD alongside the original HDD in my daughters 2011 iMac has totally transformed it. When my nerves have recovered from the experience I'm considering doing the same with mine, which is the same model and year.

Definitely not a job for the faint of heart though.

Mac Pro is too expensive (and the dual GPUs aren't really suitable for gaming either) while Mac mini lacks a discrete graphics card. The 2014 Mac mini is non upgradable as well, so you likely want to spring for the 8 gb/iris pro version, which drives up the price more.

I certainly like the idea of a Mac mini hooked up to 2 23" monitors though. But after throwing in all the misc peripherals, it seems to defeat the point of a cheap Mac.

 

[RareSloth]

I'm waiting for the update! Its such a beautiful beast of machine.

 

[jonblatho]

OS X goes the other way, getting skinnier as it evolves.

The ever-increasing size of OS X downloads begs to differ.

 

[Dubadai]

The ever-increasing size of OS X downloads begs to differ.

The size of the OS has nothing to do with how it runs... Sure, it might take up more space but the interesting part is how optimized it is and how well it runs.

 

[tillsbury]

I would like to say that based on what you are looking for in a computer, I agree with previous poster and yourself--you likely will get better mileage out of a PC/Windows.

I will however put my plug in for the iMac. I have owned mine for a little less than a year now, and cannot say enough good things about it. I am somewhat of a power user--do a significant amount of website and content database work along with marketing and design (Adobe CC), but I have never found this computer to suffer in the face of gaming. Albeit I have not tried too many different games on this computer, I have used it almost daily for this purpose, and have yet to see a problem with the types I am playing.

I must reiterate earlier statements that I really enjoy the fact that the computer is all-in-one, both in terms of design but also functionality.

While the iMac was right for me and others, it certainly isn't for everyone. Best of luck!

This. Although you would probably get more performance out of a lower-spec Mac and a separate Windows gaming machine, I can't imagine anything more awful. I had a six month old very high spec Windows machine when I first bought a Mac, and intended to carry on using it as a gaming machine. But I never did. Just too much of a pain.

My iMac (NZ$6500 over here ) put me off Windows machines permanently. I do casual gaming fairly regularly, quite often in 5k resolution. Windows 10 under parallels is also surprisingly capable now, for Windows-only gaming. And, more importantly, I can control-arrow to swap between screens without interrupting my game to check messages and emails. Works perfectly for me.

So while you could get more actual performance for the money (at least while gaming) by buying two machines, I very much doubt that you could get a better solution that way.

 

[vixenite]

This. Although you would probably get more performance out of a lower-spec Mac and a separate Windows gaming machine, I can't imagine anything more awful. I had a six month old very high spec Windows machine when I first bought a Mac, and intended to carry on using it as a gaming machine. But I never did. Just too much of a pain.

My iMac (NZ$6500 over here ) put me off Windows machines permanently. I do casual gaming fairly regularly, quite often in 5k resolution. Windows 10 under parallels is also surprisingly capable now, for Windows-only gaming. And, more importantly, I can control-arrow to swap between screens without interrupting my game to check messages and emails. Works perfectly for me.

So while you could get more actual performance for the money (at least while gaming) by buying two machines, I very much doubt that you could get a better solution that way.

I tend to agree that two machines are a bit of a pain, definitely.
Something that makes me want a MacBook as well as a gaming desktop, though, is the fact that I find it difficult to sit in a computer chair for long periods of time...

Such a silly problem, I know, but I always end up with back pain because I like to cross my legs in computer chairs and generally just end up sliding around into various positions which I assume are not too good for my posture, haha.

There's still appeal for me to just be able to lay in my bed/on the couch and use a laptop computer. And I also love the control-arrow swap, too!

Maybe I could get the best of both worlds. For now, however, I think I'll focus on building a nice PC and keep on using my 15.6" Lenovo Y510p laptop.

 

[tillsbury]

I tend to agree that two machines are a bit of a pain, definitely.
Something that makes me want a MacBook as well as a gaming desktop, though, is the fact that I find it difficult to sit in a computer chair for long periods of time...

Such a silly problem, I know, but I always end up with back pain because I like to cross my legs in computer chairs and generally just end up sliding around into various positions which I assume are not too good for my posture, haha.

There's still appeal for me to just be able to lay in my bed/on the couch and use a laptop computer. And I also love the control-arrow swap, too!

Maybe I could get the best of both worlds. For now, however, I think I'll focus on building a nice PC and keep on using my 15.6" Lenovo Y510p laptop.

The best of both worlds is to have your retina Macbook as the "occasional" computer on the sofa...

 

[aevan]

My advice: get the i5/M290X iMac 5K and a Playstation 4. Enjoy the most comfortable computer and a great gaming platform.

 

[vixenite]

My advice: get the i5/M290X iMac 5K and a Playstation 4. Enjoy the most comfortable computer and a great gaming platform.

I'm already very happy with my Xbox One.

 

[z31fanatic]

Kids and their sillystations.

 

[Lankyman]

Kids and their sillystations.

I wouldn't even know how to start one up and if I did much less what to do with it.

 

[aevan]

I'm already very happy with my Xbox One.

That will work too

 

[azure247]

I have a 5k imac and I solely use it in windows 7. I play FFXIV and I can max the settings at 1920x1080. With the current hot weather, my imac shuts itself down randomly and so I have to lower the game settings to prevent overheating again.

Would I buy it again if I had the choice? No, I have the best GPU but because of the heat, it throttles and worst, shuts down my imac. For the price I paid, I would have gotten a curved samsung Ultra Wide monitor and a nice GPU like the 980 GTX.

With that aside, I appreciate the minimal footprint it offers. I have a Nextdesk so when I change height, it does not interfere with the cables since the keyboard/mouse are all connected to the screen essentially. If I had a desktop, it would have to sit on the desk but I dont think the weight would be supported.

So yeah, if you are tight on space and want a clean look and willing to spend more money for weaker performance due to heat throttling, then go imac. Otherwise, PC is better in every way.

 

[tillsbury]

Shuts down your imac? That's not normal. You are still under Applecare. Get it fixed.

 

[azure247]

Shuts down your imac? That's not normal. You are still under Applecare. Get it fixed.

Yeah, it shuts down. I dont think there is a defect. It just gets super hot while gaming in the summer weather. I touched the vent area for a few seconds and it was unbearably hot. It helped that I lowered the game settings, but what's so great about paying so much and not being able to milk the system for what its worth because of heat issues. I wouldnt get an imac if gaming is a priority.

It also gets noisy because of the fans going into overdrive. Even turning the volume up doesnt help mask the noisy current.

 

[Lankyman]

I wouldnt get an imac if gaming is a priority.

Surely, everyone already knows this?

 

[aliensporebomb]

Look here's the deal. You can still game with your iMac - just that the price/performance is going to be a different thing versus an equivalent built PC or game console. You can spend a lot more on the Mac side and not achieve the performance you can on the PC side. My friend build a monster PC with dual Xeons, multiple video cards and massive amounts of ram (motherboard expandable to a ridiculous 96 gigs of ram - basically a server motherboard). How much did he spend? In the lower Mac Pro pricing territory. What does he also game with? His Mac Pro trashcan with the dual video cards there.