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Today's iMac or Yesterday's iMac?

pammyspyce said:
Should I get the newly released 2.8 24" iMac for $1800 or "yesterday's" 2.8 24" iMac for $1600 that's in the refurb shop? Is the chip that different? The refurb has a 500 GB hard-drive and 2 GB RAM.

I use my iMac to go on-line mostly and to store my photos and music. I have a Rev A iMac G5 right now.

TIA
Click to expand...

Is there anything wrong with your iMac G5? How much ram do you have in it? If you have not maxed it out, you could get two of these sticks from Newegg:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820220030

I have 8 sticks on this in my Power Mac G5 Dual 1.8Ghz and it works great without any problems. You could also upgrade the hard drive to give you more space.

If you really want to upgrade to get a bigger screen or the Intel Processor then I would even recommend looking for a good used on eBay or something. For example:
http://cgi.ebay.com/iMac-Intel-17-C...yZ111418QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem
or
http://cgi.ebay.com/Apple-iMac-20-2...yZ111418QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

Just my two cents . . .

-iGrant
 
I'd go refurb. There's a good chance the old 2.8ghz extreme is faster than the 2.8 in the new one. The old 2.8 model was the top of the line model. The new 2.8 isn't. Worst case the difference is going to be not noticeable.

The Amazon deal for $1220 for the old 20" is pretty good. I might go refurb though for $1099 on that too. Tax for me has always has been cheaper than they quote you (ends up about half the rate for me) and you do get a free printer with purchase from Apple's site.
 
trip1ex said:
I'd go refurb. There's a good chance the old 2.8ghz extreme is faster than the 2.8 in the new one. The old 2.8 model was the top of the line model. The new 2.8 isn't. Worst case the difference is going to be not noticeable.

The Amazon deal for $1220 for the old 20" is pretty good. I might go refurb though for $1099 on that too. Tax for me has always has been cheaper than they quote you (ends up about half the rate for me) and you do get a free printer with purchase from Apple's site.
Click to expand...

The only drawback I see with going with the refurb is that you can usaully get an extra warranty year if you pay by credit card but refurbs are generally excluded. If you use American Express and buy Apple Care, they will tack on the extra year after Apple Care expires which would give you a 4 year warranty.
 
oawong said:
The only drawback I see with going with the refurb is that you can usaully get an extra warranty year if you pay by credit card but refurbs are generally excluded. If you use American Express and buy Apple Care, they will tack on the extra year after Apple Care expires which would give you a 4 year warranty.
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Really??? I don't think I knew that . . . oawong is correct though, when I last looked on apple's website you could not get an Apple Care warranty on refurb items.
 
nick9191 said:
The older 2.8 is a core 2 extreme, the new one is only a core 2 duo. Get the older one.
Click to expand...

The extreme is a core 2 duo with an unlocked multiplier. So the only reasons to get the C2E would be for the higher clock speed and for overclocking the processor multiplier (not just modifying the FSB clock)
 
cherry su said:
The extreme is a core 2 duo with an unlocked multiplier. So the only reasons to get the C2E would be for the higher clock speed and for overclocking
Click to expand...

Can't you overclock a Core 2 Extreme to 4Ghz???? I thought I heard you could somewhere . . .

-iGrant
 
iGrant said:
Really??? I don't think I knew that . . . oawong is correct though, when I last looked on apple's website you could not get an Apple Care warranty on refurb items.
Click to expand...

Actually, you can get AppleCare on a refurb but I don't believe you'll get the addtional year coverage through your credit card.
 
oawong said:
Actually, you can get AppleCare on a refurb but I don't believe you'll get the addtional year coverage through your credit card.
Click to expand...

Well that actually makes perfect sense. Also that is good to know when I decided to upgrade to a Mac Pro . . . which will be a few . . . years . . . yeah.

-iGrant
 
I decided to get a new previous gen iMac from Amazon. I went with the 24" for $1495 after $100 rebate. I'm spending that rebate on a 4 gb RAM upgrade from OWC (which I aready ordered). So I'm getting a brand new 24" 2.4 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo with 4 GB DDR SDRAM, 320 GB SATA hard drive, and SuperDrive for $1600. I think this is going to be a huge upgrade from my 3.5 year old iMac G5. I'm looking forward to the bigger display and Photo Booth! Thanks for the advice. :D
 
pammyspyce said:
I decided to get a new previous gen iMac from Amazon. I went with the 24" for $1495 after $100 rebate. I'm spending that rebate on a 4 gb RAM upgrade from OWC (which I aready ordered). So I'm getting a brand new 24" 2.4 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo with 4 GB DDR SDRAM, 320 GB SATA hard drive, and SuperDrive for $1600. I think this is going to be a huge upgrade from my 3.5 year old iMac G5. I'm looking forward to the bigger display and Photo Booth! Thanks for the advice. :D
Click to expand...

What are you going to do with the G5 iMac??? Just out of curiosity?

-iGrant
 
I got a refurb imac three weeks ago and was one of the greatest purchases i have ever made.

Plust with the refurb store there is a chance that you will get MORE then you pay for. I got a 500gb HD instead of the 320.
 
new iMac v. (older) Mac Pro

First of all, by all accounts refurbs are a great deal. They seem to get an extra layer of quality control, and therefore are often less finnicky than "new" machines. This has been especially true on "revision a" products.

I am lusting after the new (24", 3.06) iMac. 18 months ago I made the move to Intel and bought a (2 x 3GHz) Mac Pro to replace my G5 iMac because, well, mostly just because... Now I long for the aesthetics of the all in one brushed aluminum, glossy screen of the new iMacs. I'm wondering what, if anything, I would be sacrificing in performance if I move to a max'd out (24" 3.06, 4GB) iMac?

The majority of my computer time is doing basic internet and iWork programs, but I do use Photoshop Elements 6 quite a bit, and I do work with HiDef AVCHD video in iMovie 08. I'm not sure if either of these actually uses the memory on the graphics card, or if they use CPU and system memory. My present graphics card is original equipment ( NVIDIA GeForce 7300 GT with 256 MB), so the upgraded card in the new 24" iMac might actually be an upgrade due to it's 512 MB.

Would going from my Mac Pro's four processing cores to the iMac's two processing cores be offset by the faster memory in the iMac? I now have 8GB in my Mac Pro, and would be limited to 4GB in the iMac. Would any of this even be noticeable?

So the question is what, if anything, would I be giving up in actual performance? Would there be any noticeable difference in performance in Photoshop Elements 6 or iMovie with AVCHD? Might there actually be any performance gains with the new iMac over my Mac Pro?
 
As we have in the past, we are now in the process of bench testing and adding those results to our online performance 'guide'.

In terms of the new iMacs... with the 2.66GHz and the 2.8GHz models (2.8 so far with just the ATI 2600) - these guys show a NICE bump over the prior generation comparing same speed to same speed.
http://eshop.macsales.com/shop/Memory_Benchmark/Apple_iMac/

Of other consideration..... it's pretty amazing the difference upgrading memory makes. If the choice is adding memory to an iMac already owned - or buying new... well, if you only have 1 or 2gB in a Core 2 Duo model that can take a 4GB set (2GB x 2) - for that $90 memory upgrade, it's gonna make you think it's been swapped with new. Depending on what you have now, that with 4GB of memory can even be faster than a new model with just its factory base memory config.

Kills me how many people buy new machines before upgrading memory in one they already own. Even still today find original Mac Pro owners only now upgrading past 1GB of memory.... talk about painful - and wow are they wowed just getting to even 3 or 5GB. Still left wondering why the big investment made in the Mac without the memory installed to really get the benefit of that horsepower.

anyway... The refurbs aren't a bad deal... but with the delta between old model refurb and new improved models 'new' relatively small with all things considered... just have to weight budget and needs... Reality too - all these machines today are super fast. :)
 
Thanks for both of these links, but I'm still not totally buying the performance increase between the old and new processors. A lot of this seems pretty theoretical, since other bottlenecks to overall performance haven't changed. Also not included in these comparisons (as nearly as I can tell) is one of the main factors which influenced me to buy the older 2.4 iMac over the new 2.4 entry-level model, for virtually the same price, which is the better video card in the older model.
 
IJ Reilly said:
Thanks for both of these links, but I'm still not totally buying the performance increase between the old and new processors. A lot of this seems pretty theoretical, since other bottlenecks to overall performance haven't changed. Also not included in these comparisons (as nearly as I can tell) is one of the main factors which influenced me to buy the older 2.4 iMac over the new 2.4 entry-level model, for virtually the same price, which is the better video card in the older model.
Click to expand...

I'm also trying to determine the significance of the video card differences between the older 2.4 iMac and the new entry-level iMac. Would the video card really play that much of a role for my intended uses, mainly home video editing/conversion to DVD, photo editing, web browsing and email? I'm curently thinking the new iMac would suit my purposes (and it is actually a little cheaper given my government discount if I want it immediately and pick up at my local Apple Store ........ and even cheaper if I order through Amazon).
 
oawong said:
I'm also trying to determine the significance of the video card differences between the older 2.4 iMac and the new entry-level iMac. Would the video card really play that much of a role for my intended uses, mainly home video editing/conversion to DVD, photo editing, web browsing and email.
Click to expand...

I've found some performance comparisons, but they are always for the PC cards, not the integrated graphics cards on the iMac. The advantage appears to be fairly small, but it is a little bump you lose with the entry-level iMac.
 
IJ Reilly said:
I've found some performance comparisons, but they are always for the PC cards, not the integrated graphics cards on the iMac. The advantage appears to be fairly small, but it is a little bump you lose with the entry-level iMac.
Click to expand...

So it seems like the two would be about even in terms of performance given the new iMac's larger level 2 cache, faster system bus and RAM vs. the older 2.4 iMac's better graphics card........ In which case I should purchase the system I can get for a better price (taking into consideration the larger HD of the older 2.4 iMac).
 
oawong said:
So it seems like the two would be about even in terms of performance given the new iMac's larger level 2 cache, faster system bus and RAM vs. the older 2.4 iMac's better graphics card........ In which case I should purchase the system I can get for a better price (taking into consideration the larger HD of the older 2.4 iMac).
Click to expand...

That was my theory, anyway. I decided that the performance boost of the new processor would be minimal, so I went with the better graphics card and larger hard drive. I ordered the older 2.4 model from Amazon a couple of days ago, but it's not scheduled to ship until Monday -- so there's still time for someone to disabuse me of this idea.
 
IJ Reilly said:
That was my theory, anyway. I decided that the performance boost of the new processor would be minimal, so I went with the better graphics card and larger hard drive. I ordered the older 2.4 model from Amazon a couple of days ago, but it's not scheduled to ship until Monday -- so there's still time for someone to disabuse me of this idea.
Click to expand...

I'm thinking that if you consider the performance of the two systems equal (if you assume the performace boost of the new processor is cancelled out by the beter graphics card on the old 2.4), it might be worth your while to get the new system over the older system given that the new system from Amazon costs $1149 (after rebates) and the old 2.4 from Amazon costs $1219 (after rebates) and use external drives to make up the difference in HD (when you need the additional HD space). Either way I think you're ok. One other thing to consider is that the current RAM prices for RAM upgrades (3rd party) favors the older set up although this may change as more of the new iMacs hit the streets.
 
Yes, it does seem like a less obvious choice on reflection. One other factor arguing in favor of the older model (for us) is that we already own one of the original models. My plan was to buy 2GB of RAM for the new iMac, and transfer the 1GB of RAM from the new one into the old iMac, giving me the option of maxing out the RAM in new iMac in the future.
 
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