Upgrade PC or iMac

[bwfc0907]

Hi
Just want your thoughts. My current PC is i7-950, 6gb Ram, GTX570.

I use for storing my iTunes (iTunes match & Apple Tv, gaming (battlefield 3, FIFA, CIV 5, F1 2011), converting videos, excel & word (studying). This machine is used as a server and Ethernet is hardwired.

I have a little cash, enough to buy an iMac (whether I wait to see if a new version materialises is a seperate matter).

My choices though are
1) buy the iMac & sell off my PC & use it as I do above with boot camp. Would cost approx £1k after sell off.
2) upgrade my current PC to i7-3770k, 16gb ram, GRX670, 256gB SSD. Would cost approx £600 after sell off.

Most of my machines are apple around the house & I find the cloud, pages & numbers excellent. We have 1 appleTV, 2 iPads, 1 MacBook air, 2 iPhones.

Can I have your thoughts on
1) which makes more sense
2) if upgrade is an SSD worth it?
3) do the upgrade specs look ok. Would be looking to future proof & with the motherboard is a reasonable budget.

Cheers

 

[Rlnplehshalo]

Well I guess it's what works for you, if you have a lot of devices already in sync with Apple then why not

But I will say an iMac is NOT for gaming. They use mobile GPUs, have little cooling and upgrade options that would really limit you to certain games and a predefined level of quality for each game.

If I were you get an iMac for your work, productivity or family use. Keep the PC for your intensive stuff.

 

[theSeb]

Buying a 2011 iMac right now would not make any sense at all. It's best to wait for the 2012 model to come out with ivy bridge and other updates. The mobile GPU in the iMac will be the biggest disappointment for you. The 27" can be configured with a 6970M GPU. This is ok for 1920x1080 gaming with some of whizz-bang turned off, but it won't be as fast as your 570.

The 6970m is a slightly down-clocked version of the 6850. Here is a comparison of the 6850 vs your 570.

http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/291?vs=306

The 570 basically eats the 6970m for breakfast.

The 2012 model will have a faster GPU so it's best to wait and see what it brings, if you can wait. But no matter what they stuff in there, it won't be as fast a 670.

 

[bwfc0907]

How does the new Retina MacBook Pro stack up, would that play games under bootcamp whilst giving me the benefit of an Apple?

 

[theSeb]

How does the new Retina MacBook Pro stack up, would that play games under bootcamp whilst giving me the benefit of an Apple?

The 6970m is more powerful than the rMBP's 650M so you will have a better gaming experience using the iMac. The 2012 iMac is rumoured to have the Nvidia 680M, which will be a nice upgrade.

You can play games on both the rMBP and the 2011 iMac, but you won't be able to play with the same level of graphics detail that you may be used to on the 570. That is the compromise when using a mobile GPU.

http://www.anandtech.com/show/5914/nvidia-geforce-gtx-680m-kepler-gk104-goes-mobile

 

[bwfc0907]

The 6970m is more powerful than the rMBP's 650M so you will have a better gaming experience using the iMac. The 2012 iMac is rumoured to have the Nvidia 680M, which will be a nice upgrade.

You can play games on both the rMBP and the 2011 iMac, but you won't be able to play with the same level of graphics detail that you may be used to on the 570. That is the compromise when using a mobile GPU.

http://www.anandtech.com/show/5914/nvidia-geforce-gtx-680m-kepler-gk104-goes-mobile

I'm a little confused. After looking on the iMac forum it says playing games is helped by reducing settings yet the rMBP seems to allow high settings on most games with very decent frame rates. Can you clarify?

 

[theSeb]

I'm a little confused. After looking on the iMac forum it says playing games is helped by reducing settings yet the rMBP seems to allow high settings on most games with very decent frame rates. Can you clarify?

This is because some people find 25 fps per second ok and some people think that anything below 50 fps is not ok. Reading forums where some one says, "The game plays great" is not an objective comparison for when some one says, "The game lags". These kind of statements are useless for trying to figure out if a particular computer is right for you. The rMBP has an Nvidia 650M GPU. The 2011 iMac has an AMD Radeon 6970M GPU. You can look up benchmarks yourself and see if they perform in a manner that is acceptable to you. Benchmarks by reputable sites and magazines are far more useful than subjective forum comments, since you can normally read about the testing methodology and you can be sure that apples are being compared to apples in a consistent and repeatable manner.

Some people say that running OS X and Windows at the same time using virtualisation software with only 4 GB of RAM is ok for them. I am not one of those people and find it painfully slow. It all depends on what your frame of reference is.

Here are some benchmarks for a 6970m and a 650m, but bear in mind that the 650m in the rMBP is over-clocked, by default, and it's better to look at 660m benchmarks.

650m
http://www.notebookcheck.net/NVIDIA-GeForce-GT-650M.71887.0.html

6970m
http://www.notebookcheck.net/AMD-Radeon-HD-6970M.43077.0.html

660m
http://www.notebookcheck.net/NVIDIA-GeForce-GTX-660M.71859.0.html

If you compare the scores for BF3, then you will see the following
BF3 6970M 660M 650M
low: 84.3fps 75.5fps 61 fps
med.: 58.8fps 51.1fps 42 fps
high: 45.7fps 40fps 32 fps
ultra: 19fps 18fps 14 fps

So that shows that ultra is unplayable and then the other resolutions/detail settings become more bearable. The rMBP has an overclocked 650M, which is closer to the 660M. Some people don't mind 40 FPS, but some people need 70 FPS. It's all in the eye of the beholder. People can argue and claim what they want, but the fact of the matter is that the 2011 iMac's GPU is faster than the rMBP's.

 

[robgendreau]

Are you gonna be able to transfer that copy of Windows to the Mac? If not, that could be a factor if you still need to use Windows.