44 replies to this topic

[AussieMacGamer]

rob_ART, on 08 May 2011 - 08:20 AM, said:

Comments?

Want to buy me one?

It would seem Apple have updated the EFI to allow two of the sata ports to run 6gbps. Supposedly not the DVD slot though. One step forward, one step back.


P.S if anyone was wondering about doing an aftermarked SSD on one of the earlier iMac's i finally found a walkthrough ... doesn't look so friendly.

[The Liberator]

rob_ART, on 08 May 2011 - 08:20 AM, said:

Comments?

Well, they look pretty good!

Liberator.

[AussieMacGamer]

rob_ART, on 08 May 2011 - 08:20 AM, said:

I have some Portal 2 results for the new iMac at High settings.

At 2560x1440...
38 FPS = 2010 iMac Core i7 2.93GHz with Radeon 5750 (1G GDDR5)
61 FPS = 2011 iMac Core i7 3.4GHz with Radeon 6970M (2G GDDR5)
59 FPS = 2010 Mac Pro 6-core 3.33GHz with Radeon 5870 (1G GDDR5)

At 1920x1080...
82 FPS = 2010 iMac Core i7 2.93GHz with Radeon 5750
94 FPS = 2011 iMac Core i7 3.4GHz with Radeon 6970M
180 FPS = 2010 Mac Pro 6-core 3.33GHz with Radeon 5870

At 1280x720...
141 FPS = 2010 iMac Core i7 2.93GHz with Radeon 5750
172 FPS = 2011 iMac Core i7 3.4GHz with Radeon 6970M
243 FPS = 2010 Mac Pro 6-core 3.33GHz with Radeon 5870

Comments?

Actually Rob now i think of it, i'm wondering if you can throw something really heavy at it... like Crysis 2. I'd be very interested to see the numbers

[rob_ART]

AussieMacGamer, on 08 May 2011 - 08:57 AM, said:

Actually Rob now i think of it, i'm wondering if you can throw something really heavy at it... like Crysis 2. I'd be very interested to see the numbers

Be glad to if you can tutor me on running a Crysis 2 benchmark.

Besides Portal 2, Mac games I have in my test kit include WoW (latest), Borderlands, Starcraft 2, and Left 4 Dead 2

[Thain Esh Kelch]

AussieMacGamer, on 08 May 2011 - 08:37 AM, said:

P.S if anyone was wondering about doing an aftermarked SSD on one of the earlier iMac's i finally found a walkthrough ... doesn't look so friendly.

Thanks. I'm gonna do it on my 2011 model sometime in the future! (When they are cheaper)

I'd love to see more benchmarks..

How come the 5870 dekstop edition is so much better in some games only?

[DrJohnFever]

rob_ART, on 08 May 2011 - 09:19 AM, said:

Besides Portal 2, Mac games I have in my test kit include WoW (latest), Borderlands, Starcraft 2, and Left 4 Dead 2

I would like to see if/how well it can max SC2.

[Thain Esh Kelch]

DrJohnFever, on 09 May 2011 - 05:30 AM, said:

I would like to see if/how well it can max SC2.

For what it is worth. On a PC the 6970M hits the following:
StarCraft 2
Resolution Settings Value
1920x1080 ultra 58.6 fps

So if you like Bootcamp, you can definitely play the game at ultra settings.. Now, the Mac version of course, on a higher resolution screen..

[DrJohnFever]

Thain Esh Kelch, on 09 May 2011 - 06:15 AM, said:

For what it is worth. On a PC the 6970M hits the following:
StarCraft 2
Resolution Settings Value
1920x1080 ultra 58.6 fps

So if you like Bootcamp, you can definitely play the game at ultra settings.. Now, the Mac version of course, on a higher resolution screen..

Now that is also with a worse CPU, and I know SC2 is much more dependent on the CPU than GPU compared to most games, so it is usually bottlenecked by the CPU. My friend plays on ultra with a 9800 GT. I think it'd be interesting to find if you could get good frames with the max settings on the 27" screen's resolution as well.

[tbade]

alldaveallen, on 03 May 2011 - 03:14 PM, said:

Man, these are pretty sweet. But I'm going to wait until I can have an air-conditioning unit installed under my desk. I can't believe how much heat my current iMac throws off, and if they're using the same form factor with these souped-up innards you'll probably be able to fry bacon on the top--which Apple should list as a bonus feature...

You are close to correct, I put my hand on one in a store and it was HOT! Apple should add a coffee cup holder to keep the java warm!

[AussieMacGamer]

rob_ART, on 08 May 2011 - 09:19 AM, said:

Be glad to if you can tutor me on running a Crysis 2 benchmark.

Besides Portal 2, Mac games I have in my test kit include WoW (latest), Borderlands, Starcraft 2, and Left 4 Dead 2

Here's a tool for it Rob. you will need to boot windows. It's a really bend you right over the top graphical game though, would love to see how the imac handles it.

[Homy]

If you´re interested I'm gathering all the reviews and test results here in a Swedish forum. The text is in Swedish of course but most of the reviews are in english. Some are translated by Google to Swedish.

[XxtraLarGe]

It's odd, the 3.1 GHz i5 seems to outperform the 3.4 GHz i7 with double the VRAM. What's up with that?

http://www.barefeats.com/imac11c.html

[Thain Esh Kelch]

XxtraLarGe, on 03 June 2011 - 03:23 PM, said:

It's odd, the 3.1 GHz i5 seems to outperform the 3.4 GHz i7 with double the VRAM. What's up with that?

http://www.barefeats.com/imac11c.html

1 GB VRAM is more than enough at the moment, so that doesnt add anything. And the i7 is slower due to HT being activated, which the i5 is lacking.

[XxtraLarGe]

Wait, so hyperthreading actually makes the computer slower?

Thain Esh Kelch, on 04 June 2011 - 12:49 AM, said:

1 GB VRAM is more than enough at the moment, so that doesnt add anything. And the i7 is slower due to HT being activated, which the i5 is lacking.

[AussieMacGamer]

XxtraLarGe, on 08 June 2011 - 03:10 PM, said:

Wait, so hyperthreading actually makes the computer slower?

Allocating resources to where they're not needed. As far as I know, games are still taking a while to really adopt proper multi core support. It's a minute difference but you can see why

[Thain Esh Kelch]

XxtraLarGe, on 08 June 2011 - 03:10 PM, said:

Wait, so hyperthreading actually makes the computer slower?

Apparently yes.. Fortunately you can turn it off. I think most people are happy enough with 4 cores anyway. I mean, 1-2 for a game, one for flash in your browser, and one for Mail, Pages and Adium!

[Eric5h5]

If I turn off hyperthreading on my 2010 Mac Pro, it makes Blender render slightly slower.  So "hyperthreading makes your computer slower" isn't really accurate, depending on what you're doing.

--Eric

[DrJohnFever]

Hyperthreading helps on programs that can use more threads than cores. If the program doesn't use more threads than cores, then the CPU will sometimes add a second thread onto a core that already has a thread on it, making the second thread complete slower, whereas if you would have disabled HT, the second thread would have loaded onto another core, completing it much faster.

[XxtraLarGe]

It would be interesting to see what the results would be with hyperthreading turned off then.

DrJohnFever, on 09 June 2011 - 12:59 PM, said:

Hyperthreading helps on programs that can use more threads than cores. If the program doesn't use more threads than cores, then the CPU will sometimes add a second thread onto a core that already has a thread on it, making the second thread complete slower, whereas if you would have disabled HT, the second thread would have loaded onto another core, completing it much faster.

[The Liberator]

How does one turn it off then? I am curious too.

Liberator.