TheBudge Posted February 23, 2006 Share Posted February 23, 2006 My impressions of the the new Intel iMacs: This being my first post, let me thow out some credentials: I have been in the computer buisness for over 15 years. I am CCNA and A+ certified, and have expierence with a multitude of OS's, website creation (i.e: flash, dreamweaver, notepad, PHP) software. I have used apples from the Apple IIe -> present. Although my main focus of work has been wtih PC. I just recently bought a 17in intelMac, the 1.83ghz dual core, 1GIG ram, x1600, etc. (im sure many of you know the specs on these machines) The systems that I can compaire this to are: iBook G4 1.1 ghz, 512mb ram, 32mb radeon m7500, etc. Desktop PC: Amd 64 3000+, 1 gig DDR 400, dvd burner, GeForce FX 6600 256 MB. I am getting to the jist of theses systems, but if any of you would like more info on them, please feel free to ask. Upon initial startup, I was not completly impressed, infact, it seemed slower than the intial startup of my iBook, but since this was my new toy i decided to give it a chance. after I went through the initial setup and booted into the OS, I noticed a few things right off the start, first the screen size and brightness was beautiful even on the small screen (I had played with a G5 20" iMac befroe i purchased this system) and I started off by installing the most recent OS updates. The system did a restart and that is when I noticed a Huge speen increase over my G4, and it even booted faster than my AMD 64 system. next, I installed office 2004, Firefox, and Toast 7 titanium at the same, while adding my 30+ Gigs of music to the iTunes on this computer and surfing the web. It all went smoothly, aside from a small time of lag opening iTunes and Safari, which can be attributed to the program installs. This operation I would have never attempted on my PC, and certianly not on my ibook (although im sure the iBook could handle the chore, it would just be painstakingly slow. ) I ran the updates for the software, and it all worked well. I then Purchased Macromedia studio 8, installed 4 programs included in the package at once and again, flawless operation. (I have not yet been able to use Adobe CS 2 because i ran outtta $, but when i do i will update this post) However, when opening these programs (which dont have the universal binaries yet) I noticed the intel macs major weakness: Rosetta, opening these programs was slower than it was on my desktop, and about the same speed as on the iBook. Mozilla Firefox, again to open it is painstakingly slow (compaired to the potential of the machine) and i seem to have issues with downloading on the browser, the program will freeze unexpectadly (as with many non-intel native apps. with the exception of the Macromedia software.) Then I ran some games, as many of us know games are a good way to give your system a workout. I installed World of Warcraft, Halo, Unreal Tournament 2004, and Doom3, all of which have thier requirements far surpased by this particular machine. WoW ran very well, almost, if not better than on my PC, the coloring was rich, and the textures were beautiful, I wish i could say the same about the rest of the games I install (with the exception of DOOM 3 which had the native patch on it. It looked better than on my PC, but did not run quite as fast.) Halo and UT 2k4 were choppy at best, and it didnt matter if i dropped the res from highest to lowest, and the acceleration features such as Anti-Aliasing, dynamic showdows, Trilinear filtering, etc . . . had no real effect on performance either. I suspect that when these programs become native, then this problem will be resolved. Over all this computer is FAST. It's multitasking capabilities far surpass any other computer I have used. Conclusions: - Strong performace, which can get faster over time, once universal binaries are implemented throughout MAC software. - Not for hardcore gamers, but has the capacity to be able to play many mainstream games (assuming they have the universal binaries are applied) - Great multitasking ability, super fast speed for video and audio. - If you use programs like Photoshop and Macromedia Studio daily or even a few times a week, hold off and wait for universal binaries to be released for the software. (4/5) - due to the software incompatabilities/glitches. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gt500 Posted February 23, 2006 Share Posted February 23, 2006 Nice review! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheBudge Posted February 24, 2006 Author Share Posted February 24, 2006 Thank you - I do what I can, I havent seen many user reviews of this product so i figured that I would take a crack at it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
domino Posted February 24, 2006 Share Posted February 24, 2006 Thank you for the review TheBudge. I imagine the only missing in the equation are the native professional applications. I just can't wait for the Tower Powers to be released. I would reserve Windows for gaming though. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mac OSX Coder Posted February 25, 2006 Share Posted February 25, 2006 windows defintely for gaming. If that's not what windows are for, I have no idea what their for. Windows suck! Except in games! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheBudge Posted February 25, 2006 Author Share Posted February 25, 2006 Yeah i know, Thats why i got both, abyways, I just wanted to update, I nabbed a copy of photoshop CS2, and it had an update after I installed it, Since im dumb, i forgot to test it out b4 i updated. The app seems to run smoothly, and the startup time seems pretty fast, but i am unable to determine weather adobe released the univ. binaries for the product, it def runs faster on my iMac than my iBook or PC, so i think that the binaries have been released, now all i need is another monitor and ill be good to go . Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kday Posted February 26, 2006 Share Posted February 26, 2006 Nice review. I hope the Intel Macs will be better with gaming than the previous Macs. For the time being, somebody needs to work out a dual boot solution! Oh, that's right, there is a $10,000 purse so that is not going to get done for a while.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Shinigami Posted February 26, 2006 Share Posted February 26, 2006 Nice review! Have you tried a version of firefox with the universal binary? I just installed it and it is much faster - Intel Mac builds Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
iMaurice Posted February 26, 2006 Share Posted February 26, 2006 nice to see a review by a real nerd (compliment lol) we shouldnt worry about rosetta, within a few months a lot more stuff are gonna be universal Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheBudge Posted February 26, 2006 Author Share Posted February 26, 2006 No, i did not try the intel firefox build thanx for the link. i am downlaoding now, and i will tell you guys what i think, thanx for all the feedback. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheBudge Posted February 27, 2006 Author Share Posted February 27, 2006 OK, I was able to try out the Beta universal Binaries firefox, named "DeerPark" it works well, starts sup fast, but i noticed that sometimes it will not exactly freeze but it wont allow me to use my keyboard, its wierd, any1 else have the same problem? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
domino Posted March 1, 2006 Share Posted March 1, 2006 i noticed that sometimes it will not exactly freeze but it wont allow me to use my keyboard, its wierd, any1 else have the same problem? I don't want to dilute this thread but Ff runs all the time on my hacked box. I never use safari due to my mouse problem. In any case, I don't have the same problem with it. Here is a tip, in the URL box, type the following: about:config then search for browser.cache.memory.capacity. Change the value to 16384. This change will make sure Firefox does not eat more than 70mb of your preciouse memory. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheBudge Posted March 2, 2006 Author Share Posted March 2, 2006 Tahnx a bunuch but this is not FF on a haxed box but on my MACtel, but i will take a look at it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
domino Posted March 2, 2006 Share Posted March 2, 2006 dont get me wrong. the firefox mod can be set on all platforms because Mozilla hasn't fixed the problem if excessive memory use in firefox. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheBudge Posted March 2, 2006 Author Share Posted March 2, 2006 I have the new intel binaries beta version labeled "deer park" it doent seem to ahve that value, i have: browser.cache.disk.capacity which is the closet value i could find . . . hrmmm. . . Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
domino Posted March 2, 2006 Share Posted March 2, 2006 Intel Download: http://ftp.mozilla.org/pub/mozilla.org/fir...1.en-US.mac.dmg I wonder if clean install removes the setting. I have the setting maybe because I upgraded from the previous version? Maybe Mozilla fixed the problem? Maybe not? Just watch Firefox's memory usage. Real Memory should not exceed 70mb after 2hrs of usage. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheBudge Posted March 3, 2006 Author Share Posted March 3, 2006 Sweetness thanx for all the help man! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
New001 Posted March 5, 2006 Share Posted March 5, 2006 http://icculus.org/news/news.php?id=2565 ^^ A UniBin patch for UT2004. You will be amazed at how fast it runs. Rosetta is slower in 10.4.4/10.4.5 than in 10.4.3 8F1111 from my experience. I've never heard of an iBook G4 1.1GHz with an ATi Mobility Radeon 7500. . . Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheBudge Posted March 6, 2006 Author Share Posted March 6, 2006 The iBook was bought in Sept. of 2003. and thanx i will try the unibin patch. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alban Posted March 9, 2006 Share Posted March 9, 2006 The iBook was bought in Sept. of 2003. and thanx i will try the unibin patch. ..so then it must be an iBook G3, not a G4? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheBudge Posted March 13, 2006 Author Share Posted March 13, 2006 G4 just hit the market Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alban Posted March 29, 2006 Share Posted March 29, 2006 G4 just hit the market True... the official release was October 2003 to be precise. but that machine has got a ATI 9200 mobility, and not a 7500, as you mention... see www.apple-history.com ? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheBudge Posted March 29, 2006 Author Share Posted March 29, 2006 Ill take a look man, But i know what I bought, and What I have owned for 2-3 years or so . . . Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bart86 Posted July 2, 2006 Share Posted July 2, 2006 Thanks for the review. The first time I read through it, I came away with the impression that the iMac might not be that great with games. Then I noticed that the 2 games you were really impressed with (speed wise) were Universal Binaries (e.g. native Intel) and the 2 you were disappointed with were PowerPC running under Rosetta. I think over all when those two are compiled as Universal the iMac won't be too shaby for mid range games. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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