2 basic/silly iMac questions

[Goat57]

I have a M2 MacBook Air 13" which I use for basic tasks. The only "hungry" task I do is play World of Warcraft. I am aware the MBA is no gaming PC but to me, upgrading from an Intel Mac, the performance is perfectly adequate...more than a little notebook has any right to be!

I am exploring the possibility of getting a desktop Mac but wondering if the iMac will play WoW as well as the MacBook Air considering it has a bigger screen so has more pixels to operate.

If you multiply the 2560x1664 resolution of my MacBook that is 4.3 million pixels. The iMac 4480x2520 has 11.3 million so almost 3 times as much. Does this equate to requiring three times as much processing/graphical power to produce the same frames per second, or does it not work like that?

Secondly...Does the 256GB iMac have only 1 flash drive, and the 512GB has 2 - like the MacBook Air? With my MBA, I don't need 512GB storage capacity but was advised to buy the 512GB model because the storage is split into 2 drives so is twice as fast.

Thanks in advance.

 

[rKunda]

While the write speed is faster on the larger drives, I’ve never understood why that matters for most users.

 

[Goat57]

Thanks, rKunda.

I have since done some research and it seems I was silly to follow the advice to get 512GB. However it's doing no harm having too much storage aside from having £200 less in my bank account so will forget about that one. At least I can save the money if I get the iMac.

If anyone can answer my question about the hardware demands of the extra pixels I would be appreciative.

Thanks

 

[ChrisA]

Take a look at the "Activity monotr" app while playing the game. Look at GPU and CPU utilization. If they are running at 50% then it means the GPU/CPU is twice as fast as it needs to be because 50% of the time it is sitting idle. This can give you a hint bot how the iMac would perform. But note that the M3 inside the iMac is about 20% faster than your M2.

But why not just buy a monitor for the notebook. You don't need to buy an iMac to get a larger screen. A low-cost 27 inch 4k screen would work for you. It woud cost only a few hundred dollars.

 

[Chuckeee]

I would be cautious about using Actvity Monitor like that. I have only found it useful to
- monitor swap file utilization
- monitor overall memory pressure (red/yellow/green)
- watching for suspicious or surprising processes that appear to suck up resources

 

[ChrisA]

I would be cautious about using Actvity Monitor like that. I have only found it useful to
- monitor swap file utilization
- monitor overall memory pressure (red/yellow/green)
- watching for suspicious or surprising processes that appear to suck up resources

Then try running "top" in a terminal window. It might be a little more accurate.

 

[Basic75]

Does this equate to requiring three times as much processing/graphical power to produce the same frames per second, or does it not work like that?

You'll need three times the pixel shader horsepower, but that's not the only thing determining the FPS! The same GPU might be slower or faster than one third when pushing three times the number of pixels. The answer is, as so often, "it depends."