2008 iMac 2600 vs. 8800....?!?!?!

[erl]

D4F said it pretty well. The nVidia cards (not just this one) have been beating the pants off ATi for the past several years on Windows based machines. There was no reason for anyone to think it would be any different on the iMac. Go to Tomshardware.com and look at benchmarks of the various cards and nVidia comes out on top.

http://www.tomshardware.com/charts/...1560,1562,1628,1629,1644,1603,1619,1606,1609,

Go through the different benchmarks on that page and see.

I think it's pretty apparent that there are some driver issues.

 

[ww3proggy]

Regardless of how good this card *potentially* is or how it looks on paper, right now in the iMac I don't think it can be said that this is a better "all-around" graphics card. Yes, it is better at most games, but I did not purchase my computer to play games. Had I seen the comparison for core apps (which I use a lot) the day before instead of the day after I BTO my iMac, I would not have spent the extra $200. Now, I need to get permission to return it and will have to pay shipping back. I'm not a happy camper.

 

[D4F]

Regardless of how good this card *potentially* is or how it looks on paper, right now in the iMac I don't think it can be said that this is a better "all-around" graphics card. Yes, it is better at most games, but I did not purchase my computer to play games. Had I seen the comparison for core apps (which I use a lot) the day before instead of the day after I BTO my iMac, I would not have spent the extra $200. Now, I need to get permission to return it and will have to pay shipping back. I'm not a happy camper.

Another false statement.
Prove them that the advertise it wrong and you won't have to pay a dime.
Considering you have all u need to do that then I suspect you were not really polite talking to them cause Apple has great CS and they helped me many times and it never cost me a thing.

Btw... Does +/- 15% difference in time makes such a big difference?
Serious question. Waiting 2minutes instead of 1:30 makes such a big deal that you can not wait for the drivers to be fixed?
And if you do a lot of video why didn't you go with a single CPU mac pro which is pretty much same price??

 

[ww3proggy]

Another false statement.
Prove them that the advertise it wrong and you won't have to pay a dime.
Considering you have all u need to do that then I suspect you were not really polite talking to them cause Apple has great CS and they helped me many times and it never cost me a thing.

Btw... Does +/- 15% difference in time makes such a big difference?
Serious question. Waiting 2minutes instead of 1:30 makes such a big deal that you can not wait for the drivers to be fixed?
And if you do a lot of video why didn't you go with a single CPU mac pro which is pretty much same price??

Really? You aren't out to make friends are you. I have had both great CS and very poor CS from Apple - it depends on who answers the phone. And not that I have to justify my decision, but for the $$ the iMac also has a 24" screen. And 15% (it's actually more based on the results of that test I posted) is HUGE when you are considering a project may take as much as 100 hours or more. Billing at $50/hr would you want to spend the extra $750? Probably not.

 

[D4F]

Really? You aren't out to make friends are you. I have had both great CS and very poor CS from Apple - it depends on who answers the phone. And not that I have to justify my decision, but for the $$ the iMac also has a 24" screen. And 15% (it's actually more based on the results of that test I posted) is HUGE when you are considering a project may take as much as 100 hours or more. Billing at $50/hr would you want to spend the extra $750? Probably not.

What does making friends have to do with anything here?
It was a simple question to see why did you choose a all in one system for like I suspected heavy work.

 

[50548]

Really? You aren't out to make friends are you. I have had both great CS and very poor CS from Apple - it depends on who answers the phone. And not that I have to justify my decision, but for the $$ the iMac also has a 24" screen. And 15% (it's actually more based on the results of that test I posted) is HUGE when you are considering a project may take as much as 100 hours or more. Billing at $50/hr would you want to spend the extra $750? Probably not.

So let me see...you return your "weak" iMac tomorrow and the day after Apple releases an update that fixes all such driver issues...what are you gonna do, then?

1) Complain that this time, for unfair reasons, NVIDIA performance got better but you jumped out of the train way too early, even when ALL ordinary benchmarks out there said that the 8800 is better than the 2600?

2) Say that Apple's CS sucks because you WANTED the 2600 to be better forever, given your early return of the original purchase?

3) Throw a torch at Apple because they fixed a problem with one of their drivers?

4) Demand a replacement because now you started playing games and the 8800 is much better at that?

5) All of the above?

I really hope you take a deep breath and think before making a decision...

 

[ww3proggy]

5) All of the above


You also forgot to add to that list sicking my pet ogre on Steve. I have had Apple computers (and clones) since 1987. My point was that I am disappointed that they would release this card without proper support.

 

[VanNess]

My point was that I am disappointed that they would release this card without proper support.

My understanding is that when Apple prepares to release a new machine, the hard drives that will ship with the machine are imaged en masse with the OS, iLife apps, etc. Any updates/fixes/optimizations that occur after the drives are imaged are essentially too late to the party. Even the build number for the OS on the restore disks may be slightly different than the build number for the OS on the hard drive that shipped with the machine, as the restore DVDs are manufactured after the drives are imaged and may have rolled in a few tweaks here and there.

Hopefully, Apple does some testing to insure that everything on the master image is working properly, but when it's all said and done it's altogether possible that a few bug(s) may be discovered afterwards once the machine is in the wild. And this particular Nvidia card is brand new for the iMac, whereas the current ATI card nowadays is relatively mature as it was previously the only card available for the iMac - and it has gotten much Apple love in the form of multiple driver and firmware updates over the course of the Aluminum iMac's lifespan. Yet another ATI update was was issued upon the release of the 2008 ATI-based models.

So it's absolutely disappointing that the new Nvidia card isn't living up to it's full potential out of the box, apparently. But at this point it's still very very early in the game (pun absolutely intended). As more and more Nvidia-based iMacs make their way into the wild and start to see real world use with various software configurations, Apple will be able to, hopefully, find solutions for the Nvidia-based iMacs that address it's performance for all users - gamers and non-gamers alike.

But for now, it's kind of dilemma unless you're a gamer who spends 100% of your time playing games and almost nothing more. I'm not one to recommend a machine with the caveat that certain graphics issues will probably be addressed at some point by Apple for reasons that amount to little more than a leap of faith that Apple is potentially aware of these problems and is burning the midnight oil readying a blow-you-away fix to the Nvidia drivers/firmware. However, as noted above, the Nvidia graphics option is brand-new, and given the amount of driver attention Apple paid to the ATI card over the course of the aluminum iMac's history, I have a somewhat easier time turning my faith towards Apple - as opposed to say, Dell, which obviously only peddles hardware and nothing more - in that they can come up with a driver/firmware/OS fix and make it right. Bottom line is Apple takes responsibility for both the hardware and the software on your machine, and this situation highlights the fact where that's actually a good thing.

My advice: cross your fingers, cross them really hard, when you run software update over the next several weeks.

 

[pubjoe]

I think the statement that the only (or main) advantage the 8800 currently holds is for games is very fair. It's a consumer "gamer"-tagged graphics card put into a consumer machine (with small games support). It currently underperforms in desktop tasks, not just specific programs but even in native OSX.

I would hope to see it fixed myself but hope all we like, lets face it, currently the top of the range imac is underperforming it's predecessor in much of it's common usage.

I wouldn't buy it, unless it was fixed, not because it's probably going to be fixed ...No matter how "probably".

...Yes, that is disappointing.

 

[sfroom]

My point was that I am disappointed that they would release this card without proper support.

I agree that the recent benchmark results are dissapointing. Perhaps even enough so to delay my purchase of a new iMac (I sold my 24" 2.16 7600 GT in anticipation of the update, and have been iMacless for about a month).

However, I would think long and hard before returning a machine and exchanging it for a ATI HD 2600 Pro model, just on the basis of a single benchmark.

Sure a sour benchmark might prompt a little buyer's remorse, but I wouldn't throw the baby out with the bath water.

I strongly believe that if you keep your 8800 GS unit, you'll be much happier six months from now than if you were to trade it in.

[snip]

While it may be a "false rumor" to claim that 8800 GS option should only be considered by "serious gamers", the fact that it should be recommended is fairly indisputable.

However, the argument that it should be recommended, particularly to the graphic designers or other users that use OpenGL that you speak of, has not necessarily been proven, at least not to my knowledge. Most reviews and discussion that I have read indicate that since it performs so well in games utilizing OpenGL, it should perform well in applications that also use OpenGL. But I haven't read a review by a user who actually uses OpenGL based applications.

There are lots of them out there. I know Sketchup has become very popular in the design community, and that it uses OpenGL. Has anyone read a review, or have personal experience using the 8800 GS in OpenGL based applications (like Sketchup)?

 

[D4F]

I agree that the recent benchmark results are dissapointing. Perhaps even enough so to delay my purchase of a new iMac (I sold my 24" 2.16 7600 GT in anticipation of the update, and have been iMacless for about a month).

However, I would think long and hard before returning a machine and exchanging it for a ATI HD 2600 Pro model, just on the basis of a single benchmark.

Sure a sour benchmark might prompt a little buyer's remorse, but I wouldn't throw the baby out with the bath water.

I strongly believe that if you keep your 8800 GS unit, you'll be much happier six months from now than if you were to trade it in.

[snip]

While it may be a "false rumor" to claim that 8800 GS option should only be considered by "serious gamers", the fact that it should be recommended is fairly indisputable.

However, the argument that it should be recommended, particularly to the graphic designers or other users that use OpenGL that you speak of, has not necessarily been proven, at least not to my knowledge. Most reviews and discussion that I have read indicate that since it performs so well in games utilizing OpenGL, it should perform well in applications that also use OpenGL. But I haven't read a review by a user who actually uses OpenGL based applications.

There are lots of them out there. I know Sketchup has become very popular in the design community, and that it uses OpenGL. Has anyone read a review, or have personal experience using the 8800 GS in OpenGL based applications (like Sketchup)?

I posted several times about it. Silo 3D, Cinema 4D, Vue. To sculpt, model and tweak I use my iMac with the 8800 and then drop onto my Pro to do the renders.
Only reason I didn't buy the 8800GT for the Pro yet is because I am waiting to see how the new ATI will perform on the Mac.

Using Silo 3D in a 4 split view makes the 2600 choke after creating simple objects with two maybe 2 subdivisions applied. 3rd or 4th subdivision crashes Silo with a report of openGL basically not being able to handle.
Now same thing on my iMac. 4 split screen 4-5 subdivisions and I can still work flawlessly. That is a HUGE difference.
People that post saying the 8800 is only good for games prove that they talk about things they have no idea about.

 

[SaSaSushi]

Btw... Does +/- 15% difference in time makes such a big difference? Serious question. Waiting 2minutes instead of 1:30 makes such a big deal that you can not wait for the drivers to be fixed?

Maybe you're not up to percentages in your fifth grade math class yet but it's a 50% difference in time, not 15%. Not that the facts make the slightest difference to you and your arguments.

So you understand that means waiting 4 minutes instead of 2 and yes, I think that's a pretty big deal.

 

[Draeconis]

If ww3proggy was a home user, I think it's a bit over-the-top to send it back on something that we all seem to be pretty agreed over is disappointing but will be solved in the near future. However, given that he's doing work in the professional realm, time is money. I cannot fault him on wanting to return it for a more currently efficient machine, because his clients would be very upset over being charged $750 more for the same amount of work.

The baiting and arguing in this thread is a little childish; we all have differing points of view, there is no need to share them in any way that involves belittling others.

 

[gehrbox]

But for now, it's kind of dilemma unless you're a gamer who spends 100% of your time playing games and almost nothing more. I'm not one to recommend a machine with the caveat that certain graphics issues will probably be addressed at some point by Apple for reasons that amount to little more than a leap of faith that Apple is potentially aware of these problems and is burning the midnight oil readying a blow-you-away fix to the Nvidia drivers/firmware. However, as noted above, the Nvidia graphics option is brand-new, and given the amount of driver attention Apple paid to the ATI card over the course of the aluminum iMac's history, I have a somewhat easier time turning my faith towards Apple - as opposed to say, Dell, which obviously only peddles hardware and nothing more - in that they can come up with a driver/firmware/OS fix and make it right. Bottom line is Apple takes responsibility for both the hardware and the software on your machine, and this situation highlights the fact where that's actually a good thing.

My advice: cross your fingers, cross them really hard, when you run software update over the next several weeks.

While the 8800 is new to the iMac, it is not new to OS X. The Mac Pro has had the 8800 for a while now and the same performance issues have been reported on it. There have been no driver updates to address the issue on the Pro series.

 

[SaSaSushi]

The baiting and arguing in this thread is a little childish; we all have differing points of view, there is no need to share them in any way that involves belittling others.

The bottom line is simply if you are willing to accept the current performance deficiencies on nVidia 8800 in hopes that Apple will iron them out in driver updates because having the more powerful GPU is that important to you, then you should do so. The card already beats the prior ATI 2600 by two times or more in gaming benchmarks.

If the poster above finds the performance in his new iMac with an nVidia 8800 to be unsatisfactory he has every right to return it or exchange it for one with an ATI 2600 and it's now mature drivers.

The 2600 also costs $150 less and that's another important factor if, all else considered, the performance is equal to what you intend to use your machine to do.

 

[D4F]

Maybe you're not up to percentages in your fifth grade math class yet but it's a 50% difference in time, not 15%. Not that the facts make the slightest difference to you and your arguments.

So you understand that means waiting 4 minutes instead of 2 and yes, I think that's a pretty big deal.

haha got u Sushi boy.
You talk about being polite and lecture people and what you wrote above??
hypocrit your name is

50% or even 100% is no different in the WHOLE context of what I wrote. Considering how some people are death attached to their theory I simply messed the nubers to see if somebody actually reads the whole thing. You do that's obvious but apparently you are ATI fanboi that can't accept the fact about the 2600 doing a better job partially. Sorry man. You fail.
You keep talking about same one side of the coin over and over again yet there is the other side which I proved to be correct yet you still keep spining same side of your record.
Like I told you before: put ALL facts together before dropping the diamond on the vinyl.

 

[pubjoe]

you are ATI fanboi

Ahhh well. What a shame.

...and the title of this thread could have led to an interesting and fairly important discussion.

 

[Draeconis]

While the 8800 is new to the iMac, it is not new to OS X. The Mac Pro has had the 8800 for a while now and the same performance issues have been reported on it. There have been no driver updates to address the issue on the Pro series.

Not exactly.. The Mac Pro 8800 is the 8800 GT, whereas the 8800 in the iMac is the GS which is by all accounts a 8800m GTS, which is definitely not the same as a 8800 GT. Don't forget the iMac is for all intents and purposes a souped up laptop in a screen.

The drivers for mobile and desktop cards are fairly different, as are the physical units themselves.

..You do that's obvious but apparently you are ATI fanboi that can't accept the fact about the 2600 doing a better job partially. Sorry man. You fail.
You keep talking about same one side of the coin over and over again yet there is the other side which I proved to be correct yet you still keep spining same side of your record.
Like I told you before: put ALL facts together before dropping the diamond on the vinyl.

To enter into your form of speech, you fail. Currently, the 2600 outperforms the 8800 GS at OpenGL tasks because of mature drivers; this really isn't something you can dispute, run the tests for yourself. Yes, the 8800 is a better card, we're all aware of that, but the drivers don't support it in every arena yet, and that's turning some people away at the moment, which is understandable. You're bogging this conversation down with a bit too much jibberish mate.

 

[gehrbox]

Not exactly.. The Mac Pro 8800 is the 8800 GT, whereas the 8800 in the iMac is the GS which is by all accounts a 8800m GTS, which is definitely not the same as a 8800 GT. Don't forget the iMac is for all intents and purposes a souped up laptop in a screen.

The drivers for mobile and desktop cards are fairly different, as are the physical units themselves.

Nobody has been able to determine the actual chipset used in the iMac 8800 card. Some think it may be an 8800m others a throttled GT. In any event the basic driver code between two is the same. Tweaked a little here and there for disabled features and power reduction in the M model, but the code base is the same. Please refer to NVidia XP drivers at the following link.

http://www.nvidia.com/object/winxp_175.16_whql.html

In any case it is clear that both the Mac Pro and iMac with 8800 cards suffer the same performance issues and Apple has not seen fit to fix the problem in the Pro, even though it has been in the field much longer. When (if?) they fix it in the Pro, it will also be fixed in the iMac.

 

[SaSaSushi]

haha got u Sushi boy.
You talk about being polite and lecture people and what you wrote above??
hypocrit your name is

What was the inflammatory comment, exactly? I was in the fifth grade once too.

 

[D4F]

Not exactly.. The Mac Pro 8800 is the 8800 GT, whereas the 8800 in the iMac is the GS which is by all accounts a 8800m GTS, which is definitely not the same as a 8800 GT. Don't forget the iMac is for all intents and purposes a souped up laptop in a screen.

The drivers for mobile and desktop cards are fairly different, as are the physical units themselves.



To enter into your form of speech, you fail. Currently, the 2600 outperforms the 8800 GS at OpenGL tasks because of mature drivers; this really isn't something you can dispute, run the tests for yourself. Yes, the 8800 is a better card, we're all aware of that, but the drivers don't support it in every arena yet, and that's turning some people away at the moment, which is understandable. You're bogging this conversation down with a bit too much jibberish mate.

Oh really?? lol and lol.
I'm not gonna go AGAIN writing all that story that you apparently missed FEW POSTS ABOVE but i will give you a fast OpenGL test in Cinebench 10.
Two tests - 8800 and 2600 (yes I have systems running them both). Both took about 10 seconds. And if this is the score the 8800 pulls out with immature drivers then damn I am happy not to have the 2600 on my iMac after 10.5.3 comes out and I can't upgrade the GPU


Graphics Card : NVIDIA GeForce 8800 GS OpenGL Engine

Shading (OpenGL Standard) : 6523 CB-GFX

****************************************************

Graphics Card : ATI Radeon HD 2600 PRO OpenGL Engine

Shading (OpenGL Standard) : 5951 CB-GFX


****************************************************


So I am going to state it again. Please do not talk if you have nothing valuable to add. You just create another sucked out of your own finger story.

Do I fail?? lol.. You certainly did.

 

[D4F]

What was the inflammatory comment, exactly? I was in the fifth grade once too.

Instead of trying to be cool, post some facts about both systems in various environments so we can argue about Apple.
Just move on Sushi before crucial parts of this discussion get deleted again.

 

[gehrbox]

Clearly somebody missed the benchmark quotes

The one thing the 8800 does well on the Mac IS OpenGL. It smokes the 2600 in anything that depends on it.

 

[SaSaSushi]

Instead of trying to be cool, post some facts about both systems in various environments so we can argue about Apple.
Just move on Sushi before crucial parts of this discussion get deleted again.

Hasn't that fact, that a good portion of the messages you post in here get deleted, told you anything?

When you ramble incoherently and throw personal insults around and taunt others because they might not agree with your point of view it's called trolling and its against the rules of these, and most other online forums.

If you can comprehend it I recommend you start here, paying particularly close attention to number 4.

 

[D4F]

Hasn't that fact, that a good portion of the messages you post in here get deleted, told you anything?

When you ramble incoherently and throw personal insults around and taunt others because they might not agree with your point of view it's called trolling and its against the rules of these, and most other online forums.

If you can comprehend it I recommend you start here, paying particularly close attention to number 4.

And what are you doing? First the previous post and now you're still preaching. Same thing just different words. That's why I wrote - move on or post stuff bout Apple