imac "gamer edition"

[axma]

Apparently a lot here have concerns about GPU and imac performance in games. I am not the only one to hope Apple will release one day an imac gamer edition . With Steam on mac and Blizzard new releases this update was the perfect time to deliver this dream machine :

21,5" : IMO 27" is too big to play games, 21,5" is the sweet spot.
Intel Core i5
4GB (two 2GB) memory
1TB hard drive
ATI Radeon HD 5850M (or 5870M) with 1GB
No SuperDrive : hard media are so useless these days

The question is when will they remove the useless superdrive !!! it's awfull to think of all this wasted space (especially on 21,5" model), on top of 5850M may be u could also add a SSD option


PS: sorry for my english

 

[henrikrox]

you are explaining the 27" model, and 27" isnt to big for games, i mean most people game at 40-60" on their xbox/ps3. So i dont see the problem. If you are worried about the resolution, just take it down to 1080p. it will still look great

 

[bolen]

If you don't mind the 27" monitor you can just order that exact machine today. The $1999 27" iMac is:

27"
Intel Core i5
4GB (two 2GB) memory (two free slots)
1TB hard drive
ATI Radeon HD 5850M with 1GB (renamed to HD 5750).

then you can simply add an SSD drive as BTO.

 

[Hellhammer]

What would Apple use in 27" then? 5850M would fit in 21.5" but then people wouldn't buy the 27" if it had the same GPU.

 

[ceshimm]

What would Apple use in 27" then? 5850M would fit in 21.5" but then people wouldn't buy the 27" if it had the same GPU.

agree, if they have 5850m in 21.5 inch, i will not go for 27inch and i do not care whether it's i3 or i5

 

[bolen]

I would buy the 27" in any case. No way I'll buy a monitor that is the same size and panel as the one I bought 4 years ago (that is still working very well!).

 

[TMRaven]

I would still buy the 27 inch, because it offers lynnfields.

Apple could offer 5850m in the 21" models, but I think they'd have to do some overclocking or crossfire'ing in the 27 inch models.

 

[bolen]

I would still buy the 27 inch, because it offers lynnfields.

Apple could offer 5850m in the 21" models, but I think they'd have to do some overclocking or crossfire'ing in the 27 inch models.

Yes, but first OS X would need to support crossfire at all.. and that's probably far far away.

I believe one solution is to use a custom liquid cooling solution and then place desktop chips in there. But that would really put stress on the quality control.

 

[TMRaven]

I would hate to see how big an iMac would have to be with liquid cooling and desktop gpu daughterboards.

 

[dexthageek]

I would hate to see how big an iMac would have to be with liquid cooling and desktop gpu daughterboards.

I don't see Apple EVER releasing a Gaming "iMac". The nature of AIO machines can not support it. They would have to move to a desktop machine. And if that is the case, they already offer the Mac Pro. Now a gaming desktop under 2k from Apple would be nice, but I don't see it ever happening.

 

[Bodhi395]

How can you have a gaming machine without a dvd drive?

Don't most games still come on physical discs?

 

[Ludaru]

I wouldn't mind a fatter imac. The back is facing the wall anyway.

 

[axma]

How can you have a gaming machine without a dvd drive?

Don't most games still come on physical discs?

Games are cheaper online (same as music and movies), check Steam prices for example

I have a lot of games: WoW, Heores of Newerth, Left 4 dead, TF2, Modern Warfare 2 but no physical discs at all.

Optical drives are the floppy drives of today, i hope Apple will be among the first to drop them (as they done with floppy)

Just think of the improvements they could do with all this space in macbook, macbook pro and imac product lines

 

[thejadedmonkey]

I would hate to see how big an iMac would have to be with liquid cooling and desktop gpu daughterboards.

I think it was toshiba that made a nice all-in-one that was about an inch thicker than the current iMac, and had a current gen graphics card, and core i7, etc, and it was all liquid cooled. If Apple wanted to do it, they could... but I'm sure market research shows that they'd have to sacrifice too much of their profit margin

 

[Gregintosh]

I think a "gaming" iMac will come about when the technology supports putting top notch gaming components in the same small form factor. Eventually the technology will get that good.

In the mean time, games for Apple seem to be taking off a bit, that way when a gaming Mac comes out you will actually have a decent selection of modern games to go along with it.

In about 3-4 years as optical drives die out even more, I suspect Apple will remove them from the design. Right now, I think just enough people use them just enough of the time to justify its presence on people's MAIN workhorse machine (which the iMac is for millions of people, unlike say the MacBook Air which was always a secondary machine and thus did not need an optical drive).

Maybe 3-4 years is when we'll get the "gaming mac" - sounds like the timelines for all the improvements may converge around that time. Though if I had to place my bets, I would bet that Apple figures out a way to make the iMac even thinner rather than using the excess space on upgrades.

 

[D'Illusion]

I wouldn't mind a fatter imac. The back is facing the wall anyway.

I'm glad I'm not the only one who feels this way. Much rather a thicker more featured iMac than one that sacrifices performance for the sake of aesthetics.

 

[Hellhammer]

I think it was toshiba that made a nice all-in-one that was about an inch thicker than the current iMac, and had a current gen graphics card, and core i7, etc, and it was all liquid cooled. If Apple wanted to do it, they could... but I'm sure market research shows that they'd have to sacrifice too much of their profit margin

Apple doesn't do extreme computers. Yes, there are 15" laptops with desktop i7 and desktop 5870 but they have like 10 fans and are like 5" thick. People would still whine if iMac had desktop 58xx because it would lack the easy upgradeability and be more expensive than PC etc. It's never going to be a perfect machine

 

[TMRaven]

I think it was toshiba that made a nice all-in-one that was about an inch thicker than the current iMac, and had a current gen graphics card, and core i7, etc, and it was all liquid cooled. If Apple wanted to do it, they could... but I'm sure market research shows that they'd have to sacrifice too much of their profit margin

I dunno if I'm talking about what you're talking about, but there was this company that designed the liquid cooling for an iMac-like all in one. The actual case was about the same size as the iMac's, but the stand was very bulky and undesirable. The current iMacs have current gen graphics cards as well. I think the gpu they were using in the liquid cooled all-in-one was GTX 285M, and the cpu was i7 920, which is very comparable to what the current top-end iMac is. The only difference is I think they might've SLI's two 285ms together.