NVIDIA Geforce 9400M vs. ATI Radeon HD 2400XT?

[macstatic]

How does the NVIDIA Geforce 9400M (in the new 20" iMac) compare to the ATI Radeon HD 2400XT (which is used in the previous version 20" iMac)?
Can it do more (especially in consideration of the upcoming Snow Leopard) or won't the average Joe feel any difference?

I'm trying to decide on getting the new (but much more expensive, at least here) model or the previous 20" model at the old price.

 

[macstatic]

Nobody?
Strange that there aren't any benchmarks around for this as it's probably a pretty common question now that OpenCL in Snow Leopard is an issue.

 

[J&JPolangin]

...I'm looking for the same info and its hard to find...

 

[nick9191]

Hardware wise, the 9400M is better even despite being onboard, but Nvidia's Mac OS X drivers are crap compared to ATI's, so I'd bet on the 2400XT to be honest.

 

[NRose8989]

Hardware wise, the 9400M is better even despite being onboard, but Nvidia's Mac OS X drivers are crap compared to ATI's, so I'd bet on the 2400XT to be honest.

True, even the 2600 pro beat the 8800GT in core image apps.

 

[J&JPolangin]

Hardware wise, the 9400M is better even despite being onboard, but Nvidia's Mac OS X drivers are crap compared to ATI's, so I'd bet on the 2400XT to be honest.

True, even the 2600 pro beat the 8800GT in core image apps.

...so is the previous gen 2.4 Ghz 20" iMac worth it for $979 NIB compared to the current gen 2.66 Ghz 20" iMac at $1179 - the extra $$ would go toward 4 GB of RAM and maybe a larger HDD?

 

[jincongz]

Stats:

Here's a comparison of their desktop cards:
http://www.gpureview.com/show_cards.php?card1=524&card2=578

Personally, for $200, you can go buy a PSP and game with that instead... I'd say go with the 2400XT.

 

[J&JPolangin]

Here's a comparison of their desktop cards:
http://www.gpureview.com/show_cards.php?card1=524&card2=578

Personally, for $200, you can go buy a PSP and game with that instead... I'd say go with the 2400XT.

...thanks for that link, if I read it correctly the cards really seem pretty much the same and the differences in performance between the two computers probably come from the faster CPU vs the video cards?

 

[flopticalcube]

Notebookcheck rates the 9400m above the 2400XT: http://www.notebookcheck.net/Mobile-Graphics-Cards-Benchmark-List.844.0.html

 

[jincongz]

Notebookcheck

Heck, they rate it above the 3470... I was surprised at that one.
http://www.notebookcheck.net/Comparison-of-Graphic-Cards.130.0.html

 

[opeter]

Heck, they rate it above the 3470... I was surprised at that one.
http://www.notebookcheck.net/Comparison-of-Graphic-Cards.130.0.html

Because 34xx series = 2400 series.

The only difference is:

The AMD ATI Mobility Radeon HD 3470 is a faster clocked HD 3450 and therefore also produced in 55nm and with DirectX 10.1 support (the enhancements over the HD 2400 series).

 

[BlizzardBomb]

It's hard to measure directly because the new iMac has several minor improvements over the old model e.g. faster low-end processor (2.66 GHz vs. 2.4 GHz), faster RAM and higher Hard Drive density.

That said, Macworld places the total difference at under 10% and graphical difference at 10 - 20%. So I don't think the new model will be that much better in terms of Snow Leopard. That and the drivers for Radeons are a little bit better than the GeForce drivers at the moment.

 

[eXan]

In most cases the 2400 is slower, but you can get the previous gen 2.66 iMac which had Radeon 2600 and it beats the cr@p out of 9400.

But this shouldn't concern you unless you play 3D games or use Motion/Aperture/Color.

 

[txnoob]

http://store.apple.com/us/product/FB324LL/A?mco=MjE0NjA3MA

here's the link to the prev gen 20" w/ the 2600PRO

$999

 

[trip1ex]

Macworld shows the 9400M ahead although I think the 9400M configs have a faster cpu in them. I'm sure one won't notice much of a difference between the two though.