Which model though? The 27” one in my Apple Store was the 7600K. I don’t think they had any 7600 or 7500 models.
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The new iMac is a lot noisier!
- Thread starter Darajavahus
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Which model though? The 27” one in my Apple Store was the 7600K. I don’t think they had any 7600 or 7500 models.
In that case, if yours does not make that noise, maybe your fan is magic?
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It's indeed quite chill in the Amsterdam apple store.
Anyone care to speculate on what this whole situation might look like with Coffee Lake iMacs?
I have a 4.0 i7 2014 iMac 5k, and am thinking of sitting out this 2017 generation and waiting for Coffee Lake. I really want a quieter iMac, but I would also like a clear bump in performance over my current machine, since I tend to keep computers for at least 3-5 years.
I'm thinking that a 6-core i5 Coffee Lake might be significantly quieter than my 2014 i7, but perform much better than the 2017 7600 i5. Is that a safe assumption?
I have a 4.0 i7 2014 iMac 5k, and am thinking of sitting out this 2017 generation and waiting for Coffee Lake. I really want a quieter iMac, but I would also like a clear bump in performance over my current machine, since I tend to keep computers for at least 3-5 years.
I'm thinking that a 6-core i5 Coffee Lake might be significantly quieter than my 2014 i7, but perform much better than the 2017 7600 i5. Is that a safe assumption?
It's a safe assumption the 6-core i5 will perform better for multi-threaded work. It is not a safe assumption it will perform better for single-threaded work. In fact, there is a good chance it will be slower. We don't know what the clock speeds will be, but it is likely that the 6-core i5 chips will not be as highly clocked as the fastest i5 now. They demo'd a 3.5 GHz chip which is probably an i5 since it didn't have hyperthreading, but it was 3.5 GHz. People are speculating the final i5-8600K (or whatever it is called) may be higher than 3.5 GHz, but how much higher? 3.6 GHz? The current i5-7600K is 3.8 GHz.
It's also definitely not a safe assumption it will be quieter. Remember, Coffee Lake is still 14 nm.
Either way, in your situation it's definitely a good idea to wait. Your computer is just 3 years old, it has 5K, and it's pretty fast.
Thanks for the clarification. Can you (or someone else) give me a rough idea of which activities use multi-threading and which are only single-threaded?
Many of the basic functions of Adobe's apps aren't very well multi-threaded, so for those you'll usually do better with a high clock speed than you would with multiple cores.
OTOH, for some specific Adobe tasks, or if you're encoding video for example, the applications can max out as many cores as you can throw at them.
Take a look at this bench. Fast clocks beats more cores:
Then take a look at this bench. More cores beats fast clocks:
https://www.pugetsystems.com/labs/a...Intel-Core-i7-7700K-i5-7600K-Performance-880/
Okay, so is it roughly safe to say that if I'm not gaming or encoding video, a higher clock-speed, single processor would be better than more cores and lower clock speed?
The skylake and kabylake cpus appear to have extra features useful for 4k video. h.265 decoding and encoding, and iirc, netflix 4k requires some DRM features of kabylake. Of course, this requires OS support--possibly Windows.
There's also usb-c/thunderbolt 3.
There's also usb-c/thunderbolt 3.
Interesting. Thank you.
My 2012 iMac was a 1tb HDD which I added an external SSD to via Thunderbolt to boot from. Kept it going and is still "OK" today but its noticeably sluggish. My 2013 13'' MBP seems smoother.
My new 2017 iMac will be used primarily for Adobe Lightroom and Final Cut. I've found the OS to be much smoother on the i7. Swiping between spaces. Opening new Finder windows. I like that.
This article (https://www.pugetsystems.com/labs/a...Intel-Core-i7-7700K-i5-7600K-Performance-880/) seems to show that the i7 gives a tiny speed boost for my needs so I think the quieter i5 will be the model to go for.
No. Actually for most current games, you're faster with faster cores compared to more cores. And some productivity work benefits from multithreading. It really depends on what you do and what software you use.
I betcha the responsiveness is due in large part to the storage.
A current MacBook Pro with SSD would probably blow your 2012 iMac Core i7 with HDD out of the water in terms of OS responsiveness.
Hell, my 2017 MacBook 1.2 GHz dual-core Core m3 with SSD often feels about 10X faster than my 2010 Core i7 quad-core 2.93 GHz with HDD.
I can attest to this. I used to have a 2010 or 2011 iMac with HDD and even my 2013 Macbook Air with SSD felt more responsive.
EugW, thanks for the clarification on threading. I'm still torn... but I'll probably wait until at least after the iMac Pro is released to make a decision.
Just wait for the Coffee Lake non-Pro iMacs. This is a big change for Macs. Maybe they'll even update the design at the same time, considering they're already changing things a bit with the Mac Pro.
I'd wait myself but for some budgeting reasons it makes more sense for me to buy this year than next, and plus, my current iMac is from 2010, with a hard drive and no USB 3. I'm long, long overdue.
I wonder when all these "trial" i7 iMacs being sent back are going to hit the Apple Refurbished Store??
It's not surprising that the fans are kicking up.
He is running Cinebench, which uses all the power of the CPU and GPU.
I have to say that we don't know where the multi-core support is going to. Maybe in a few years, it's a big deal? Who knows?
I do need a lot of cores and I went with the i7. It's also nice to know that you're prepared for future programs that will benefit from multiple cores.
PS. I was gaming a few days ago with my iMac with Win 10 on it. I maxed out everything in Project Cars and I was suprised, that even under this load the fan didn't get to its peak the whole time. Mostly it was running on medium speed.
I do need a lot of cores and I went with the i7. It's also nice to know that you're prepared for future programs that will benefit from multiple cores.
PS. I was gaming a few days ago with my iMac with Win 10 on it. I maxed out everything in Project Cars and I was suprised, that even under this load the fan didn't get to its peak the whole time. Mostly it was running on medium speed.
Very true - I thought CPU PECI was a good idea as well, so I set the fan software to monitor if that goes above 55C and then ramp up the fan. Should provide for an emergency backup in case forgetting to set the fan on auto when doing heavier tasks.
The iMac fan @1050rpm for light tasks has now officially made me appreciate the machine properly!
Update - Audio is its own kind of world and I am finding for ease of handling multiple types of sessions and plugins - the i7 may actually be necessary :-(. On the plus side - I am now able to load sessions near 50% cpu and keep the temps at least in the 80s by disabling Turbo. Having the headroom to go above this at minimal fans at times is a plus I may not be able to pass on. If I do keep the i7 - Apple Care and 2.5 years is the longest I would keep it though... strange times! I still do not think this is a "good" thermal design but at least with AppleCare for the life that I will keep this it is their problem if things go wrong.
Uh oh...
I wonder how many people ordered the i5 for Logic because of your posts...
I'm sticking with my 7600 order though.
Uh oh...
I wonder how many people ordered the i5 for Logic because of your posts...
I'm sticking with my 7600 order though.
I'm happy with my decision to get the 7600K. For my usage, it will handle Logic just fine. And I won't need to disable turbo to keep it cool.
Uh oh...
I wonder how many people ordered the i5 for Logic because of your posts...
I'm sticking with my 7600 order though.
. If I were only a Logic user this would be easier but I am also a Pro Tools user (plus Studio One and Davinci Resolve) and that Pro Tools is nowhere near as efficient as Logic. Still - I stand behind all I have written! The i5 is still not off the table for me either. It really is a tough one cause once you hit the limit of the i5 it doesn't go slower it just stops. Song isn't over yet though and I have 6 days left to make my choice. I keep updating here so that any interested folks can follow my thought process. Turning Turbo off is a help for audio but temps are hovering in the high 80s on less than 50% ProTools load. But at that load - the i5 won't go .I asked this in another thread to a different user, but I'm wondering just how loud and annoying the fans become when writing music or mixing music.
I don't mind if the fans are on a little bit (as my mac mini got pretty loud, but if it gets too loud it could be an annoyance when trying to mix.
I currently have the i5 7600 but I'm considering returning it to get the 7700k to future proof the machine and ensure I can run anything I throw at it.
In Pro Tools on the i7 I can keep the fan at idle till CPU loads >40% with Turbo OFF - CPU in the high 80s, (preliminary data - more to come in a few days). Fan at 1200 no bother. Once the CPU gets in the 90s the fan is fairly erratic so far but at least for a bit stays mostly below 1800 RPM. It is not bad but it is also not ignorable with no other noise in the room (think recording acoustic instruments and Vocals). Anything above that is no good for me. And for editing and recording if I can't reliably keep the fan at 1200 it won't work for me. Ideally I want the max average Temp to be ~80degC as well.
In the audio work you are doing - how is the CPU utilization? Lots of headroom left?
the cpu test uses cpu.
the gpu test uses the gpu-- plus the cpu has to feed the instructions, but that's not all that demanding.
As you can see, the gpu score is blanked out, so the radeon parts aren't likely to be abnormally warm. It looks like the i7 gets hot, and moderate fan speeds aren't always sufficient to vent the heat.
power gadget would be helpful here.
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Thank you for your reply. That is really helpful.
Honestly I still have quite a bit of headroom left with the 2017 3.5ghz i5, but I'm also still learning to mix tracks properly so I may currently not be using as many plugins at once as i will by the time I've made it to the mixing stage and gotten better at that process.
I don't do any recording via mic so I don't think that part will be an issue. It's all in the box synthesizers and a few hardware synthesizers.
My last machine was a slower mini 2.6ghz intel core i7 (i7-3720QM) with 16gb ram. On that machine I was definitely starting to see slow down in my projects before getting close to reaching mixdown.
My thought is that the i5 probably will work fine for now, but if I want to make it last and be able to use VSTi in the future, the i7 would be my best bet.
From what you're saying it sounds like the fan won't get much louder than my mini when pushing its limits (which admittedly was pretty loud)
Thanks again.