[X4U] 2 vs 4 cores, iMac?

[Joe Tinney]

This doesn't really help you with your core question but I think the bigger difference is in the technology shift that has happened with processors recently.

>From the machines you've listed I would like to highlight that the last machine, in addition to the extra cores and thread support, is an entirely different processor platform. Not saying it is a different processor architecture, it is still a native 64-bit chip like the Core 2 Duo's, but it differs significantly from them otherwise under the hood. All of this is largely transparent to the Operating System and applications except for the SSE4.2 extensions which will be of benefit when developers code that in to their applications.

While it is technical, this offers a good comparison of the processors (as that is the primary differentiator of the systems below): http://ark.intel.com/Compare.aspx?ids=41495,35605,42915. 

Both systems have the same 4GB of DDR3 memory, the i5 features a new technology that allows faster access to memory by the processor than previous generation technologies (that's why you lose the Front-Side Bus [ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Front-side_bus ] speed and get the Direct Media Interface [ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Direct_Media_Interface ] throughput on the i5 processor). 

At any rate, I would highly recommend that if you are seriously considering any of these that you go with the i5 option. Regardless of additional core utilization (which Snow Leopard and some applications by Apple have been redesigned to take much advantage of) you'll have much greater performance due to the technology changes in that processor platform in general and specifically concerning computational operations performed on data in memory and being passed around inside the system (other than from hard disk).

Good luck,
Joe Tinney

-----Original Message-----
From: x4u-bounces at listserver.themacintoshguy.com [mailto:x4u-bounces at listserver.themacintoshguy.com] On Behalf Of Joe Sporleder
Sent: Wednesday, August 04, 2010 3:51 PM
To: A place to discuss Mac OS X for the casual user.
Subject: [X4U] 2 vs 4 cores, iMac?

There are some nicely priced previous generation 27" iMacs on Apple's online store, refurbished section (see below). Unless one is doing a ton of video encoding, 3-D modeling, etc, will the 4-core iMacs offer much extra in performance? Does Photoshop take advantage of the extra cores? We do not do much with filters in Photoshop - color correction is our Photoshop's primary function. Although we area media company, a print publisher and a radio station, we are getting more and more into audio and video online through our websites, such as Youtube and Blip.tv, etc (iMovie for now, but would be open to Final Cut Express or Pro).

Refurbished iMac 27-inch 3.06GHz Intel Core 2 Duo 27-inch LED-backlit glossy widescreen display 4GB memory 1TB hard drive 8x SuperDrive (DVD±R DL/DVD±RW/CD-RW) ATI Radeon HD 4670 graphics with 256MB memory
Built-in iSight camera	
$1,269.00
Save $430.00
25% off

Refurbished iMac 27-inch 3.33GHz Intel Core 2 Duo 27-inch LED-backlit glossy widescreen display 4GB memory 1TB hard drive 8x SuperDrive (DVD±R DL/DVD±RW/CD-RW) ATI Radeon HD 4670 graphics with 256MB memory
Built-in iSight camera	
$1,439.00

Refurbished iMac 27-inch 2.66GHz Quad-Core Intel Core i5 27-inch LED-backlit glossy widescreen display 4GB memory 1TB hard drive 8x SuperDrive (DVD±R DL/DVD±RW/CD-RW) ATI Radeon HD 4850 graphics with 512MB memory
Built-in iSight camera	
$1,529.00
Save $470.00
23% off

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