Question 2012 27" iMac for gaming now and future

[stephenz]

I'm thinking about buying a new 27" iMac and want your opinions. I plan on maxing out most of the specs (listed below). I realize it isn't an ideal gaming computer and that it is overpriced due to the "apple tax" but I want your opinion on its gaming abilities. I'm not a big gamer but want to try out a few games. My main use will be general browsing and media playing but if I can play COD and some other games, I will.

What is its gaming ability now and what can I expect it to be in the future? Will it just run games now but definitely not in the future or does it have some room for "growth"? Thanks in advance for your help.

27" iMac
3.4GHz Quad-core Intel Core i7, Turbo Boost up to 3.9GHz
32GB 1600MHz DDR3 SDRAM
1TB Fusion Drive
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 680MX 2GB GDDR5

 

[lt_dan_zsu]

That is just stupid. For games, you only need an i5, a 670, and 8gb ram. That would be far more than the majority of people would need for a few years. You say that you aren't that into gaming? Look at this ram
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820231559
That isn't "Apple tax", that's a pirate scheme. You could build a pc with all of that for 1700-2000, and that's including a 1440p monitor. For what I just build on the apple website, that Mac costs $3200.

 

[stephenz]

It's a long story that I was trying not to have to explain but it looks like maybe I will.

I have had tons of problems with my Dell XPS 1640. I contacted Dell and they sent me a "replacement". The replacement is a fulled loaded Alienware M17x (huge upgrade!). I'm not interesting in it because it is so heavy and bulky so I am going to sell it. It is brand new in the box with a full warranty so it is worth about $3000. With that money, I plan on purchasing a Mac.

I don't plan on upgrading the RAM immediately because I can do that myself for much cheaper than Apple charges ($600). The cost of the above system without the RAM upgrade is $2600. Then I get about $100 off for being a student, bringing it down to $2500.

I realize that to most of you spending that amount of ridiculous but the way I see it I am upgrading my 4 year old Dell for a fully loaded Mac.

 

[lt_dan_zsu]

Or you could upgrade your computer, FOR A FULLY LOADED ALIENWARE! I don't even like alienware, but that will get way better performance than a mac. I am legitimately getting mad right now. You a $3000 pc for your broken dell. When my dell broke I got 4 months without a desktop. I would keep the dell or order custom build your own. You could get a nice 1440p display and a beast of a pc for that price.

 

[Hazle]

What is its gaming ability now and what can I expect it to be in the future? Will it just run games now but definitely not in the future or does it have some room for "growth"?

like most gaming laptops, which this iMac use as it's parts, the answer is the former; don't expect this to last any more than 2 years, unless you don't mind playing at lower graphic settings or a lower resolution over time. and based on Apple's history of limiting users to upgrade the hardware themselves, as well as the fact that this is a laptop's hardware, which are always limited in upgrades, i'd say you have very little room for growth at best, if any at all.

now, unto the anti-apple rant; you're practically paying $2500 for an i5 pretending to be an i7, and a graphics card that performs between a 7870 and a 660ti. it's a PC you can get for $800-1000 less, or a few hundred less if you're going with a pre-built. from that $3000 you gain selling that alienware, you could get a much better deal with a far better gaming performance with a far better chance to last you longer than 4 years.

unless you don't mind paying the premium for sleek looks alone, in the end, it's your call.

 

[stephenz]

I agree with everything that everyone has said but Mac does have that X factor that you can't compare apples to apples with (no pun intended). I've never owned a Mac but I am tired of the same old windows OS and am willing to give it a try. I also like the simplicity that Apple gives.

I expected an anti-apple sentiment here on this forum. Which is fair. Being an electrical engineer, I understand both sides. I'll have to give this some thought. Now you all have me excited about doing a custom desktop build with a large monitor!

 

[DarkSable]

I was going to say "since when do they make macs that good," before I realized that this was using mobile parts.

That's a COMPLETE ripoff. So here's what you do.

1) Sell the Alienware.
2) Buy yourself a decent, but not amazing, laptop for office work.
3) Build yourself a computer that will be twice as powerful as this one for half the price.
4) Pocket the remaining $500 and pat yourself on the back for not buying an underpowered, overpriced POS that can't even run a lot of games anyways.

 

[DarkSable]

I agree with everything that everyone has said but Mac does have that X factor that you can't compare apples to apples with (no pun intended). I've never owned a Mac but I am tired of the same old windows OS and am willing to give it a try. I also like the simplicity that Apple gives.

I expected an anti-apple sentiment here on this forum. Which is fair. Being an electrical engineer, I understand both sides. I'll have to give this some thought. Now you all have me excited about doing a custom desktop build with a large monitor!

Yes, apple makes things user-proof. That also means that when you WANT to do something, you can't. (Trust me, I've worked in IT, and trying to get OSX to do something more complicated than play a video is an incredible waste of time and energy.)

If you don't like windows, then try windows 8, or dual-boot linux. What is comes down to is that the Mac is simply a horrible waste of money that's good for content creation (except for rendering) and not a whole lot else.

 

[Formata]

If you want to run PC games a very high/ultra settings, iMacs have really struggled in the past. The main issue being, essentially they have a laptop GPU that is trying to push graphics on the large resolution screens iMacs come with as opposed to a smaller laptop screen that the GPU was designed for (That's just my opinion). The latest generation are probably the best equip to game than iMacs have ever been with the latest nVidia GPUs. For gaming... custom building a PC is the way to go for sure if your aim is to be playing with high details/settings at a high resolution. If you just want to be able to play the games and are happy with medium settings, an iMac is probably fine, but you are paying a lot for it.

When I needed a Mac for the industry I work in. I bought a 2 year old iMac off ebay for half the price, but I only use it for Adobe CS which runs fine, and because I love gaming on a PC, I keep my Windows machine upto date and sink my $ into that instead

 

[ArcticWonder]

Or you could upgrade from a Dell to a fully loaded homebuilt computer... And put the grand you save towards rent, or gas, or.....

 

[lt_dan_zsu]

I like what dark sable said. I just can't stand apple. they sell their products saying that they are better than the other ones. Why are they better? Because it's what smart people buy! In reality they don't. They sell you a dumbed down down more expensive versions of other products. Macs do have a very nice looking aluminum chassis though!

 

[envy14tpe]

I agree with everything that everyone has said but Mac does have that X factor that you can't compare apples to apples with (no pun intended). I've never owned a Mac but I am tired of the same old windows OS and am willing to give it a try. I also like the simplicity that Apple gives.

I expected an anti-apple sentiment here on this forum. Which is fair. Being an electrical engineer, I understand both sides. I'll have to give this some thought. Now you all have me excited about doing a custom desktop build with a large monitor!

Apple does make beautiful computers and their monitors are phenomenal. I almost bought the iMac until I realized that I couldn't play games on it. The included GPU is not adequate for demanding games such as Battlefield 3, but its fine for Minecraft or Wow.

For $3000 you could create a $1000 desktop and buy a iMac. The iMac has an input, so I believe you could run your gaming PC through the Apple monitor.

 

[DarkSable]

^You could also just get a cheap, amazing quality monitor from Korea. They make ones that are even better than the iMac's screen. (Plus, the Retina display screens when used as just a screen have significant latency.)

 

[lt_dan_zsu]

^You could also just get a cheap, amazing quality monitor from Korea. They make ones that are even better than the iMac's screen. (Plus, the Retina display screens when used as just a screen have significant latency.)

I've looked at these monitors before, they looked amazing. According to this review, they beat the apple monitors, as he said.
http://www.overclock.net/t/1280755/review-tests-crossover-27q-led-p-pivot-edition-gallery-with-apple-cinema-display

 

[DarkSable]

They're bloody incredible. My school has iMacs, and a friend of mine has one of the pixel perfect 30" displays...

If I weren't so bloody addicted to gaming at 120Hz, I'd buy one of those monitors in an instant.

 

[envy14tpe]

I've looked at these monitors before, they looked amazing. According to this review, they beat the apple monitors, as he said.
http://www.overclock.net/t/1280755/review-tests-crossover-27q-led-p-pivot-edition-gallery-with-apple-cinema-display

Personally, I'd choose a Korean model or Dell. However, the OP seemed like he really wanted a mac and mac OS.
I must agree this wave of cheap Korean monitors is interesting.

 

[DarkSable]

So... Have the OP buy a macbook in all it's, erm, "glory"

And buy a real computer for when he wants to get stuff done?

(But seriously, OP... even if you end up buying a mac, TRY it first. Borrow a friends and try to do things that are easy in windows, like changing settings to personalize the computer, or messing with root files. Hell, you can make a perfect OSx UI environment in Windows by using mods other people have made already - so why cripple yourself by using an OS that won't let you do anything?)

 

[stephenz]

Thanks for the insight guys. I knew the iMac was incredibly overpriced before I posted but this thread got me thinking about other options.

I can build a solid gaming desktop, buy an iPad for taking notes at school, and still have some cash leftover. Now are you guys going to try to sway me away from the iPad?

 

[FinneousPJ]

Custom PC build is good.

Next, I'll sell you a Linux compatible tablet - if you're in electrical engineering (like me), you should enjoy the tinkering.

 

[stephenz]

Maybe instead of the 27" iMac screen I'll do a triple monitor setup!

Would I need 2 graphics card to run a triple monitor setup on my desk and power my 40" lcd tv across the room? I don't plan on running video on both at the same time.

 

[envy14tpe]

Thanks for the insight guys. I knew the iMac was incredibly overpriced before I posted but this thread got me thinking about other options.

I can build a solid gaming desktop, buy an iPad for taking notes at school, and still have some cash leftover. Now are you guys going to try to sway me away from the iPad?

i Macs are overpriced but they are great computers for some users. As for Apple, my girlfriend loves her iPad but I use a nexus 7. Very different styles. An iPad is still a good buy.

Build a desktop and walk around with an iPad.

 

[DarkSable]

Thanks for the insight guys. I knew the iMac was incredibly overpriced before I posted but this thread got me thinking about other options.

I can build a solid gaming desktop, buy an iPad for taking notes at school, and still have some cash leftover. Now are you guys going to try to sway me away from the iPad?

Yep! Actually, I'm not going to try to talk you out of the iPad, I'm going to try to talk you out of a tablet in general.

They're great for certain things, but have you ever tried to sustain typing (such as note-taking) on them? Even with a dinky little rubber keyboard it's an incredible pain. Consider something with a larger keyboard if you're going to be typing a lot; your hands will thank you.

 

[stephenz]

Yep! Actually, I'm not going to try to talk you out of the iPad, I'm going to try to talk you out of a tablet in general.

They're great for certain things, but have you ever tried to sustain typing (such as note-taking) on them? Even with a dinky little rubber keyboard it's an incredible pain. Consider something with a larger keyboard if you're going to be typing a lot; your hands will thank you.

The plan is to get a stylus and write my notes on there.

 

[DarkSable]

Never tried that one, but my handwriting is so bad it wouldn't work out for me - I can barely read notes taken with pencil.

 

[squareff255]

I agree with everything that everyone has said but Mac does have that X factor that you can't compare apples to apples with (no pun intended). I've never owned a Mac but I am tired of the same old windows OS and am willing to give it a try. I also like the simplicity that Apple gives.

I expected an anti-apple sentiment here on this forum. Which is fair. Being an electrical engineer, I understand both sides. I'll have to give this some thought. Now you all have me excited about doing a custom desktop build with a large monitor!

With all due respect to everyone here... don't listen. haha I am a mac user. I have built PC's for years, I love them for gaming, but I use macs for my gaming (I install Windows side by side with Mac OS X) because I really can't stand Windows for anything else. Once you go Mac, you can never go back and people who have never really owned a Mac could never understand. They are more expensive for their beautiful, high-quality manufacturing and amazing OS. I'm getting the 27" iMac for gaming as well, and with the upgraded 2GB GTX 680MX graphics card, it can run any of today's games at max settings at about 60fps.

DO IT. YOU WON'T REGRET IT.