The Notebook Review forums were hosted by TechTarget, who shut down them down on January 31, 2022. This static read-only archive was pulled by NBR forum users between January 20 and January 31, 2022, in an effort to make sure that the valuable technical information that had been posted on the forums is preserved. For current discussions, many NBR forum users moved over to NotebookTalk.net after the shutdown.
Problems? See this thread at archive.org.

    Apple retina iMac

    Discussion in 'Gaming (Software and Graphics Cards)' started by Phase, Oct 16, 2014.

  1. Phase

    Phase Notebook Evangelist

    Reputations:
    7
    Messages:
    483
    Likes Received:
    100
    Trophy Points:
    56
    So apple just announced their 5k retina iMac with i7 at 4.0ghz and the amd r295x GPU for around 2500 dollars. That's a really good price. Do you guys Think by apple doing this, it'll drive pc makers to lower the costs of their 4k screens and gpus or what?
     
  2. HTWingNut

    HTWingNut Potato

    Reputations:
    21,580
    Messages:
    35,370
    Likes Received:
    9,878
    Trophy Points:
    931
    Nope. It's a Mac.

    I'm assuming you mean the R9 M295X chip? The GTX 970 and 980 beat the pants off it, and laptop systems can be bought with them for well under $2500 with 3K and 4k screens.


    For $2500 you can build an SLI GTX 970 desktop that will run circles around the R295X2.

    $700 2x 970 SLI
    $600 4k LCD
    $400 CPU
    $150 16GB RAM
    $200 Mobo
    $250 Case + PSU
    $100 Windows

    ~$2500 and that's without any bargain shopping.
     
  3. maxheap

    maxheap caparison horus :)

    Reputations:
    1,244
    Messages:
    3,294
    Likes Received:
    191
    Trophy Points:
    131
    A vast majority of gaming is still done on windows machines. That settles the question.
     
  4. hfm

    hfm Notebook Prophet

    Reputations:
    2,264
    Messages:
    5,296
    Likes Received:
    3,049
    Trophy Points:
    431
    The $2499 config has a 2GB m290x, you need to add $250 to get the 4GB m295x
     
    alexhawker likes this.
  5. Phase

    Phase Notebook Evangelist

    Reputations:
    7
    Messages:
    483
    Likes Received:
    100
    Trophy Points:
    56
    yeah but how much is dells 5k monitor going for? im sure a 5k monitor with that much color depth and refresh rate would be around 2,000 or more by itself right?
     
  6. Mitlov

    Mitlov Shiny

    Reputations:
    2,681
    Messages:
    5,689
    Likes Received:
    909
    Trophy Points:
    281
    Even so, with a gaming PC hooked up to Dell's 5k monitor, you don't have to throw out monitor every time you want to upgrade the GPU. The sealed-system nature of the iMac is a really bad form factor for PC gaming. It has all the downsides of a gaming laptop without the portability benefits of being a laptop.
     
    killkenny1 likes this.
  7. hfm

    hfm Notebook Prophet

    Reputations:
    2,264
    Messages:
    5,296
    Likes Received:
    3,049
    Trophy Points:
    431
    If you love OS X and want to play games.. the new iMac with the m295x is pretty much your only option. 2nd place being if you can deal with the 750M in the 15" rMPB
     
  8. KCETech1

    KCETech1 Notebook Prophet

    Reputations:
    2,527
    Messages:
    4,112
    Likes Received:
    449
    Trophy Points:
    151
    what color depth .... its still an 8 bit panel, and the gamut looks to still be in the sRGB range.