[wetstuff]

I'm looking at refurb iMacs. I upgrade about every two/three years. I started with refurbs long ago and never felt screwed or needed to return one. I started my iMacs with a Bondi Blue and still have a Classic II from the late-80s.

I want to bump up to 27" this time from this 21", 2.2 Intel Duo, but there are two mid-range machines for the same price?! The 3.2 is Intel i3 and the 3.3 is Intel Duo. How do you find out the difference? ...is one processor better for X tasks vs the other? Maybe you had to plow this ground already... Thanks.

Jim
Salisbury MD

[ghporter]

Go with the i3. It's an evolutionary step up from all of the Core Duo processors. The difference in processor speed will be completely irrelevant, because the i3 is more efficient.

[CIA]

Refurbs from Apple are great, I've bought a ton over the years, and only recommend them to friends when they are in the market for a mac. The _only_ issue I've ever had was a refurb Airport Extreme base station, and Apple replaced it quickly for free. All the actual computers I've bought have worked great for years without fail.


Anyway, get the i3. Hands down a better performing machine.

[Vindicator]

Instead of the 27" Core i3 at $1439, you might consider spending $90 more and getting the previous generation Core i5 at $1529.00. The ATI 4850 graphics are still very good versus the 5750 and it will probably be 3+ years before a reasonably priced SSD is available to go in the Core i3. Absolutely, positively don't get the 3.33GHz Core2 Duo. The 4670 graphics alone make it a horrible choice for anyone getting a 27" iMac.

[wetstuff]

Thanks all .. I had a few minutes to do a little digging, and it appears the GHz is not the only measure... but then my personal chip set overheats when I start reading things like:

"Another significant performance difference is how the Core i7 and Core i5 products will be handling hyper-threading. Hyper-threading is a technology used by Intel to simulate more cores than actually exist on the processor. While Core i7 products have all been quad-cores, they appear in Windows as having eight cores. This further improves performance when using programs that make good use of multi-threading." (I gather this may mean Photoshop..)

It takes me some time to actually pull the trigger .. I'll let youall know what/why. Thanks.

Jim

[Big Mac]

Core i7 is the top of the line consumer Intel chip series for now. Don't worry if you can't understand HyperThreading. Just know that if performance is really important to you you'll probably want to spring for the i7, but the i5 model is not far behind it.

[P]

Hyperthreading means that a processor with 2 cores can act like if it were for 4 (and 4 cores like 8, etc). If you have 2 cores of 1 GHz, they can act like they were 4 cores at 600-650 MHz - say. It's the main boost clock-for-clock between the Core 2 and the Core i3.

The biggest performance boost is between dualcore (Core i3 and Core i5-600 series) and quadcore (Core i5 700 series and Core i7). If you can manage to find a model with the Core i5-750 (last gen model), do it. You will not regret it. The Core i7-860 is a minor boost on top of that (it basically adds some virtualization tricks and adds back Hyperthreading, but Hyperthreading is less useful if you already have 4 cores).

[Eug]

Too bad there's no quad-core 21.5" model.

Core i7 is awesome (I have it), but I'm not a big fan of the ergonomics of the 27" model. The chin really affects the height of the unit. It's 20.4" high, vs. the 17.75" high of the 21.5" model.