[damianslame]

So I am at a stand still I am strongly considering selling my Mac Pro 1,1 and upgrading to a iMac 27" i7.

I think the big problem is that I just recently sold my 30" Cinema display and I am now using a 83% color gamut Dell Monitor as my main. Needless to say the colors are not that amazing.

So I am at this stand point. Get the Big Display with new Hardware
or
Keep the older box, somehow upgrade its insides and get a new Monitor.

Mac Pro
2x 3.0 Xeon Dual-Core
10GB DDR2 RAM
2TB of storage
ATI HD 4870

Displays:
DELL P2310H
LG L246WP

vs

iMac i7 2.8 Quad
8GB DDR3 RAM
1TB Storage

Anyone have any suggestions?

I was looking at the U2410 Dell 24" for my main display.

[P]

Unless you're allergic to glossy screens or all in ones, pick the iMac.

[Simon]

The Dell U2410 should be a very decent screen. Apart from an LED backlight it has pretty much everything you'd want.

In terms of performance the iMac can't be considered an upgrade compared to the expensive MP you already have. Let alone match the amount of RAM you use. The cost of that iMac is $2400 which is many times more than what that Dell screen will cost (~$500). You shouldn't spend $1900 on something that doesn't deliver substantially better performance (and actually removes expandability!).

Bottom line, get a new screen for cheap now. Don't throw out your MP until the iMac can actually beat it by a good margin. Once that happens you can still ask yourself if an AIO can sufficiently replace your MP.

[ddiokno]

Great post... I, too, was wondering what the performance difference would be. More specifically, how does the Xeon dual core 3.0 compare to the i7 when using handbrake to rip movies for an iPod? Are the speeds comparable or does one have a very big advantage? What about the real world feel across the OS and other applications? I've read many of the different posts and articles comparing the new Nehalem Mac Pro to the iMac i7, but haven't really seen anything comparing the new iMacs to the Woodcrest based Mac Pros...
Thanks!
david

[Eug]

The Mac Pro may become more attractive in 2010 Q1 if you can wait that long.

[Simon]

Originally Posted by Eug 

The Mac Pro may become more attractive in 2010 Q1 if you can wait that long.

Umm, the OP already has a MP. He's not asking about how the current MP does or about buying a new MP. He wants to know how his old quad-core 3 GHz MP (dual dual-cores) will do against a new i7 iMac.

The answer to that is quite simple. Even though the MP is already quite old, the just released iMac won't be dramatically better in anything. It will win a bench here and there, and the MP will beat it at others. Overall it's going to be fairly similar. If somebody already has such a MP in use and is wondering if spending $2500 on a new iMac will offer a huge performance benefit the answer is clearly no.

[P]

Originally Posted by ddiokno 

Great post... I, too, was wondering what the performance difference would be. More specifically, how does the Xeon dual core 3.0 compare to the i7 when using handbrake to rip movies for an iPod? Are the speeds comparable or does one have a very big advantage?

Core i7 will win by a significant margin. I can't find a test of your exact config against Core i7, but this page might be interesting. The Core i7 860 beats the Q9650 (3 GHz Penryn quadcore), but the Q9650 would likely beat your Xeons as it supports SSE4.1, which will improve encoding efficiency, and uses plain ol' DDR2 rather than the high-latency FB-DIMM.

Originally Posted by ddiokno 

What about the real world feel across the OS and other applications?

The iMac should win, as it has a much lower memory latency, but HD performance plays a bigger role than you'd think.

Originally Posted by Simon

In terms of performance the iMac can't be considered an upgrade compared to the expensive MP you already have.

It's a massive upgrade on CPU performance. Those are Woodcrests, not Wolfdales, and that is FB-DIMMs it uses. If it really is just a question of $500 against $2200, then OK, but that's not how I read it. Do you already have the Radeon 4870, for instance? Also remember that the older MP is not worth 0$ today. Estimates have it at $1500-$2000 still, and that's with the default GPU.

Unless expandability is a must, upgrade to an i7 iMac. Video encoding is one area where the i7 shines.

[Simon]

P, I know you have an iMac on order and I understand that you're excited. But you're not helping the OP by being partial, no offense. Let's get real here. We are talking four 3 GHz Woodcrest cores against four 2.8 GHz Lynnfield cores. Performance there will be similar, give or take 20% here and there. Bottom line a slight advantage on the iMac's side thanks mainly to SSE improvements. But then there's a real desktop 4870 vs. a mobile (read crippled) 4850, 10 GB vs. 8 GB RAM, tons of expandability vs. none at all, etc. and all of this for an extra $2000. You'd have to be nuts to spend that much money on so little.

Had the OP asked if he should get an i7 iMac or buy a quad MP it would clearly be the iMac. But since the OP is asking if he should scrap his MP and instead spend $2500 on an iMac the rational answer is clearly no. Not until the iMac can offer substantially better performance than his MP. And that will be the next iMac at the earliest. Most probably it actually won't be the case for at least another two generations of iMacs (Sandy Bridge).

[Eug]

Originally Posted by Simon 

Umm, the OP already has a MP. He's not asking about how the current MP does or about buying a new MP. He wants to know how his old quad-core 3 GHz MP (dual dual-cores) will do against a new i7 iMac.

The answer to that is quite simple. Even though the MP is already quite old, the just released iMac won't be dramatically better in anything. It will win a bench here and there, and the MP will beat it at others. Overall it's going to be fairly similar. If somebody already has such a MP in use and is wondering if spending $2500 on a new iMac will offer a huge performance benefit the answer is clearly no.

Come 2010, a new Mac Pro might be a significant upgrade to what he has now, and a significant upgrade over the iMac.

And it wouldn't be that hard to sell the old Mac Pro.

[P]

Originally Posted by Simon 

P, I know you have an iMac on order and I understand that you're excited. But you're not helping the OP by being partial, no offense.

That has nothing to do with it. I might as well say that you're recommending the MP because you're biased against all-in-ones.

Originally Posted by Simon 

Let's get real here. We are talking four 3 GHz Woodcrest cores against four 2.8 GHz Lynnfield cores. Performance there will be similar, give or take 20% here and there. Bottom line a slight advantage on the iMac's side thanks mainly to SSE improvements.

Similar? Nehalem is a monster. Apple's comparison page is between 8 core Yorkfield MPs with a slight clockspeed advantage and the current batch 8 core. I has only one test where the advantage is as low as 20%, and all the synthetic tests are more than twice as fast - and this is Yorkfield, not Woodcrest. Yorkfield has all the relevant SSE4 optimizations, so Woodcrest would be worse, clock for clock. No, the test is far from an exact analogue, but 20% here or there, from SSE4? The main advantage is the memory latency dropping from the insanely high levels of FB-DIMMs and down to the market leading levels of Lynnfield.

Originally Posted by Simon 

But then there's a real desktop 4870 vs. a mobile (read crippled) 4850, 10 GB vs. 8 GB RAM, tons of expandability vs. none at all, etc. and all of this for an extra $2000. You'd have to be nuts to spend that much money on so little.

Of course it's not worth $2000, but it won't be a $2000 difference. You're counting as if he would be throwing the old MP into a landfill. The base model, with 2.8 GHz quad and a Geforce 7300, is estimated at $1500-2000 still. I'd argue that it's not worth that, but those are the prices you get when you search for it. His model has a faster processor than the base, and that Radeon 4870 is still $350 alone from Apple. I'd take the chance to sell that thing right away, before someone realizes what a silly price that is.

Originally Posted by Simon 

Had the OP asked if he should get an i7 iMac or buy a quad MP it would clearly be the iMac. But since the OP is asking if he should scrap his MP and instead spend $2500 on an iMac the rational answer is clearly no. Not until the iMac can offer substantially better performance than his MP. And that will be the next iMac at the earliest. Most probably it actually won't be the case for at least another two generations of iMacs (Sandy Bridge).

This is the biggest CPU performance boost we get until Haswell at least. Sandy Bridge is all about bringing Nehalem TDPs down and finally integrating the GPU onto the CPU die. Yes, Sandy Bridge will have some vector instructions that will be useful in the long run, but if you're looking for something on the level of the integrated memory controller or even hyperthreading, something to massively accelerate existing code, Sandy Bridge won't be it.

[Simon]

Originally Posted by P 

I might as well say that you're recommending the MP because you're biased against all-in-ones.

Which is complete nonsense considering I have two AIOs on my desk right now. These are iMacs I actually ordered myself and use regularly.

And with that I think we're done.

[Simon]

Originally Posted by Eug 

Come 2010, a new Mac Pro might be a significant upgrade to what he has now, and a significant upgrade over the iMac.

And it wouldn't be that hard to sell the old Mac Pro.

I fully agree. Right now he can spend a lot of money on a minor update at best and in the process sacrifice his GPU, RAM, and pro expandability, or he can wait until the MP gets an update. He loses nothing by waiting. If the new MP offers a decent price-performance ratio he can compare that to the current iMac. If not he can still wait until an iMac comes along that actually kills his MP. But jumping the gun now and spending a lot of money on only minute improvements just doesn't make sense. Especially not with an expensive MP.

[P]

You just said that you think that the next iMac that beats the current one will be one with Sandy Bridge, which will be here fall 2011. That MP will be 5 years old by then. That's your choice?

And sure, the Gulftown MP might be a great deal - too bad that wasn't an option in the question. It's a risk waiting for it, because a good low-end MP would drop the price of that old MP like a rock, but I don't think such a model is coming. It's probably no big risk. Put another way: saving the money for a better deal is a fine option. Spending it upgrading a Woodcrest MP is insane.

Which is complete nonsense considering I have two AIOs on my desk right now. These are iMacs I actually ordered myself and use regularly.

No less so than your argument. I picked that model because reading benchmarks and the future Intel roadmap, I'm convinced that this is the perfect time to buy to get good performance for a long time. I would have loved a better GPU, but then it outpaces all consoles by a mile, and that's what the games are developed for anyway. An SSD would have been ideal, but I can squeeze one in later if I feel like it. Obviously this means that I think that this is a great opportunity to buy, but the iMac isn't great because I just ordered mine: I ordered one because the current model is great.

If you look around the Internet, you can find benches comparing Nehalem to Penryn in every single configuration you can imagine. They've been doing them for a year, so there's a lot out there by now. Look around a bit, and you'll see why I picked this one - and why I was so royally pissed off about the quad MP when I saw the price.

[JCP21]

Imac i dont need to say anymore, the imac is currently better the MBP and i see it staying as that!

[Simon]

Originally Posted by JCP21 

Imac i dont need to say anymore, the imac is currently better the MBP and i see it staying as that!

What does the MBP have to do with any of this??? The OP asked about his old MP vs. a new iMac.

[damianslame]

I would like to say. THANK YOU ALL.

For your advice. I am thinking I will go with the 24" Dell unless someone could offer a better display with high color accuracy.

I realized that Christmas is coming and that money can be better spent elsewhere.

For the record. If I had the spare cash I would just buy the 27" and keep the MP as a spare.

Dont get to upset. But part of the big reason for my thought in change was

A: Big Display
B: My MacPro cannot install 64bit Windows7 xD

Thanks Again.

[P]

Best of luck with your choice - a new display always comes in handy, and that model is an IPS one that also accepts DisplayPort in - might be handy down the line. Just don't spend cent upgrading that MP.

[mr. burns]

U2410 is dell's 24" IPS display which uses a good panel. it's the same panel that's in the HP LP2475w, which has gotten good reviews.

i have a mac pro 1,1. i run 64-bit win7 fine.

[justmetoo]

Originally Posted by damianslame 

...But part of the big reason for my thought in change was
B: My MacPro cannot install 64bit Windows7 xD

Couldn't be further from the truth, read some posts lad, lots of Mac Pro 1.1 owners are running Win7 x64... It may not be 'officially supported' but this community never puts up with that crap, there IS a work around and it works well.

[Peetah]

Okay...

Beyond speed, ram and monitor you should consider wether or not you use the 4 drive bays in the Mac Pro. I have the same model as you. I like the new iMac 27 i7 and would consider it, but I have a mirror raid and business critical information on my Mac. I can't afford the downtime of a failed drive, even though I also have a MacBook as backup. I currently use 3 bays. One for the mirror raid, one backup and then I have an offsite backup as well. Just something to consder

[Eug]

That was a consideration for me too, although I know some people who use RAIDed external drives for stuff that isn't super dependent on drive speed.

[damianslame]

I went ahead and created a Raid for my main HD and did a clean install of SnowLep so its somewhat faster.

I am getting the 24' dell and waiting it out to get the 27" when ether I have the cash or they upgrade it. I would hate to be stuck with that 4870 for the rest of the computers life.

I thought about it and I do use all of the drive bays.

I have one for storage 1.5TB (that I dont really want to go external)
I have one for Windows (Raptor Drive)
And two for the new Raid.

I would rather have this Pro around for a while longer. It still pulls a lot of weight.

[richardh99]

I'm running a Dell U2410 as the second monitor on my new i7 iMac. Both hardware calibrated (Spyder Pro) and set to matching (near as dammit) luminosity. Up until Friday last, I'd been very impressed indeed with the U2410 and rather worried that I wouldn't get on with the glossy screen on the iMac. Silly me. The 27" iMac screen makes the Dell look grainy and grubby - it is, hands down, the finest screen I have used for long enough to usefully comment on. With the backlight set low enough, it's very easy on the eyes and just great for Aperture - I use the dell for the catalogue and the iMac for the edits.

Richard

[cgc]

Barefeats just did a comparison between iMac i7 and some other Macs...that iMac is fast.

[Simon]

Originally Posted by richardh99 

I'm running a Dell U2410 as the second monitor on my new i7 iMac. Both hardware calibrated (Spyder Pro) and set to matching (near as dammit) luminosity. Up until Friday last, I'd been very impressed indeed with the U2410 and rather worried that I wouldn't get on with the glossy screen on the iMac. Silly me. The 27" iMac screen makes the Dell look grainy and grubby - it is, hands down, the finest screen I have used for long enough to usefully comment on. With the backlight set low enough, it's very easy on the eyes and just great for Aperture - I use the dell for the catalogue and the iMac for the edits.

This bodes very well for the iMac's screen. The U2410 has an excellent reputation so far. I would definitely consider it to replace my old 23" ACD once it breaks down. The one serious disadvantage with the U2410 is that it doesn't come with an LED backlight. It has a good CCFL backlight, but no matter how well that's engineered, it will never be quite as good as the even and instant-on backlighting you get with an LED display. And the iMac of course comes with one (as every modern Apple screen). Also, your new iMac has a higher resolution (ppi) than the U2410 which can make it appear more crisp. Anyway, it sounds like the iMac's display is working well for you. Good to hear.

[Todd Madson]

One other thing I'd add months later that isn't immediately obvious: the 27" iMac's 27" display can be used as a DISPLAY for other computers when it becomes obsolete. I understand that this is the only iMac that can be used for those purpose.

I agree, this display is off the wall insanity. The brightness, clarity and color gamut is sick. It's right next to my 23"
Acer LCD connected to my PowerMac G5 (still with us) and it seems a bit drab and blurry by comparison.

[P]

Age hurts CCFL backlights - that 23" was likely a lot better when it was new - but I agree that the 27" iMac display is awesome. It's the best computer display I've seen.

While it's correct that the 27" iMac can be used as an external display, note that

a) the computer needs to be on and fully powered up to do that
b) it supports a very limited set of resolutions. As far as I know, it's only 1280*720 and 2560*1440.

[tooki]

re: b):
OK, but so what? If you’re using it with a computer, what motivation would you have to run it at anything other than the maximum resolution?

[P]

Getting it booted in Windows before installing graphics drivers? Windows only supports a very limited set of standard resolutions (640*480, 800*600 and usually 1024*768), and as far as I can tell, the iMac has none of those resolutions. You'd need a second monitor, a slipstreamed install disc or some fancy HD swapping to fix.

[Big Mac]

You mean the iMac's screen isn't capable of dropping down to very low resolutions?

[P]

Yes, that's what I mean (when used an external monitor). I haven't tested, but the Internet seems to think so.