[Ozzpot]

I am thinking about buying my third Mac, and I am very tempted by the new iMac G5s now they have been upgraded. This is the one I am looking at:

� 17-inch widescreen LCD
� 2GHz PowerPC G5
� 667MHz frontside bus
� 512K L2 cache
� 1GB DDR400 SDRAM - Probably add another 1GB later.
� 160GB Serial ATA hard drive
� Slot-load 8x SuperDrive
� ATI Radeon 9600
� 128MB DDR video memory

I am not much of a Mac gamer, preferring to use my -Xbox/32" TV/couple of mates- setup for that stuff, but I have Unreal Tournament 2004 and Sim City 4 that I don't play much because my iBook G4 933, my best Mac, struggles to run them well. I would love to get back into them.

Will this new Mac be any good? I use the 1.6ghz model at work and I love it. I love the zen minimalism of an iMac, and I would not consider a PowerMac because of this (and also maybe the price).

I have �1000 to spend, and this one comes in at �1019 with my student discount. What do you think? What kind of performance can I expect from UT2004 for example?

Thanks.

[mac freak]

UT2004 will perform commendably, I'd say. You probably won't be best off running it at full res, but play around and you should find a satisfactory sweet spot.
SimCity 4 is slow on every platform, regardless of everything. It just bogs itself down. But it's still awesome, and there will be a VERY marked difference between this iMac and your iBook.

[Ozzpot]

Originally Posted by mac freak

UT2004 will perform commendably, I'd say. You probably won't be best off running it at full res, but play around and you should find a satisfactory sweet spot.
SimCity 4 is slow on every platform, regardless of everything. It just bogs itself down. But it's still awesome, and there will be a VERY marked difference between this iMac and your iBook.

Cool. Yeah when I first got UT2004 I was surprised how well it ran on my iBook (with settings at low to middle). It's actually not bad if I'm only playing 1on1 Deathmatches (my favourite), but even then the framerate can drop below 10.

Sim City runs awfully though. Almost unplayable. This and the lack of screen real-estate on a 1024x768 screen made me lose interest but I'd love to give it another go.

Thanks for your opinions.

[videian28]

Originally Posted by Ozzpot

I am thinking about buying my third Mac, and I am very tempted by the new iMac G5s now they have been upgraded. This is the one I am looking at:

� 17-inch widescreen LCD
� 2GHz PowerPC G5
� 667MHz frontside bus
� 512K L2 cache
� 1GB DDR400 SDRAM Probably add another 512MB later.
� 160GB Serial ATA hard drive
� Slot-load 8x SuperDrive
� ATI Radeon 9600
� 128MB DDR video memory

I am not much of a Mac gamer, preferring to use my -Xbox/32" TV/couple of mates- setup for that stuff, but I have Unreal Tournament 2004 and Sim City 4 that I don't play much because my iBook G4 933, my best Mac, struggles to run them well. I would love to get back into them.

Will this new Mac be any good? I use the 1.6ghz model at work and I love it. I love the zen minimalism of an iMac, and I would not consider a PowerMac because of this (and also maybe the price).

I have �1000 to spend, and this one comes in at �1019 with my student discount. What do you think? What kind of performance can I expect from UT2004 for example?

Thanks.

If I am not mistaken you must add ram in pairs for this machine, as you do on the powermac G5's so be prepared to dump both your 512 sticks =/

My brother in law got himself a 2.0ghz 17" iMac and when it arrives I will post WoW performance with 1g of ram

[Thorin]

Originally Posted by videian28

If I am not mistaken you must add ram in pairs for this machine, as you do on the powermac G5's so be prepared to dump both your 512 sticks =/

I'm fairly sure that's not true. If you look at Crucial's Website and look up the Power Mac and iMac G5's, it suggests you buy sticks for the Power Mac in pairs, but the iMac in single sticks. I think you can just throw extra RAM into the iMac without worrying about pairing it up.

[trip]

Originally Posted by Thorin

I'm fairly sure that's not true. If you look at Crucial's Website and look up the Power Mac and iMac G5's, it suggests you buy sticks for the Power Mac in pairs, but the iMac in single sticks. I think you can just throw extra RAM into the iMac without worrying about pairing it up.

Correct: refer to this posting http://forums.macnn.com/showthread.php?t=253681

[videian28]

good to hear

[Pierre B.]

Instead of starting a new thread, I will ask it here: does anyone know how well the new iMac 20" will perform with somewhat older games like RtCW? Will it possible to run it with all settings max at native resolution and stil have decent performance?

[Ozzpot]

Having very little to do at work today, I just installed UT2004 + latest patch + communtiy bonus pack on my office iMac. (RevA - G5 1.6ghz, 512mb RAM, FX5200 64mb VRAM).

I only set it up and played quickly, because I am having to be discreet here and half the office can see my screen, but I threw all the settings to the MAXIMUM (although I could only do a max 1024x768 resolution ).

Anyway, at these settings it played like a dream. I would estimate 30-40fps, (Deathmatch, medium sized map, 3 bots).

I can't wait to try it on my dream system (G5 2.0ghz, 2gb RAM, 128mb VRAM).
With 25% more CPU, quadruple the RAM and double the VRAM, I can see this being a very very good machine for my gaming needs. I just hope SimCity 4 is equally as impressive!

[videian28]

no one run WoW on a new iMac yet?

my bother in law is still waiting for his to be delivered (freakin taking forever)

[videian28]

well he got it yesterday

there is no reason at all to worry about playing wow on a 17" new iMac

looked good with good framerates, everything maxed except farclip (that brings every system to it's knees) only thing not turned on was full screen bloom, that drops any system by 10fps (mine included)


not to shabby at all, he is very happy with his first mac!

he tried it at 512mb and 1gb, both worked well

hell I am thinking of selling my monster Mac and going to one of these

[Powerbook]

* p u m b *

I was hoping of more iMac gamers???

PB.