iMac Graphics card question

[bryantlc]

I have been waiting since March for the iMac refresh and will be buying an iMac on August 7 no matter what.

My question is: If the only two games I want to play on my iMac is WOW and Starcraft II will I be ok with The ATI Radeon X1600 256MB?

 

[BlizzardBomb]

Nothing is set in stone on Starcraft II requirements, but yes it plays WoW nicely and should play Starcraft II on at least low settings.

 

[hob]

I wouldn't buy an iMac on August 7th "no matter what" - you can smell the updates are imminent, just wait a while longer. it'll be worth it

 

[bryantlc]

The updates have been imminent since May. Since I will not be playing anything besides those two games and have not had a working computer since March I am going to pull the trigger soon.

 

[topgunn]

Perhaps you could swing the 24" w/ the 7600GT?

 

[Haoshiro]

I have the 256MB X1600 and I will be very surprised if that doesn't play SC2 just fine.

Obviously the 7600GT is much better, but the X1600 does very well. I play UT2K4 @ 1280x800 with every setting maxed out and get 100+ fps.

Blizzard's games rarely demand the latest machines (PC or Mac) to play well.

That said, I agree, these updates will happen soon and I think it would pay off to wait for it - you'll probably be disappointed if you don't.

 

[Antares]

The X1600 will likely run Starcraft 2 very well. I would be shocked if it didn't.

 

[maccompaq]

The new iMacs are almost here, and they will be awesome!

 

[bryantlc]

The thing is, is that no one here knows when they are coming. If they come out on August 7th we should be hearing some more rumor rumblings but everything is quiet.

 

[r-o-b]

Diablo 2

I have a similar question concerning Diablo 2 on an ATI x1600 256MB iMac. The game runs fine as long as I don’t try to configure it to run with OpenGL. The only reason I want this option to work is so that I can have the ‘Perspective’ option turned on. Any suggestions on what I can do?

 

[DoFoT9]

u will b fine with the x1600.....

u will b even better off with the new and improved imacs on the 7th!!!!!!

 

[Eric5h5]

Any suggestions on what I can do?

Wait for Blizzard to issue a bugfix.

--Eric

 

[harveypooka]

I have been waiting since March for the iMac refresh and will be buying an iMac on August 7 no matter what.

My question is: If the only two games I want to play on my iMac is WOW and Starcraft II will I be ok with The ATI Radeon X1600 256MB?

Hang on! Check the Buyers Guide for more information.

 

[~Shard~]

Apple is holding a Mac-related event on August 7th. That is fact, not rumor. So wait at least until then. If there are no iMac updates announced, then buy since you really need a new machine. If new ones are announced, then buy a new one and hope that the shipping times won't be too terribly long!

As for WoW and SC2, WoW shouldn't be a problem. As for SC2, I doubt it would be either, but no one knows when SC2 will be released. Its system requirements will no doubt be releatively modest when it is released, but modest requirements now versus modest requirements 2 years from now are completely different matters i.e. the average video card a year from now is closer to a high-end card today. What I'm getting at is that SC2 could be released this Xmas or late 2008, we simply don't know yet.

All that being said, I should hope that the current offering is good enough for SC2 as I don't see it being a demanding system hog of a game, but we won't know until more details are released.

 

[pcorajr]

I have been waiting since March for the iMac refresh and will be buying an iMac on August 7 no matter what.

My question is: If the only two games I want to play on my iMac is WOW and Starcraft II will I be ok with The ATI Radeon X1600 256MB?

We are on the same boat my friend. I want to play the same games, and I have the same problem, my current computer (PC with Vista) is about to bite the dust. I have been waiting since march for an update. I am hoping that they do come out with an update on the 7th.

The main differance is that i am going for the 24" with the 7600GT. This card is way better than the ATI cards. So i would suggest going with the 24" and that card if you can afford it.

 

[Anonymous Freak]

I wouldn't buy an iMac on August 7th "no matter what" - you can smell the updates are imminent, just wait a while longer. it'll be worth it

Exactly. What if the announcement on August 7th is "258% faster iMacs, coming August 20th!"?

(If they went with desktop chips, and put in a quad-core, you could get a 3 GHz quad-core chip, which would have 257% more raw processing power than the current dual-core 2.33 GHz chip; not to mention a front side bus twice as fast, faster memory, and a newer video chip. I'm *REALLY* hoping they go for desktop Core 2 Duo/Quad chips on the iMac... Thin and light is nice and all, but I don't want to choose between a 'notebook on the desk' and the 'workstation' Mac Pro. I want a *REAL* desktop. Keep the mini for the 'thin and light' desktop.)

 

[FreedomFighter]

Hey guys I have a question,

I am looking to get a new Imac or mac pro now every one says the 7300 graphics card in the mac pros are crap and to stay away but the 7600 in the imac 24" are they any better?

 

[Mackilroy]

The 7600 GT cards in the iMac are indeed better than the 7300 GT in the Mac Pro.

 

[Hydra]

The 7600 GT cards in the iMac are indeed better than the 7300 GT in the Mac Pro.

Yep, the 7600 in iMac is also clocked nicely, should spank 8600 in the new macbook pro's with ease. I even saw some benches where it almost caught up with X1900 from mac pro.

I guess nVidia continues to deliver excellent performance with lower specced hardware. As in comparison X1600 and 7600 are more or less identical in specs but it's much faster. X1900 should be alot faster but doesn't seem to be the case.

I'd so fancy a quad core iMac with 24" screen and proper GPU with proper clocks.

I've been waiting to get to overclock my X1600 in OS X but nothing has happened so far, clocks nicely in WXP from what I've tested.

Here are some examples of the iMac's 7600 speed:
http://barefeats.com/santarosa.html
The 7300 seems to hang up with 8600 from new mbps and spanks even X1600 easily.

 

[Mackilroy]

It *does* seem that the x1900 beats the 7600 in newer games, though – witness Doom 3, where it scored nearly 40 frames per second faster, nearly double the FPS on Prey, and even more in Halo. (not that Halo is *that* new, but it's still more recent).

 

[Mac.Jnr]

Exactly. What if the announcement on August 7th is "258% faster iMacs, coming August 20th!"?

(If they went with desktop chips, and put in a quad-core, you could get a 3 GHz quad-core chip, which would have 257% more raw processing power than the current dual-core 2.33 GHz chip; not to mention a front side bus twice as fast, faster memory, and a newer video chip. I'm *REALLY* hoping they go for desktop Core 2 Duo/Quad chips on the iMac... Thin and light is nice and all, but I don't want to choose between a 'notebook on the desk' and the 'workstation' Mac Pro. I want a *REAL* desktop. Keep the mini for the 'thin and light' desktop.)

Yeah! Put 3Ghz Quad Core QX6850's and add about 1.5g's on the price!

 

[BornAgainMac]

Yep, the 7600 in iMac is also clocked nicely, should spank 8600 in the new macbook pro's with ease. I even saw some benches where it almost caught up with X1900 from mac pro.

I wish the Macbook Pro's had the 7600 instead of the slower 8600. I didn't realize the newer technology was slower. And it bet it was just to save a few dollars.

 

[BlizzardBomb]

I wish the Macbook Pro's had the 7600 instead of the slower 8600. I didn't realize the newer technology was slower. And it bet it was just to save a few dollars.

Actually, you're comparing the desktop 7600 GT with the mobile version of the 8600 GT. The desktop 8600 GT is actually better than the 7600 GT.

 

[Anonymous Freak]

Yeah! Put 3Ghz Quad Core QX6850's and add about 1.5g's on the price!

Well, carp. They didn't do it. (For $250, you can upgrade from mobile 2.4 GHz to mobile 'Extreme' 2.8 GHz, but that's it.) I would have liked the choice, though. (Wouldn't have been 1.5 kbucks, that's what the QX6850 alone costs, street price, Apple wouldn't pay that much, and would have reduced the 'upgrade' cost by some amount just because they don't have to include the slower proc. I found a QX6850 for just over $1000, and if you assume the upgrade would have been from the mid-high-end E6750, which costs about $200, then the upgrade cost would likely be $750-$800.)

It is interesting to note that Intel doesn't even *ADVERTISE* a 2.8 GHz mobile proc, though. The highest mobile Core 2 Duo is the X7800 at 2.6 GHz. So is this an overclocked X7800, or an unannounced X7900? (Just as the Mac Pro got an early-release quad-core 3.0 GHz chip, when the highest speed public release chip was 2.66 GHz.)

 

[harveypooka]

What a disappointing iMac refresh it was.

Games are not coming back to the Mac. They are coming to the Mac Pro...