You would expect an iMac powered by the fast Core 2 couple chip useable to outperform iMacs with lesser clock upper . And that was sure the case when we ran our bench mark testing on Apple ’s build - to - social club iMac Core 2 Duo with a 2.33GHz processor — it easily beat its fellow Core 2 Duo models as well as an sr. Intel - base iMac track down on a 2GHz Core Duo microprocessor chip .
But what you might not expect is for that in high spirits - end consumer auto to gravel out a professional column powered by two dual - nucleus chips in Macworld Lab tests . Nevertheless , that ’s precisely what bump — the 2.33GHz iMac Core 2 Duo edged past the 2GHz Mac Pro . Granted , that ’s not the received Mac Pro configuration — that model comes with two 2.66GHz processors — but it ’s still impressive to see a dual - core consumer machine outperform a quadruplet - core desktop purpose at professionals .
As mentioned in our first rung of iMac psychometric test , we received the recently updated iMac Core 2 duette line in stages . Our initial examination covered the 17 - column inch , 2GHz iMac and the 20 - column inch , 2.16GHz model . This clip around , we ’re concentrating on the 24 - inch iMacs — an off - the - ledge model that ships with a 2.16GHz Intel Core 2 Duo processor , a 250 GB unvoiced drive , and an NVIDIA GeForce 7300GT computer graphic bill of fare with 128 MB of memory , and a 2nd built - to - order configuration sport a 2.33GHz Core 2 Duo C.P.U. , NVIDIA GeForce 7600 GT artwork card with 256 megabit of memory , and twice the hard effort capacity of the stock 24 - column inch iMac .
With a Speedmark grade of 259 , the beefed up iMac ( with 8 pct quicker processing cores ) was 6 percent faster than the standard contour 24 - column inch iMac . More telling , it was about 2 per centum faster than the quadriceps femoris - pith 2GHz Mac Pro inMacworld ’s overall system public presentation benchmark . concede , the clock focal ratio of the optional Core 2 Duo is well faster than the Xeon , but doing the mathematics : the iMac ’s 4.6GHz of processing force versus the 8GHz of processing exponent on the Mac Pro , give the Mac Pro with a 74 - percent theoretical speed advantage . The tryout do not argue that the higher - close screen background is always exploit that reward .
Core 2 Duo iMac Benchmarks
Best results inbold . address system initalics . * denotes build - to - order model with upgraded video recording circuit card
Speedmark 4.5 scores are relative to those of a 1.25GHz Mac miniskirt , which is assigned a score of 100 . Adobe Photoshop , Cinema 4D XL , iMovie , iTunes , and Finder scores are in minutes : second . All systems were run Mac OS X 10.4.7 with 1 GB of RAM , with central processor performance set up to Highest in the Energy Saver orientation pane when applicable . The Photoshop Suite trial run is a set of 14 written job using a 50 MB single file . Photoshop ’s memory board was set to 70 percent and History was jell to Minimum . We record how long it took to render a vista in Cinema 4D XL . We used Compressor to encode a 6minute:26second DV file using the videodisc : Fastest Encode 120 minutes – 4:3 scope . In iMovie , we apply the senior video effect to a 1 - minute movie . We converted 45 minutes of AAC audio single file to MP3 using iTunes ’ High Quality setting . We used Unreal Tournament 2004 ’s Antalus Botmatch average - frames - per - second score ; we test at a resolution of 1,024 - by-768 pixels at the Maximum scene with both sound and graphics enabled . We produce a Zip archive in the Finder from a 1 GB folder.—Macworld Lab testing by James Galbraith and Jerry Jung
As common , the applications most practiced at using multiple processors privilege the quad - core Mac Pro . Our Cinema4D render trial showed the low - conclusion Mac Pro terminate the project 35 percent faster than the build - to - order iMac . Our Aperture tests result , break out below , show the Mac Pro to be 30 percent quicker exporting RAW file cabinet as JPEGs , and our Compressor MPEG2 encoding test shows the quad - core system beating this fastest iMac by 35 percent .
Aperture and Unreal Tournament Tests
All systems were lead Mac OS X 10.4.7 with 1 GB of RAM . We used Unreal Tournament 2004 ’s Antalus Botmatch middling - frames - per - second account ; we tested at a resolve of 1,680 - by-1,050 pixels at the Maximum context with both audio and graphic enabled . We put down the prison term it took to import 30 RAW single file into Aperture and then export them as JPEGs.—Macworld Lab testing by James Galbraith and Jerry Jung
But these mental test are in the minority . Many applications , like iMovie , iTunes , Photoshop , and Microsoft Office — not to refer job most folks spend the 24-hour interval running on their Macs , like Christian Bible processing , spreadsheets , internet browse , and 3 - D game — are either not as CPU - intensive or are less savvy when it comes to multiprocessing . Thus , the iMac Core 2 Duo ’s quicker clock amphetamine trump the multiple Xeons found in the 2GHz Mac Pro .
The custom iMac also include higher - end graphics card than the standard 24 - inch model , a $ 125 choice that reduplicate the amount of computer graphic remembering and moves from an NVIDIA GeForce 7300GT to a GeForce 7600GT . When lead artificial Tournament at 1,024 - by-768 resolve , the number of frames the custom system was able-bodied to exhibit was bully than the standard iMac , but not stunning . Boosting the resolution to the aboriginal full resolving of the 20 - column inch iMacs ( 1,680 - by-1,050 picture element ) showed the benefit of using the faster , more remembering - laden card . The standard configuration ’s frame rate dropped by 20 flesh per instant at the higher resolution , the custom iMac slowed down by only 6 figure per second .
We ’ll have review of the entire iMac Core 2 Duo line in the come up days .
[ James Galbraith is Macworld Lab conductor . ]
