I'm trying to evaluate a purchase but am having trouble finding apples-to-apples performance comparisons for these two machines. A year and and many details separate them. Are there any common benchmarks that consider disk and graphics performance? Which is preferable for software development (dual-head, but otherwise light on the GPU)?
Mac Pro (2006) [Detailed specs]
- Two dual-core Xeon processors at 2.66GHz (1.33GHz bus)
- 3GB RAM
- NVIDIA GeForce 7300 GT with 256 MB RAM
iMac (2007) [Detailed specs]
- Core 2 Duo (obviously dual-core) at 2.4GHz (800MHz bus)
- 3GB RAM
- ATI Radeon 2600 with 256 MB RAM
Both machines have their original hard drives (SATA).
Thanks in advance for your input.
Best Answer
Your question is somewhat difficult to answer, because not all is based upon “raw” performance.
I’d say that it would be better if you consider the following differences:
RAM
HARD DRIVES
Video
RAM Speed, Bus Speed, etc
All these things don’t really change your day to day workflow, yes, some Front Side Buses are faster than others, but in the end, the difference is probably not a decision factor. (given similar specs of course).
Connectivity
So which one do I chose?
The answer is, there’s no answer. You have to evaluate your priorities. I wouldn’t change my Mac Pro (early 2008) for a new iMac, because I already have two 27’’ screens, already have 4 drives in there (with some RAID going on) + an SSD for the OS and I have replaced the stock video card (NVIDIA) with an ATI (because my nVidia Failed and the ATI costed the same as the out of warranty nVIdia). My Mac Pro is going to turn 3 years soon and it works fantastically.
The iMac on the other hand, is a beautiful looking machine that if you use paired with a lot of BlueTooth stuff, makes your desk look very pristine. Sadly, I need storage, redundancy and multi-core for some of the things I do for a living, so the 8 cores of my Mac Pro are needed in my case.
I notice that the MultiCore is godsend sometimes, you see processes hanging there at 100% and the rest of the CPUs and cores take care. But of course, a normal World of Warcraft user wouldn’t even use 5% of all that.
I suggest you visit Anandtech’s Mac section if you want some benchmarks and reviews. It’s usually filled with good impressions and comments and sometimes comparisons. I don’t know if you’ll find an exact comparison between those two models, but you might come up with something similar.
My Personal Opinion
Get the Mac Pro if you’re going to develop and already have screens (or the budget to buy them), because in the future, when you want your time machine, your drive cloned, more space, etc., the Mac Pro is going to be much more helpful than stacking fragile external Firewire/USB drives.
UPDATE ON VIDEO
According to the experts (tegeril), the “ATI 2600 Pro is a substantially superior card to the Nvidia 7300GT”. You’ll have to find some benchmarking for that and of course evaluate if you’re going to need the extra power or the expandability is better.