imac 27' 675mx vs 775m

[robE]

Hello, I'm a bit in a dilemma and i hope you can shed some thoughts on it.
I have the opportunity to buy an used(~7 months, still in the first year warranty) 27' iMAC 2012 with 675mx at around ~1650$ or i could go after an refurbished 2013 iMAC with 775m at ~1950$. I didn't list the other specs because both are more or less the same...the differences in cpu perf are negligible.

What would you guys do? Does the 775m or 2013 model worth the extra 300$? It's very hard for me to decide because the both options have advantages and disadvantages, i guess 675mx is enough for my gaming needs but the 2012 model is getting outdated slowly where the 2013 model is newer and it's like a new machine with minor details like AC wifi(not that would matter much)

Thanks!

 

[TheStu]

What are you planning on doing with it?

If it's still under warranty, then you can take the savings on the 2012 model, and get AppleCare for it, extending the warranty to 3 years.

 

[Tegeril]

Do either of them have a SSD? The 2013 model would use the substantially speedier PCI-E connected SSDs. The 2013 has 802.11ac. And the 2013 has twice the video ram. It also looks like you'd be getting 200Mhz more speed base and turbo, and the newer model has AVX 2.0 support.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IMac_(Intel-based)#Slim_Unibody_iMac

-----

Also from: http://www.anandtech.com/show/7365/apple-updates-the-imac-haswell-cpus-pcie-ssds-80211ac-wifi

"The 775M, on the other hand, should be quite an upgrade compared to the 675MX in the previous gen. The 675MX had 960 CUDA cores running at 600MHz while the 775M has 1344 cores running at 719MHz. As the 775M is a brand new SKU, I couldn't find any benchmarks for it but given that the specs are very close to the 680M, the 775M should be about 30% faster than the 675MX."

 

[Tegeril]

If that wasn't clear, I'd say get the 2013 model.

 

[h9826790]

The 675M only have 1G VRAM, may be barely enough for the current game running in 2560x1440, but definitely not enough for future use, or some intensive games (e.g. X-plane).

In fact, if I were you, I will take the 2013 model. I am not sure will I get the i7 (because it's upgradable later on), but I will definitely go for the 780M 4G VRAM option. With that extra few hundred dollars, the graphic card should be good enough for next few years. And make all the money really worth spending.

From the new Mac Pro's architecture (Single CPU but dual GPU), Apple simply tells you that the future software will be more GPU demanding rather than CPU demanding. In fact, even though non-graphic apps like Safari can use up more than 1G of VRAM (if available) to improve performance.

Since the iMac's graphic card is basically non-upgradable (I know you can, but not easy at all, and almost guarantee that you will lost the boot screen), and it seems you can afford that extra $300. It's better to pay a bit extra money for a much longer lasting machine.

My estimate is the 675M may be good for the next 1-2 years (depends on what you need), but the 780M should able to last for 5 years. Of course, you can always choose to sell your iMac later and then pay some extra money to get abetter machine. If you prefer to change machine frequently. The 2012 iMac may be a good option for you.

 

[h9826790]

someone make a simple table to show the VRAM usage for his computer when playing games at 2560x1440.

http://forums.anandtech.com/showpost.php?p=36333372&postcount=24

Although the test result is for Windows, but the situation in OSX will be more or less the same (and your iMac is completely able to run Windows). As you can see, even though 2G VRAM is not quite enough for current game already. And none of them use less than 1G VRAM for best performance.

 

[Tegeril]

Getting a refurb with the 780m is tacking on another $300 to his purchase. When he was considering just the 675mx, I'd say that's probably above the interested-to-buy range. I'd go with the 2GB 775, as stated above.

 

[Don Vito Corleone]

FYI, there are some very good deals on late 2012 iMacs at the moment. I bought this nicely-equipped machine, complete with 675MX, for $1384 - http://www.macmall.com/p/Apple-iMac/...80~pdp.iaebhbb It doesn't have a Fusion drive, which I would probably insist on for my personal machine, but this was for work. So far I have been very happy with it.