Steve Jobs announced new iMacs on Tuesday and while I’m not sure I like the new enclosure, I do like the other improvements that come with the new iMacs like faster processors, more hard drive space, and the Santa Rosa chipset.
I thought I’d compare the performance of the latest 24-inch iMac against the previous generation of 24-inch iMacs using Geekbench 2. While I don't have any results for the 24-inch iMac with the [Core 2 Extreme](http://www.intel.com/products/processor/core2XE/index.htm) processor right now, I'll update this article once I receive results for the Core 2 Extreme processor. I’ve updated the article to include results for the 24-inch iMac with the Core 2 Extreme.
Setup
- iMac (24-inch Mid 2007) New
- Intel Core 2 Extreme @ 2.80GHz
- 2.00 GB 667 MHz DDR2 SDRAM
- Mac OS X 10.4.10 (Build 8R4031)
- iMac (24-inch Mid 2007)
- Intel Core 2 Duo @ 2.40GHz
- 2.00 GB 667 MHz DDR2 SDRAM
- Mac OS X 10.4.10 (Build 8R4031)
- iMac (24-inch)
- Intel Core 2 Duo @ 2.33GHz
- 2.00 GB 667 MHz DDR2 SDRAM
- Mac OS X 10.4.10 (Build 8R2218)
- iMac (24-inch)
- Intel Core 2 Duo @ 2.16GHz
- 2.00 GB 667 MHz DDR2 SDRAM
- Mac OS X 10.4.10 (Build 8R2218)
I’m reporting the baseline score, rather than the raw score, for each benchmark (where a score of 1000 is the score a Power Mac G5 1.6GHz would receive). Higher is better.
Results
Overall Performance
| iMac (24-inch Mid 2007) Core 2 Extreme @ 2.80GHz |
3791 | |
| iMac (24-inch Mid 2007) Core 2 Duo @ 2.40GHz |
3243 | |
| iMac (24-inch) Core 2 Duo @ 2.33GHz |
3049 | |
| iMac (24-inch) Core 2 Duo @ 2.16GHz |
2898 |
Integer Performance
| iMac (24-inch Mid 2007) Core 2 Extreme @ 2.80GHz |
3382 | |
| iMac (24-inch Mid 2007) Core 2 Duo @ 2.40GHz |
2862 | |
| iMac (24-inch) Core 2 Duo @ 2.33GHz |
2761 | |
| iMac (24-inch) Core 2 Duo @ 2.16GHz |
2549 |
Floating Point Performance
| iMac (24-inch Mid 2007) Core 2 Extreme @ 2.80GHz |
5356 | |
| iMac (24-inch Mid 2007) Core 2 Duo @ 2.40GHz |
4485 | |
| iMac (24-inch) Core 2 Duo @ 2.33GHz |
4340 | |
| iMac (24-inch) Core 2 Duo @ 2.16GHz |
4108 |
Memory Performance
| iMac (24-inch Mid 2007) Core 2 Extreme @ 2.80GHz |
2669 | |
| iMac (24-inch Mid 2007) Core 2 Duo @ 2.40GHz |
2402 | |
| iMac (24-inch) Core 2 Duo @ 2.33GHz |
2048 | |
| iMac (24-inch) Core 2 Duo @ 2.16GHz |
2060 |
Stream Performance
| iMac (24-inch Mid 2007) Core 2 Extreme @ 2.80GHz |
1998 | |
| iMac (24-inch Mid 2007) Core 2 Duo @ 2.40GHz |
1912 | |
| iMac (24-inch) Core 2 Duo @ 2.33GHz |
1548 | |
| iMac (24-inch) Core 2 Duo @ 2.16GHz |
1561 |
Conclusions
The latest 24-inch iMacs have two major advantages over the older 24-inch iMacs; they have faster processors, and they use the new Santa Rosa chipset (instead of the Napa chipset used in the older 24-inch iMacs).
The faster processor helps increase both integer and floating point performance, while the faster front-side bus on the Santa Rosa chipset helps increase both memory and stream performance.
So if you’re running memory-intensive applications (like Aperture or Photoshop) you’ll certainly notice an increase in performance with the new 24-inch iMac. Heck, the fact that the new 24-inch iMac supports 4GB of RAM while the old 24-inch iMac supports 3GB of RAM might be enough to convince you to get one!