During the course of the week we speak to hundreds of Apple users across the country and although the conversations differ, there are some topics that consistently appear. Without doubt the number one question we get asked is 5K Retina iMac or Mac Pro?
Here we take a look at these two powerhouses and see which one is best for your business..
Considering the Mac Pro was realised in June 2013 and the Retina iMac hit our shelves last October you would assume that the debate would have died down. Instead it is still as intense and that is simply because gap between the models is no longer clear. They both have amazing attributes.
The Mac Pro is squarely aimed at those who want workstation performance and the figures are simply incredible. Using Intel Xeon based CPUs the Mac Pro can come with up to 12 Cores of processing power. You get flash storage, up to 64GB RAM and the ability to run 3 external 4K monitors or 6, yes 6, Thunderbolt displays.
However, it is the dual workstation class graphic processors that really give the Mac Pro its boost. The Dual GPUs normally idle cores can be used by the operating system and supported apps for additional processing power. In tandem with OpenCL and other supported APIs, applications can lean on the more powerful Graphics capabilities for general processing.
This is not to suggest that the iMac is a slow machine. Even in its standard configuration with the i5 Quad Core 3.5GHz processor it is impressive. We provide a free RAM upgrade to 16GB, coupled to the standard 1TB Fusion Drive, to help speed things up, and its AMD Radeon R9 M290X 2GB Graphics card will happily edit HD video in Final Cut Pro all day long.
The iMac’s real advantage however, is that Retina Display. With a resolution of 5120 x 2880 it is stunning. If you are video editing, working on photographs, reading lots of text all day the 27” Retina Display is a joy to work with. It is simply brilliant and what’s more you can run an external 4K display alongside the 5K if needed.
So where does this leave us? As with all buying decisions we would recommend that you really look at your needs. If you run software that would take advantage of the Mac Pro’s 8 or 12 core solutions then you have to go for this model. Regardless of how great the iMac’s performance it just isn’t there to match these higher end models.
If however, you are considering the entry level Mac Pro then we would really recommend you seriously consider the 27”iMac with 5K Retina Display. It’s cheaper than the entry level Mac Pro and you get a 5K in built display, a keyboard and a mouse all as standard.
With lease prices starting at just £17.78 + VAT per week for the 27” iMac with 5K Retina Display or £21.88 + VAT per week for the Quad Core Mac Pro we are sure that we can find the right Mac for your business.
