M4 iMac vs Intel iMac: Specs, options, value in contrast

Apple’s self-designed chip initiative, Apple Silicon, has been round for fairly a number of years. Launched in 2020, Apple Silicon has systematically changed all of Apple’s Intel-based Mac fashions with variations utilizing its personal design of processor.

The iMac noticed its final Intel launch in 2019, a time when Apple continued to make use of an older iMac design.Two years later, Apple modified the sport by not solely bringing out an Apple Silicon iMac, however one which was radically redesigned.

Individuals nonetheless utilizing an Intel iMac will discover issues have moved on significantly, and that an improve will make lots of adjustments to their computing setup.

Whereas Apple Silicon has been in use since 2020, there’ll nonetheless be lots of Mac customers who’ve stayed on Intel all through. Analysts decided that 56% of latest Mac house owners had held on to their older Mac for 3 years or extra, in a 2024 survey.

That is not a brand new development both. The identical survey from 2020 discovered that 40% of Mac patrons at the moment held onto their {hardware} for 3 or extra years.

There’s an excellent probability that a part of that 56% section consists of Intel Mac house owners.

As to why they could be holding onto their {hardware} for thus lengthy, there are a number of causes, apart from price. For instance, they could have Mac software program that runs on Intel’s structure, and never Apple Silicon.

Then there’s reminiscence, as Intel Macs usually gave the choice so as to add extra. Apple Silicon customers are caught with what they initially configured, with no choice to improve the insides for themselves.

Here is how the final base Intel 21.5-inch iMac, which price $1,299 on the time, compares in opposition to its counterpart, the $1,299 M4 24-inch iMac.

The M4 24-inch iMac is a far cry from the design used within the final Intel iMac. When Apple converted to Apple Silicon, it made a substantial variety of adjustments, together with an overhaul of its look.

Earlier than, there have been massive bezels to the perimeters, a tapered again part to the perimeters to offer the phantasm of thinness, and a fairly restricted number of colours.

Now, the iMac shares the design aesthetic of the iPad Professional, with flat sides and minimal bezels, in addition to a really large shade palette for customers to select from. The chin nonetheless persists, however all the pieces else has gone by means of lots of change.

M4 24-inch iMac vs Intel 21.5-inch iMac: The newer iMac has a skinny however slab-like development

On condition that there are two display sizes at play, and the novel design adjustments, you’ll be able to count on the bodily dimensions to be very completely different.

The 21.5-inch iMac is 17.7 inches excessive and 20.8 inches large total. The 24-inch iMac is a bit taller and wider at 18.1 and 21.5 inches respectively, however not by a lot.

The footprint on the newer mannequin is considerably smaller, due to a smaller base. That brings the general depth of the M4 iMac to five.8 inches versus 6.9 inches for the older mannequin.

Whereas barely greater, the 24-inch iMac is significantly lighter than its predecessor. The 21.5-inch iMac weighed 12.1 kilos, versus 9.74 kilos for the M4 iMac with two ports, 9.79 for the four-port model.

At 21.5 inches, the Intel iMac’s LED-backlit show supplied so much to customers. At 4,096 by 2,304 pixels, it supplied a pixel density of 219 pixels per inch.

The 24-inch mannequin’s obtained the identical LED-backlit show expertise, however in an clearly bigger dimension. As a 23.5-inch, 4.5K show, it has a decision of 4,480 by 2,520, giving it an analogous pixel density of 218 pixels per inch.

M4 24-inch iMac vs Intel 21.5-inch iMac: The most recent iMac’s show is larger than the Intel era’s display

What hasn’t modified is the brightness, which rests at 500 nits for each fashions. There’s additionally Huge shade (P3) assist throughout the board, although you do not get True Tone on the older mannequin.

One different expertise change for the show is that it is doable to get a Nano-texture remedy for the entrance glass to attenuate glare and reflections. Nonetheless, that is solely out there as an optionally available additional on the four-port model of the M4 iMac, not the bottom two-port model.

The final era of Intel iMac was offered with three CPU choices. The bottom was a 3.6GHz quad-core Intel Core i3 chip.

The mid-tier choice was a 3.0GHz 6-core Intel Core i5, with a Turbo Increase as much as 4.1GHz. Lastly, the best finish choice was a 3.2GHz 6-core Intel Core i7, with a 4.6GHz Turbo Increase.

In terms of reminiscence, the Intel mannequin began with 8GHz of two,400MHz DDR, with 16GB and 32GB improve choices.

The M4 is out there in two variants, relying on whether or not the consumer wants the two-port mannequin or four-port model.

The 2-port has an M4 chip with an 8-core CPU, with 4 efficiency cores and 4 effectivity cores. The four-port mannequin has a 10-core CPU, with 4 efficiency and 6 effectivity cores.

Apple makes use of unified reminiscence for its Apple Silicon chips, which permits all chip parts entry to the identical pool, with out segmenting and duplicating information. The 2-port begins with 16GB of reminiscence with a 24GB improve out there, whereas the four-port provides a 32GB choice on high.

Graphics on the Intel fashions included a Radeon Professional 555X with 2GB of GDDR5 reminiscence, a Radeon Professional 560X with 4GB of GDDR5 reminiscence, and a Radeon Professional Vega 20 with 4GB of HBM2 reminiscence.

The GPU on the M4 fashions are Apple’s personal designs, with 8 cores and 10 cores for the two-port and four-port choices, respectively.

The Apple Silicon chips additionally profit from issues the Intel mannequin merely would not have, together with the Neural Engine. The 16-core component is used for duties the place machine studying is at play, akin to Apple Intelligence.

Then there’s the Media Engine, which gives hardware-acceleration video encoding and decoding. That is historically a really CPU-intensive process, so handing it off to a devoted part is a large profit for some purposes.

As for a way a lot better the M4 is over the Intel counterparts, there isn’t any direct solution to evaluate by benchmarking, as Apple’s newest chip hasn’t been examined but. Nonetheless, we are able to go by Apple’s claims.

Apple says the M4 chip makes the iMac 1.7 instances sooner than the M1, with regards to the CPU. The GPU can also be claimed to be 2.1 instances sooner, able to double the body charge in video games.

M4 24-inch iMac vs Intel 21.5-inch iMac: Geekbench single-core and multi-core figures

Utilizing the M1 iMac as a information, Apple’s declare signifies that the M4 ought to attain about 3,987 for single-core checks in Geekbench, and about 14,224 in multi-core testing.

Against this, the bottom Intel i3 can get 1,205 and three,442 respectively, whereas the i5 goes to 1,358 and 5,006. The i7 chip, the Intel iMac’s quickest, continues to be properly behind at 1,496 for single-core and 6,259 for multi-core.

The Intel chips are additionally soundly crushed by the M1 iMac, which will get 2,345 for single-core and eight,367 for multi-core.

M4 24-inch iMac vs Intel 21.5-inch iMac: Geekbench Metallic figures

In terms of the GPU, the M4 theoretically scores about 67,000 on Geekbench’s Metallic check.

The Radeon Professional 555X is listed at 17,628, the 560X at 23,747, and the Vega 20 at 33,916. The Vega 20 is nowhere close to the M4’s potential rating, however it does a minimum of beat the M1’s 32,168 whole.

In contrast in opposition to the M1, the CPU and GPU capabilities of the Intel Mac are outclassed by Apple Silicon. No matter how correct Apple’s claims are, the M4 must be significantly higher.

The Intel iMac makes use of a FaceTime HD digital camera to deal with video calls and taking pictures from the perspective of the iMac.

The M4 has a superior one, branded as a 12MP Middle Stage digital camera. Able to 1080p video, it is also boosted by a complicated picture sign processor to computationally enhance the picture.

It additionally has Desk View, a characteristic that simulates a top-down view of the consumer’s desk, which will be helpful to point out bodily objects to different individuals.

M4 24-inch iMac vs Intel 21.5-inch iMac: Exterior audio is the way in which to go, as usualM4 24-inch iMac vs Intel 21.5-inch iMac: Exterior audio is the way in which to go, as usualM4 24-inch iMac vs Intel 21.5-inch iMac: Exterior audio is the way in which to go, as traditional

In terms of audio, the M4 iMac has a high-fidelity six-speaker system with force-cancelling woofers, full with large stereo sound and Spatial Audio assist. The Intel iMac has a lot easier stereo audio system.

The older iMac additionally makes use of a microphone to choose up audio. The M4 mannequin makes use of a studio-quality three-mic array with a excessive signal-to-noise ratio and beamforming.

This makes it so much simpler to choose up your voice clearly, which is helpful for Siri queries.

Each fashions have a headphone jack, however the M4 iMac goes for one with assist for high-impedance headphones, utilized by audiophiles.

The Intel Mac had, in its base configuration, a 5400RPM 1TB arduous drive, although you would get variations with an SSD or a Fusion Drive. This latter choice combines SSD and arduous drive tech to supply excessive capability and sooner learn and write speeds for a few of your information.

Fashionable Macs have, for some years now, converted to SSDs. It is a significantly sooner solution to entry and write information, and quieter too as a result of lack of spinning metallic.

Within the M4 iMac, capacities begin off with 256GB, however you would improve to 1TB on the two-port mannequin, or 2TB on the four-port.

In terms of ports, the 21.5-inch iMac provides a shocking quantity of flexibility. The again contains the headphone jack, two Thunderbolt 3 ports, 4 USB 3.1 ports, an SD card reader, and a Gigabit Ethernet port.

Against this, the M4 iMac is extraordinarily minimalist. The 2-port base mannequin has simply two Thunderbolt 4 ports on the rear, with no card reader or Gigabit Ethernet, although you’ll be able to at all times go for the four-port mannequin with Gigabit Ethernet, or pay for the improve. .

After all, there’s an argument to easily including a Thunderbolt dock to the iMac to broaden its connectivity, however that may dent the uncluttered desk look a bit.

There’s Wi-Fi 6E assist within the M4 iMac, so you should utilize wi-fi networking, however you’ll be able to nonetheless get Gigabit Ethernet in order for you. You would both improve to the four-port mannequin, or pay the $30 improve payment so as to add the port to the facility brick.

Wi-Fi on the Intel iMac is the a lot older 802.11ac. Bluetooth can also be an older model, with Bluetooth 4.2 in use in opposition to the M4’s Bluetooth 5.3.

All fashions ship with peripherals, together with the Magic Mouse or Magic Trackpad, in addition to a Magic Keyboard. Nonetheless, the M4 iMac’s keyboard will be configured with Contact ID, bringing biometric safety to the desktop Mac, one thing fully lacking from the older iMac.

The 2019 Intel iMac began from $1,299 with the Intel Core i3 chip, AMD Radeon Professional 555X graphics, 8GB of reminiscence, and a 1TB arduous drive.

M4 24-inch iMac vs Intel 21.5-inch iMac: The M4 provides an enormous array of colorways

The M4 iMac at $1,299 has the 8-core M4 chip, an 8-core GPU, 16GB of unified reminiscence, and a 256GB SSD. The four-port model, with the 10-core GPU, 16GB of reminiscence, and 256GB SSD, is $1,499.

Reminiscence upgrades price $200 per improve tier. The storage upgrades begin at $200 for 512GB, one other $200 for 1TB, and one other $400 for 2TB.

Upgrading to Gigabit Ethernet on the two-port mannequin is $30, whereas including Nano-texture to the four-port mannequin is $200.

When Apple Silicon Macs got here out, they had been praised for providing appreciable efficiency positive aspects over the Intel variations they had been changing. 4 generations of Apple Silicon later, and it is gone from a “ought to improve” to “should improve.”

Not simply due to the efficiency of Apple Silicon now, however due to the Intel chips it replaces. The Intel processors from 2019 are significantly sluggish relative to trendy requirements, to the purpose that even a swap to an M1 iMac can be useful.

The argument of retaining maintain of the Intel chip for some software program must be lifeless by now. You’d count on most mission-critical software program would’ve been up to date to run on Apple Silicon within the final 5 years, so the argument should not apply anymore.

Add within the bigger 24-inch show, the advantages of SSDs over spinning metallic discs, and a extra trendy design, and it turns into a no brainer to improve.

There was a concrete motive to maintain utilizing an Intel iMac. There’s much less of a motive to take action now.

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