How does the iMac 4GB AMD Radeon perform on X-Plane?

[Captainkw]

Hello everyone! Does anyone know how well the AMD Radeon R9 m295x 4gb Graphics Card, for the 27" iMac, works when flying on X-Plane? Is the frame rate pretty good? Can settings move up high enough across the board? Anyone who has this machine please advise. Thanks!

[mmerelles]

i do have the imac 5k higher spec like yours, it runs perfect.

[stevekirks]

Hello everyone! Does anyone know how well the AMD Radeon R9 m295x 4gb Graphics Card, for the 27" iMac, works when flying on X-Plane? Is the frame rate pretty good? Can settings move up high enough across the board? Anyone who has this machine please advise. Thanks!

Easiest answer is to download the X-Plane demo and try it. It's time limited but functions exactly the same as the full software.

[Nelson L.]

In general, beware Macs for XP - bad history. Look into it and see if it works for you, but I would want at least an Intel CPU in there (AMD CPUs have problems with XP). Things like resolution, settings, addons, and overall hardware equality all play a factor, so you'll have to tinker. It's not just the GPU.

[chevyrules]

In general, beware Macs for XP - bad history. Look into it and see if it works for you, but I would want at least an Intel CPU in there (AMD CPUs have problems with XP). Things like resolution, settings, addons, and overall hardware equality all play a factor, so you'll have to tinker. It's not just the GPU.

Macs only have Intel CPU's and the Retina 5K iMac has either the 4690 or 4790K in it.

The only concern about the M295X is heat. Several reports is that the M295X can easily hit 100 C which is not good at all. Really wish Apple stuck with NVIDIA and stuck the 980M in there..... But Apple likes to go in cycles with their GPU supplier and right now they are in their AMD cycle.

I have a Late 2013 27" iMac with the 4670 and 780M. I like it with X-Plane. Now I can't have the highest settings, but I am overall happy with the look of X-Plane right now. Temps are around 55-60 C for the CPU and 64-70 C for the GPU which are good temps( anything below 80 C from what I read is fairly good) when I force the fan to 2600 RPM vs using Apple's stock fan control( Apple values quietness over temps).

[Nelson L.]

Ah, didn't know that all of them were Devil's Canyon. What a waste... From what I hear, either model throttles since the iMac lacks any sufficient cooling. I'll stick with PCs...

[chevyrules]

Ah, didn't know that all of them were Devil's Canyon. What a waste... From what I hear, either model throttles since the iMac lacks any sufficient cooling. I'll stick with PCs...

It's not necessarily the iMac's lack any cooling. Just AMD's are horrible at TDP's. My temps for my Late 2013 27" iMac is well within a good range with the 4670 at 55-60 C and the 780M at 64-70 C when manually setting the fan to 2600 RPM. NVIDIA's are certainly better cards for Apple's thinness obsession. They run much cooler and they are faster.

[Nelson L.]

It's still an Apple... Enough said

[Captainkw]

Thanks for all the responses. I have a powerful 2012 27" iMac with intel core i7. However, its max vram at the time was NVIDIA GeForce 2GB which is what I have. I wanted to get the 5K with AMD Radeon 4GB but will wait because a new iMac with a faster Graphics Card should be released before the end of the year. Thanks for all the info again!

[chevyrules]

Thanks for all the responses. I have a powerful 2012 27" iMac with intel core i7. However, its max vram at the time was NVIDIA GeForce 2GB which is what I have. I wanted to get the 5K with AMD Radeon 4GB but will wait because a new iMac with a faster Graphics Card should be released before the end of the year. Thanks for all the info again!

It should still be AMD GPU's. And I don't know when suitable desktop Skylake CPU's will be available. I can't see Apple dropping the 4790K for a lower clocked Skylake given Skylake's further focus of energy efficiency than performance.