Geforce 9400m..

Is this card good? will it handle photoshop work and some movie editing.. I may also do a little 3d work. Im considering buying the brand new imac's out. The 24'' 2.66ghz one. Thanks for any help.

It's a decent mid-range GPU. It should up to par for all of those tasks.

Right, does the graphics card play a big role in things like photoshop and movie editing.. or is most of the pressure on the ram?

Photo and video editing mainly strains the processor and tends to also require a lot of RAM. The graphics card is rarely or never used for those things. That's only for 3D rendering and gaming, really.

Thats cool. Just out of some curiosity also. the fact that the display is 24'' and i was to game on it. would this lower my fps in comparison to a system with the same specs but with a 20'' display? or do other factors come into play with this?

Macks said:

Thats cool. Just out of some curiosity also. the fact that the display is 24'' and i was to game on it. would this lower my fps in comparison to a system with the same specs but with a 20'' display? or do other factors come into play with this?

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No, that's pretty much it. Gaming at 1920x1200 is demanding even for higher-end graphics cards (depending on the game, of course). I doubt a 9400M could play any games at 1920x1200 other than perhaps really old stuff like Warcraft 3 and older. It wouldn't be able to do 1680x1050 either, though, so don't worry about it. You can always drop the resolution of your game to something like 1280x800 and it'll just scale to your screen. Scaled resolutions usually look pretty bad on LCDs but they're not as bad during games as they are for general use.

Having a 24" is so much nicer anyway. I'd go for it if you can afford it. The 9400M won't do very well in games regardless of resolution, but it can still play them at least.

Yeah im definetley going to go for this. Am i also right in saying that the 9400M will benefit more in performance wise with more RAM as oppose to less..

For your purposes, yes.

Right ok, lol ive been watching some videos and im contemplating getting the one up with the gt120.. I dont know why but i feel that the 9400 isnt going to be enough.. im really not sure on this now

You could get a refurb instead and have better graphics for less money. Don't drop too much money on getting better graphics for gaming on a Mac, though. It's $300 extra for basically a better graphics card and a slightly faster processor. Not worth it. You could use that money for a game console instead or something.

Mama Luigi said:

Photo and video editing mainly strains the processor and tends to also require a lot of RAM. The graphics card is rarely or never used for those things. That's only for 3D rendering and gaming, really.

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Actually, I believe Adobe added some GPU processing to CS4, so the conventional thinking that photo editing is CPU and memory intensive only no longer holds true.

Kash said:

Actually, I believe Adobe added some GPU processing to CS4, so the conventional thinking that photo editing is CPU and memory intensive only no longer holds true.

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Yes thats what im thinking.. I actually study graphic design so the CS4 series of application will be what mainly what im going to be using.. Will photoshop utilize all of my 9400 GPU power or will i need a better card?

Kash said:

Actually, I believe Adobe added some GPU processing to CS4, so the conventional thinking that photo editing is CPU and memory intensive only no longer holds true.

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Yes, it does still hold true.

Sure, Adobe has moved some features to the GPU in Photoshop CS4, but those are far from being extremely graphic intensive. Not even the 3D features. Any standard, entry GPU could handle those. You won't need a souped-up, high-end graphics card for any of the new features, so the advice is still sound.

Applications that are primarily 2D, like image and video editors, don't need a super-duper, maxed out video card.

You will benefit much more from adding system RAM.

Basically... while Photoshop CS4 will benefit (slightly) from a faster video card, the point remains that the CPU still does most of the work, and CS4 would still run just fine even on a very slow GPU. It doesn't need a powerful GPU to perform well.

Is the 9400m OpenGL.. (not sure what it is) i checked on the system requirements for the cs4 suite and it said compatiable cards with OpenGL and Shader something or other..?

Macks said:

Is the 9400m OpenGL.. (not sure what it is) i checked on the system requirements for the cs4 suite and it said compatiable cards with OpenGL and Shader something or other..?

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Yes. In fact, the 9000-series is a full DX10 part, so it has pixel shader support and is fully up to date.

Hi Macks, I came across your posts while searching to confirm the same question - whether PS CS4 will run all it's new graphics features on this 9400m. I thought I'd pop back and point you in the direction of this article which confirms that it does Motherboard And CPU - Review Tom's Hardware : Apple MacBook Review: Part 1 . It's convincing but I reckon I may just get the mac peeps to test this in the store before I buy this new mini.
Evan