How Does the 2020 iMac's CPU Performance Compare to M1 and M2 Chips?

Question

I would like you to provide a comparison of the CPU performance of the 2020 iMac with the newer M1 and M2 chips.

Answer 1

The iMac line from 2020 still comes with the Intel Core i5-10600 which has a PassMark score of 13689. This is only a little bit behind the M1 chip which has a Passmark score of 14230,and the base model M2 chip's 15466, meaning that the iMac's performance is still somewhat competitive which is appropriate for casual usage, video editing, and multitasking.

Comments

Great content, would love to see more 2020 27" iMac content since I believe this was the last Intel iMac and since the transition to Apple Silicon, has became an under rated beast of a machine.

For context, I have a M1 Pro 14" with 16gb ram and 1tb and I also use the 2020 iMac 5700xt with 64gb 1tb storage.

I don't notice that much of a difference, really. The M1 Pro is a bit snappier but other than that, the Intel 2020 iMac I use seems be a great deal considering it's all in one.
I do gaming, video editing, browsing, and light 3d model/photo editing and I can tell you, I don't notice night and day differences. The thing I do notice a big difference is that I can run more programs on the iMac considering I have 64gb of ram versus 16gb.

I feel the M1 Max can go head to head against the fully spec iMac 2020 or beat it.

The M1 pro is not noticeable..actually because of the 5700xt, I feel the iMac wins most of the time in rendering and gaming. I do have to say though, my iMac gets hot often. You can hear the fans good amount.

M1 Pro base + Studio display will be more expensive than the base iMac 2020. So the iMac is still a good deal but the issue is the support later down the road.

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The 2020 27 Inch iMac has been tested, and its maxed out configuration is faster than the maxed out iMac Pro configuration for 3D stuff like gaming, 3d rendering, content rendering, photo rendering. So its basically just the fastest iMac out there. However, there are reports that the M3 iMac with 24B of ram is faster than the 2020 iMac with the i9, 5700XT, and the 128GB of ram which I heavily doubt. However if that is the case, it would be insane to see that the M3 iMac is shockingly the fastest iMac apple has ever made! Not in raw power of course but in real world performance.

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the imac 2020 27" you cannot upgrade the internal storage drive. so make sure get the drive size you want.

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i bought a refurb 2020 27" i9 10 core imac in 2021.  due to covid i didn't need it right after i got it.  i just took it out of the box last week.  bumped it to 64GB ram. sweet.

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YES i got one...... and i got the BASE model for 600 and then upgraded the ram to 128gb for 300 Sooo cheap an its a brilliant machine

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I bought the last 2020 iMac in 2021 and kept it boxed. Recently retired my 2017 and set it up, boosting the ram to 64 Gig. Won't part with my iMacs until I have to. The 2017 went into storage for a backup.

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I have a 2020, 27" iMac 3,6 GHz 10-Core Intel Core i9, 40 GB RAM 2667 MHz DDR4, AMD Radeon Pro 5700 8 GB, with 1 TB of storage. It´s a killer machine, and the screen is amazing. I do audio mixing, and mastering for a living, and haven´t had any limitations with it so far. My 2011 MacBook Pro just died, is giving me a White Screen, so I´m not sure if it can be repaired, though I just had the motherboard, and battery replaced 2 years again. I´m thinking of buying a refurbished M1 Pro, 10 Core, 16 GB, 1TB to replace it, because I´ve heard from many people the M1 Pro is actually better than the M3 Pro for audio applications, and that the M3´s are built more for graphic, and content applications. I´m living in Germany, and everything seems to be more expensive here, especially computer gear. My 2020 27" iMac was close to 4000€, but I had a girlfriend working for Apple at the time, and only paid 3200€. My plan is eventually to buy a Mac Mini Studio at some point, and just use the screen. I´m still running Catalina, but am starting to have problems with updates from Native Instruments, etc., since Apple no longer supports Catalina. I`m currently in the middle of producing an album, but when that´s finished I´ll probably upgrade to Ventura, which is the latest OS I think it will still run optimal on. Anyway, I really enjoy your content. I´ve read several, and have become a subscriber. :)

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I bought one when it first came out 72gb ram i7 512gb ssd and it is so slow now! So I have replaced it with a  mac mini m2 base model and it is leaps and bounds faster so I'm selling my imac next month

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I found the i7 version with 8gb ram, 512gb ssd for 1600$… It’s way pricier in Europe. For about the same price I can get the base model M3 iMac… I don’t know what to do