Edmund Dworakowski

I've decided to scrap my elderly PC based laptop and purchase a new iMac® with Retina 5K display for my photo editing. I'd like to find well designed, high tech handsome, ergonomic, and portable (wheels) work station that will fit all of the components plus room for additional stuff like an external drive or two...
If anyone know of such an animal, I'd be grateful for the information. Also, any first hand experience both positive or negative regarding the iMac® with Retina 5K display -
Thanks,

johnst1001a Loc: West Chester, Ohio

I have an Imac, love it. It's a 3year old model, so only 16 gb ram max, and not the new 5k. I would love to step up to the new model, with 32 gb ram, and the I7 processor. Don't even think of the downsides, there are none. It is pricely with all the bells and whistles, but it's worth every penny. The display on mine is excellent for photos, I can't imagine how much better the 5k would be. Must be incredible, particularly with high resolution, 20+ mega pixel cameras.

Go for it. It's will be quite the experience.

SueMac Loc: Box Elder, SD

I have a 2 1/2 y.o. 21" iMac. Ordered it with 16 gig of ram, i7 processor and upgraded graphics card. Great set up...it fits well in the motorhome. I've drooled over the new 27" ones with the retina display. I bet the photos would really look good on it. But alas....this one will do for quite some time!

rpavich Loc: West Virginia

Buy one now...I love it.

jackpi Loc: Southwest Ohio

I got my Retina 5K iMac the day before thanksgiving. Loaded. 32GB RAM, 4GHz processor, 3TB fusion drive, high end video card (4GB). Using a 4TB Thunderbolt 2 MyPassport Pro as backup. My old tower PC is in the corner.

The iMac boots up in 15 sec. It keeps current and frequently used programs and data on the 120GB SSD that is integral to the fusion drive. So Everything I do is practically instantaneous, including operations in Lightroom. It appears that everything displayed on the screen has been scaled to 5K--instantaneously. Internal sound system is very, very good--as good as the premium sound system I had on the PC. I got the wired keyboard with the numeric keypad. I find the wireless keyboard a bit too small. The wireless Magic Mouse is a revelation: it has no buttons or scroll wheel, but you use the pressure sensitive top surface to simulate two buttons and a scroll wheel. Very elegant!

Is it worth the price? If you can afford it, absolutely!!

Gene51 Loc: Yonkers, NY, now in LSD (LowerSlowerDelaware)

An 8 bit display is not the best for photo editing. That being said, I think I'd rather have a pair of lower res 10 bit displays where I could actually read the text in the interface and can display Adobe RGB color space, as opposed to a larger, single 5K display. I do retouching for others, and I am a nature and landscape photographer, and color accuracy is my number one priority. The new iMac is sexy, but doesn't provide the photo editing experience I have come to depend on.

usken65

I prefer dell Alienware

jackpi Loc: Southwest Ohio

You are correct. All Apple displays (including the Retina 5K) are 8 bits per channel displays. What extra bit depth will do is smooth the gradients in subtle color transitions. The best examples are things like blue sky, clouds, or fire. Where an 8-bit panel might show subtle banding or macro-blocking, a 10-bit capable display can reduce or eliminate those artifacts. I haven't seen any of those artifacts on my iMac, but I haven't had it that long.

It is ironic that the graphics card in my iMac supports 10 bit displays, but the iMac display is only 8 bits and there is no way to use a separate display.

I can, however, easily calibrate my 5K Retina display to any of the following standards:
iMac
Adobe RGB (1998)
EPSON sRGB
EPSON Standard RGB - Gamma 1.8
Generic RGB Profile
sRGB IEC61966-2.1

Which 10 bit display are you using? Many displays that advertise themselves as 10 bit displays are actually 8 bit displays that use dithering to simulate the extra 2 bits. But the dithering is effective in removing the artifacts described above.

Gene51 Loc: Yonkers, NY, now in LSD (LowerSlowerDelaware)

It is not a good idea to profile a Mac display to AdobeRGB - there is not enough bit depth to properly display everything.

As you suspected, I use a pair of Dell 2413 displays - they are 8 bit with either a 10 or 12 bit LUT - and they require an XRite profiling tool that writes directly to the display, along with an NVidia Quadro K620 display adapter. Now the 10 bit capability is only visible in Photoshop, and with the 30 bit color support turned on, but on images that contain the color depth and subtle tone and color transitions, you can see a difference. AdobeRGB is also closer to printer gamut, regardless of whether you send your work out to a printer that does silver halide printing on a 36 bit Lightjet printer using Fuji Crystal Archive paper, or a 12 color Epson loaded with wide gamut Ultrachrome ink.