I'm developing an iPad app. I purchased a MacBook Pro, but have been running into performance issues while simulating the app and trying to run CS5, XCode, iOS simulator, Safari, and a few other misc programs. Last thing to do is to order another 8 GB of RAM for a total of 16GB on this desktop. I'm downloading XCode right now. That will be the true test of this set up. So far it has been rock solid, but I haven't taxed it too much. I was able to migrate my files, settings, and user account over using the migration tool without any problems (only the slow speed.)

Total cost was $587 for CPU, MB, case, PSU, and HDD. GPU was another 99. Ram would have cost 45, but I already had it. I already had an extra 120mm fan and fan controller as well, but thats optional. OSX was 19.99. I'd put this at around $740 retail. You could do better by down grading the motherboard (-99), going with HD4000 graphics (-99, if you don't need resolutions over 1080p or if the MB supports DL-DVI), and not using an Enterprise level HDD (-20).

This setup smokes the current top of the line iMac except at gaming, but for an extra 100 dollars I could have gone with a 560TI which would smoke the 6970M (top end iMac GPU.) Figure around $700-800 compared to 2100 for the iMac. The good part is that I can upgrade as needed and OC the 3570k. With an OC, there is no comparison.

Vindir, it is hard to blow 2000 dollars on 1.5 year old equipment. If you can wait, the new iMacs may be coming out soon. However, I doubt they will be any faster than what I put together for a third of the price. I'll update you guys with stability reports. Supposedly, if it works well for the first day without any crashes then it is perfectly stable. Stability issues with OSX installs let you know real quick.

I'll run geekbench in a bit and compare it to my MBP.