New 2012 iMac slower SD renders from AE than a 2007 MacPro?

Hi there -
I just purchased a new iMac for our small production house. 99% of the time, we are loving the machine: the performance, the stability, the speed, are all significant improvements over our 5 year-old Mac Pros. We have run numerous tests comparing the performance of our new iMac to our old MacPros and on average, the new iMac is performing 2-4 times faster than our Mac Pros. However, we've run into one specific issue where our iMac performs worse than our older MacPros, and unfortunately, this one issue is a major part of our everyday work flow and currently prevents us from converting all of our old Mac Pros to new iMacs. I'll try to be as brief yet detailed as possible so you have all the specs.
Our problem is when we render out standard definition Quicktime Animation MOV's out of Adobe After Effects CS5.5, our new iMac performs 30-100% slower than our 5-year old Mac Pros.
Here are the machines we're comparing:
Mac Pro (OS X 10.6.8)
2 x 3 GHz Dual Core Intel Xeon, 10 GB RAM,
NVIDIA GeForce 7300 GT 256 MB VRAM
vs.
2012 27" iMac (OS X 10.8.2)
3.4GHz Quad-core Intel Core i7, 32 GB RAM
NVIDIA GeForce GTX 680MX 2GB, 3 TB Fusion Drive with (128 GB SSD)
Both machines are running Adobe After Effects CS5.5 and are using the exact same projects and assets. Source files were stored on the desktop for each test, and outputs were sent to the desktop. We have also manipulated Multi-Core Processing settings and RAM-Allocation settings and while we saw slight differences in render times on the iMac, it was never close to competing with the MacPro.
Here are some of the other test results we get that meet our expectations:
                  - Encodes out of Adobe Premiere Pro are about twice as fast on the new iMac
                  - HD renders out of Adobe After Effects (both H.264 and Quicktime Animation) are about twice as fast on the new iMac
Other tests
                  - We have downloaded a trial version of AE CS6 and have gotten similar results (SD renders are slower on the new iMac than our older MacPros).
Does anyone have an idea what is going on here? Is there some way that the operating system, hardware, or Adobe software treat these files differently so that standard definition renders would be much slower than a 5-year old Mac Pro? Considering our new iMac has far superior processors and memory, we are not surprised that our HD renders are much faster now on our new machine. But we are just baffled on how it could be performing worse on SD exports.

I am having the exact same problem. I purchased an Imac and it was deliverd last week. I installed CS6 Production premium and went to work in after effects on a project that rendered very slow on my 2011 macbook pro 2.2 quad core I7 with 8gb DDR3 ram and an intel HD 3000 512 MB.
My new Imac has the exact same specs as yours and I figured it would fly through the render, but in Premiere and AE the results are the same, my macbook pro is equaling and even surpassing the speed of the render time.
I am very frusterated that the preformance is like this. If someone has answers please pass them on.

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I was just over at the local Apple store loking at the new 21.5" iMac, and to be honest, I wasn't all that impressed. I have been waiting for over a year to upgrade my Mac, and had high expectations for the new 2012 iMac's .... but seeing and playing with one in the store .... the new one's may not be for me.
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A Basic Guide for Data Migration
If you are migrating a PowerPC (PowerMac) system (G3, G4, or G5) to an Intel-Mac be careful what you migrate. Keep in mind that some items that may get transferred will not work on Intel machines and may end up causing your computer's operating system to malfunction.
Note: if you are upgrading to a Mac with Mac OS X 10.7 (Lion) or later, or with the intent of upgrading to 10.7 or later anytime in the future, be aware that any applications that are not labelled Universal, or haven't been upgraded to Intel CPU compatibility will not run on Lion or later. Documents may migrate if an Intel native application exists that will open them, but applications that are PowerPC only will not. This user tip explains what else is needed for upgrading to Lion: https://discussions.apple.com/docs/DOC-2465.
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Rosetta supports "software that runs on the PowerPC G3, G4, or G5 processor that are built for Mac OS X". This excludes the items that are not universal binaries or simply will not work in Rosetta:
Classic Environment, and subsequently any Mac OS 9 or earlier applications
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System Preference add-ons
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Additional links that will be helpful to new Intel-Mac users:
Intel In Macs
Apple Guide to Universal Applications
MacInTouch List of Compatible Universal Binaries
MacInTouch List of Rosetta Compatible Applications
MacUpdate List of Intel-Compatible Software
Transferring data with Setup Assistant - Migration Assistant FAQ
Because Migration Assistant isn't the ideal way to migrate from PowerPC to Intel Macs, using Target Disk Mode, copying the critical contents to CD and DVD, an external hard drive, or networking will work better when moving from PowerPC to Intel Macs. The initial section below discusses Target Disk Mode. It is then followed by a section which discusses networking with Macs that lack Firewire. You can also determine if you have Firewire by looking at this image of the ports typically found on a PowerMac G4 Firewire 800, which has two 6 pin Firewire 400 (IEEE 1394a) ports below the USB ports, and below that, a Firewire 800 (IEEE 1394b).
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2. Backup your data. This is vitally important in case you make a mistake or there's some other problem.
3. Connect a Firewire cable between your old Mac and your new Intel Mac.
4. Startup your old Mac in Target Disk Mode.
5. Startup your new Mac for the first time, go through the setup and registration screens, but do NOT
migrate data over. Get to your desktop on the new Mac without migrating any new data over.
If you are not able to use a Firewire connection (for example you have a Late 2008 MacBook that only supports USB:)
1. Set up a local home network: Creating a small Ethernet Network.
2. If you have a MacBook Air or Late 2008 MacBook see the following:
MacBook (13-inch, Aluminum, Late 2008) and MacBook Pro (15-inch, Late 2008)- Migration Tips and Tricks;
MacBook (13-inch, Aluminum, Late 2008) and MacBook Pro (15-inch, Late 2008)- What to do if migration is
unsuccessful;
MacBook Air- Migration Tips and Tricks;
MacBook Air- Remote Disc, Migration, or Remote Install Mac OS X and wireless 802.11n networks.
Copy the following items from your old Mac to the new Mac:
In your /Home/ folder: Documents, Movies, Music, Pictures, and Sites folders.
In your /Home/Library/ folder:
/Home/Library/Application Support/AddressBook (copy the whole folder)
/Home/Library/Application Support/iCal (copy the whole folder)
Also in /Home/Library/Application Support (copy whatever else you need including folders for any third-party applications)
/Home/Library/Keychains (copy the whole folder)
/Home/Library/Mail (copy the whole folder)
/Home/Library/Preferences/ (copy the whole folder)
/Home/Library/Calendars (copy the whole folder)
/Home/Library/iTunes (copy the whole folder)
/Home/Library/Safari (copy the whole folder)
/Home/Library/Fonts
/Home/Library/Widgets
/Home/Library/Syndication (Tiger) or /Home/Library/PubSub (Leopard) <<< RSS
/Home/Library/Internet Plug-In
Credit goes to iBod for this information.
If you want cookies:
/Home/Library/Cookies/Cookies.plist
/Home/Library/Application Support/WebFoundation/HTTPCookies.plist
For Entourage users:
Entourage is in /Home/Documents/Microsoft User Data
Also in /Home/Library/Preferences/Microsoft
Credit goes to Macjack for this information.
If you need to transfer data for other applications please ask the vendor or ask in the Discussions where specific applications store their data.
5. Once you have transferred what you need restart the new Mac and test to make sure the contents are there for each of the applications.
Special instructions for those who have purchased Mac models that do not support Rosetta:
The newest (post 2010) Mac models run only Lion or Mountain Lion. They are not able to run Snow Leopard at all. However, you can still run PPC applications using Snow Leopard and Rosetta by intalling Snow Leopard as a virtual machine using Parallels. This is not an exercise for the truly inexperienced user, but it is completely doable provided you are willing to spend some money and some time. For complete instructions on what to do see https://discussions.apple.com/message/18280105#18280105. Although the instructions are keyed to Parallels 7, you should instead use the latest version, Parallels 8. (This information was contributed by user MlchaelLAX.)
Written by Kappy with additional contributions from a brody.

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Zdnet says:
"... however, third-party companies such as ErgoMart and iMacMount.com offer adapter kits for these iMac 2012 smaller models. iMacMount offers a $79.95 kit for 17-, 20- and 21.5-inch models. The company's site says its current iMac Mount VESA Mount Adapter Kit supports the now problematic Late 2012 21.5-inch iMac
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