Can 2012 iMac be used as monitor for PC with thunderbolt?

You can buy as good or better monitors then what the iMac has for much less then what the iMac costs.

Why would you want to use a All In One computer as just a monitor for some other, Any Other, Computer.

Seems a bit foolish to me.

But I bet iof you type in to a Google search "Use iMac display as monitor for a PC" you will get a bunch of hits. Probably a video or 2 also.

You might try using the Parallels software program that enables Windoze to be run on a Mac; that way you could eliminate a second keyboard too. But then, if you had Parallels runing on your Mac the PC would be totally and utterly superflous since you could just load all of your PC stuff into a sub-directory on the Mac HD. It'd run better too.

Lulus_Dad wrote:

You might try using the Parallels software program that enables Windoze to be run on a Mac; that way you could eliminate a second keyboard too. But then, if you had Parallels runing on your Mac the PC would be totally and utterly superflous since you could just load all of your PC stuff into a sub-directory on the Mac HD. It'd run better too.

That is fine If he has a Non Branded install of Windows on his PC. In other words a Retail copy of Windows installed on his PC. None of the Virtual Machine programs let you import a Branded installl of Windows. That is Totally against the license terms. When I say Branded I mean a version that came with the PC from makers like Dell, HP, Sony and the like. Those versions are for those specific brand of PCs and can Not be moved or installed on other hardware, virtual or physical.

And to your comment that it will run better on a Mac is just completely false. No OS runs better in a Virtual Machine then it does on it own set of physical hardware. Not only that but if you use Boot Camp to install Windows on it own partition on the Mac the Mac still has limiting factor invovled that are not present when running on Real Windows PC hardware.

The newer iMacs should work as monitors if the video source is Thunderbolt. It will not work to use Mini Display Port cable between the PC and the iMac. The reason is the MDP is an only output, wile the Thunderbolt port is both output and input. That means it should work.

After using PC's since the beginning, I FINALLY got my FIRST mac, the base 22.5" model at the end of November; I did install an extra 8 GB of RAM for a total of 12 GB which only took a few minutes. I still use Quicken for Windows and even have a DOS app, (Andrew Tobias' "Managing Your Money" (MYM)) that contains financial history back for years; this app wouldn't even run on Windows 7 without the Windows XP emulation mode. I installed licensed version of Parallels 8 and then Windows 7 64-bit, Quicken for Windows (2011) and finally the Windows XP mode for Windows 7 and lastly the MYM files. Everything installed in only a few hours and they all run FLAWLESSLY and at lightening fast speeds.

I like to have multiple things up and running, e.g. Outlook, Excel, Safari, Quicken, etc. and had no interest in running Boot Camp which would only allow me to run Quicken alone.

is there any list of PC working MBOs for thunderbolt connectivity with iMac 2012?