Could "geared towards pros" mean no more HDD

[Canadia69]

when they said the new iMac will be "geared towards pros" do you think that could mean I could expect SSD to come standard??? If so i really hope they start at 512gb (but I know I'm dreaming)

On that note, we should expect a price bump (regardless of ssd or not) right? I hope not...I'm saving enough counting that the prices will be the same....I'm guessing I should start saving a lot more :/

(Sorry for the bad English)

 

[nambuccaheadsau]

lol you can't have it both ways Canadia69! Better specs at lower prices.

For mine I think platter drives are moving towards redundancy. Whatever is offered I will not be buying any more platter drives, and on my iMac bought just before Christmas I opted for 1TB Flash Storage. Dearer? Yes of course but I expect to recover most of that when I upgrade next in 2020 and sell the iMac, if I am still hanging on to the perch!

 

[fastlanephil]

when they said the new iMac will be "geared towards pros" do you think that could mean I could expect SSD to come standard??? If so i really hope they start at 512gb (but I know I'm dreaming)

On that note, we should expect a price bump (regardless of ssd or not) right? I hope not...I'm saving enough counting that the prices will be the same....I'm guessing I should start saving a lot more :/

(Sorry for the bad English)

What they said was that configurations for the 2017 iMac will include higher end options, so expect something more than just a spec bump offered as far as the higher end iMacs are conserned and you'll pay for it. I would imagine that Apple will drop the HDD and the Fusion drive or 256 SSD will be entry level storage. There might still be a HDD option for education sales.

 

[Dave245]

What they said was that configurations for the 2017 iMac will include higher end options, so expect something more than just a spec bump offered as far as the higher end iMacs are conserned and you'll pay for it. I would imagine that Apple will drop the HDD and the Fusion drive or 256 SSD will be entry level storage. There might still be a HDD option for education sales.

I wonder if there will also be a redesign for the "Pro" the option of a keyboard with Touch Bar and Touch ID would also be nice along with more SSD options like 2TB.

 

[maflynn]

that could mean I could expect SSD to come standard

One can only hope. I took it as that there may be a mechanism for the owner to replace the drive as well.

 

[Sirmausalot]

when they said the new iMac will be "geared towards pros" do you think that could mean I could expect SSD to come standard??? If so i really hope they start at 512gb (but I know I'm dreaming)

On that note, we should expect a price bump (regardless of ssd or not) right? I hope not...I'm saving enough counting that the prices will be the same....I'm guessing I should start saving a lot more :/

(Sorry for the bad English)

There will be a separate higher end pro or two with multi-core CPUS. SO there will be a significant price bump for those models . And they probably will come only with SSD or Fusion standard. As always, it depends on what you want to do with it. Only certain applications will benefit from multi-core CPUS and higher end graphics. So the question is: what do you want to do with your iMac?

 

[MacGizmo]

One can only hope. I took it as that there may be a mechanism for the owner to replace the drive as well.

It would be awesome if they had a "snap-in" drive bay card for SSDs the same way they have for RAM, wouldn't it?

A "pro" iMac for me would be an extra SSD drive (or this user-upgradable bay we're talking about), a much better video card option, all the latest ports, keyboard with TouchBar. You can already add 64GB of RAM, so nothing need be done there.

The only problem I see with this sort of thing is that if they make an iMac too nice, it takes away too many potential sales of Mac Pros.

 

[cobracnvt]

The baseline configs need higher amounts of fast SSD storage and significantly reduce the overpriced storage upgrade prices. Pro users need fast data storage space and not waste time to justify the high costs of small upgrades.

 

[danielwsmithee]

What is most interesting to me is the timing of the rumored update. KabyLake chips and Polaris graphics are out now so why the delay until October for the next release.

In my mind this leaves two possibilities, both of which is a significant change:

1. Apple is switching to AMD Ryzen CPUs and wants the extra time to get everything just right.
2. Apple is going to create a Pro option design that is designed around 140W Intel CPUs like the Skylake-X chips due in October. My guess is one or more these chips will also get a Xeon E3 badging.

If Apple is serious about serving Pros again. They need the top end iMac to support the best single processor chips available, the Mac Pro should go dual processor.

 

[androo4519]

when they said the new iMac will be "geared towards pros" do you think that could mean I could expect SSD to come standard??? If so i really hope they start at 512gb (but I know I'm dreaming)

Yes, I think introducing all-new Macs is the best opportunity they have for killing off the HDD. If they can get rid of the headphone jack, they can do this. But if the new iMac is to be taken seriously we don't want comedy base specs like we have at the moment. It needs to start high-end and be up-gradable to seriously high-end. This is make or break time for the Mac.

 

[Fravin]

I'll bet in better dGPU...

Katy Lake isn't so different from actual lineup and there's little space to make iMac better. It's a terrific machine. Maybe with better dGPU it could change the game.

Don't think Apple will kill the HDD at low end models.

 

[hurtmemore]

My feeling is they'll get rid of HDD/Fusion drive options completely in an upcoming redesign, leave it to external storage if people need more.

Because let's assume they are working on 'pro configurations' - the i7 model already has some thermal throttling, and we're already 'overdue' for a refresh, I think it's safe to assume they're redesigning the iMac again. If they are, this year's design will be looking at the internal design they want to have 2-3-4 years down the line too. Reality is HDD's are being phased out due to size and performance, so the time to scrap them is now, design everything else around that decision. Getting rid of a big HDD on all models gives them a lot more flexibility for the higher end cpu/gpu configurations.

I think on the lower/mid levels they'll have 256gb, but higher tiers it will start at 512 with 1TB / 2TB options.

 

[prizm]

Geared towards pro will undoubtedly mean, a massive, massive price increase. On the order of the new Macbook Pro.

 

[danielwsmithee]

My feeling is they'll get rid of HDD/Fusion drive options completely in an upcoming redesign, leave it to external storage if people need more.

Because let's assume they are working on 'pro configurations' - the i7 model already has some thermal throttling, and we're already 'overdue' for a refresh, I think it's safe to assume they're redesigning the iMac again. If they are, this year's design will be looking at the internal design they want to have 2-3-4 years down the line too. Reality is HDD's are being phased out due to size and performance, so the time to scrap them is now, design everything else around that decision. Getting rid of a big HDD on all models gives them a lot more flexibility for the higher end cpu/gpu configurations.

I think on the lower/mid levels they'll have 256gb, but higher tiers it will start at 512 with 1TB / 2TB options.

I agree, remove the HDD use the space to redesign with an improved thermal capacity for a 150W CPU and a 150W GPU. That would allow you to get up to a 10-core CPU and a RX480 or GTX1070.

 

[cynics]

There will still likely be a HDD options available in there for 2 reasons.

One and most obvious, higher profit margins.With the ability to offer a less expensive price.

Two, storage capacity. Many creative professionals working with video can be using a few hundred gigabytes or more on a single project. Now a lot of those people are working off external storage but not all. A 3tb option is important more for "pros" then your average customer. So not offering it to the people that need it the most would be strange. Hell, they don't make a SSD large enough for my iTunes media and I'm not dealing with pro res stuff hahah.

Also this question is a tad bit silly IMO. Them not offering a HDD option will not make an SSD option cheaper....these aren't iPhones. If you don't want a HDD then get an SSD but being excited about Apple giving less options? Odd....

 

[JMacHack]

There will still likely be a HDD options available in there for 2 reasons.

One and most obvious, higher profit margins.With the ability to offer a less expensive price.

Two, storage capacity. Many creative professionals working with video can be using a few hundred gigabytes or more on a single project. Now a lot of those people are working off external storage but not all. A 3tb option is important more for "pros" then your average customer. So not offering it to the people that need it the most would be strange. Hell, they don't make a SSD large enough for my iTunes media and I'm not dealing with pro res stuff hahah.

Also this question is a tad bit silly IMO. Them not offering a HDD option will not make an SSD option cheaper....these aren't iPhones. If you don't want a HDD then get an SSD but being excited about Apple giving less options? Odd....

They already have 2tb SSD's on had from the MBP refresh, I would imagine they'd just shove 'em in the iMac chassis rather than spend time procuring 2-4tb HDD's or engineering higher capacity fusion drives.

 

[cynics]

They already have 2tb SSD's on had from the MBP refresh, I would imagine they'd just shove 'em in the iMac chassis rather than spend time procuring 2-4tb HDD's or engineering higher capacity fusion drives.

True, wasn't aware of the MBP or I forgot. Still got those higher profit margins though. 1-2 GB PCIe SSDs are expensive.

 

[JMacHack]

True, wasn't aware of the MBP or I forgot. Still got those higher profit margins though. 1-2 GB PCIe SSDs are expensive.

I'm not an expert on procurement or anything like that, but I would think that it would be more expensive to get/engineer a line of hard drives specifically for one product than to use parts that you already have (albeit those parts being more expensive themselves). It would seem beneficial to me to have less overhead in that regard.

 

[cynics]

I'm not an expert on procurement or anything like that, but I would think that it would be more expensive to get/engineer a line of hard drives specifically for one product than to use parts that you already have (albeit those parts being more expensive themselves). It would seem beneficial to me to have less overhead in that regard.

They already have the HDD's too.

 

[CWallace]

The iMac Pro will almost certainly be SSD-only and I expect we're looking at Fusion for the rest (with SSD options).

I don't see the iMac Pro getting more than 6 cores because it then starts to play in Mac Pro territory. Unless they make the Pro a beast starting at 8/12 cores and going up.

 

[JMacHack]

They already have the HDD's too.

Yeah but they're 5400RPM drives, something that should've been phased out years ago.

 

[redheeler]

when they said the new iMac will be "geared towards pros" do you think that could mean I could expect SSD to come standard???

Geared toward pros on the high-end, where SSD (or Fusion drive) is already standard in the current models. Apple has made no guarantee regarding the rest of the lineup, but if Apple has any sense of decency left, we will finally see SSD or Fusion drive standard across all models - which frankly should've happened back in 2012 or 2013.

 

[theluggage]

when they said the new iMac will be "geared towards pros" do you think that could mean I could expect SSD to come standard??? If so i really hope they start at 512gb (but I know I'm dreaming)

Does it really matter what comes as standard? Having the options is useful.

I think the wording was that there would be versions of the iMac aimed at pros - and on the higher-end iMacs, the 256GB SSD instead of the Fusion drive is already a zero-cost option. The HD-only versions are a sales ploy to create a lower entry-level price (or maybe some big customers still won't buy SSDs) - if you do 5 mins of research, you don't buy them (unless you want an ornament for a receptionist's desk).

If you're a video/audio pro then you'll probably be looking at a serious external storage solution hanging off thunderbolt anyway so a modest internal SSD big enough for OS, Applications, swap, temporary files etc. should be all you need.

On the other hand, if you're a non-pro user and don't want an external box, a Fusion drive couple of TB of spinning rust built-in is the most economical way to store your movie collection.

Having a >256GB SSD in an all-in-one desktop is convenient if you've got money to burn, but not essential. The equation changes if you have a laptop (where you don't want to carry external drives and the robustness of SSDs is good) or a tower system (with space for a substantial storage array & easily swapped drives). Much as some of us would like it, I don't think Apple is likely to come out with a tower.

Now, if Apple completely re-design the iMac case then they may well go SSD-only.

 

[Moonjumper]

Does it really matter what comes as standard? Having the options is useful.

What comes as standard is important for easy availability. If a computer goes down when a deadline is near, being able to walk into a shop and get a suitable spec replacement is important. Usually you can only pick up a standard spec machine on the day.

 

[Dave245]

I think we are likely to see the same iMacs with spec bumps and a higher end configuration for those "Pro" users, I also think a new Keyboard with the same keys as the MacBook Pro and maybe the Touch Bar.