Well the 11th gen Intel desktop CPUs are a bit of a disaster so I don't think I would want one anyway.
Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Why are people so mad about the new iMac?
- Thread starter Astralis56
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
I don't think it is way cheaper, I think the iMac is slightly more expensive ($100 USD or so).
Thanks: but if I buy another M1 Mac, I’d prefer good speakers, microphones and a new cooling system instead.
The cooling system in the Mini looks a lot more robust than the one in the iMac to me. It was built for an Intel six core CPU. The integrated mics and speakers are great of course but you can add better speakers to a Mac mini.
The biggest advantage of the Mini though is you can easily swap it out for the M1X/M2 model. I looked seriously at the Intel mini before buying a 2020 27" iMac but it was so overpriced relative to the iMac.
Sure, I know the Mini is more flexible, I like them 🙂but the ongoing issues keep me away. I’ll wait and see what the next M chip Macs bring.
If I understand correctly, they didn't want that because of the heat from the screen.
I don't think so that is anyone is crazy about the new MacBook! but why you look like that everyone is crazy about the new MacBook?
Ah, the chin! What's the big deal about the chin? I have one, and it seems even larger because I wear a beard.
OK, I was glad to see the chin disappear from iPhone, but the trade-off there was more screen real estate. I doubt that Apple would fill that space on iMac in order to deliver a 4:3 aspect ratio. I'd guess that if the chin went bye-bye there would be nothing but open air to replace it.
Practically speaking? I guess the iMac's chin is driven by thinness. Would there be room behind the display panel for the speaker assemblies, fans, and main logic board? Yes, if the unit was twice as thick as it is. The available photos show, however, that those components are in the chin. You might say, "Chin makes thin."
So queue the "Apple is obsessed with thinness" comments. It's certainly not essential that iMac be that thin - my 27-inch has that deep bulge in the back, and after living with that for many years... the new, totally flat back looks sorta svelte. It also makes it look like an oversized iPad Pro, which isn't necessarily a bad thing.
One thing about the chin is that it helps distinguish iMac from a simple flat screen display. If you have to contemplate how the thing will look when on display in a store, that's not an inconsequential consideration.
Thin was likely the primary motivation for the MagSafe power connector - there's not enough depth to accommodate the familiar IEC mains power receptacle. A lesser manufacturer might have just equipped the thing with a non-removable power cable, but that also necessitates country/region-specific models with the appropriate power plug on the other end. It's still more efficient to produce one, world-wide configuration and drop an appropriately-plugged power cable or power adapter into the box. And as an added bonus, folks love MagSafe and that satisfying click when it leaps from your fingers and fastens itself to the machine. Quick-disconnect isn't as important in a desktop as a laptop, but it'll still prevent some unfortunate accidents. And wall warts/external power supplies do reduce internal cooling requirements and bulk (there's that thin-thing again) even though they do clutter up the externals.
As to the side-mounted headphone jack? Not too many reasons for complaint if you actually use it for headphones - it's a much better spot than the back. As others have noted, thin may have been the driving force of this move, too, due to the depth needed for that jack. However, unless you're an audio pro who's connecting the Mac to an analog audio interface box (instead of a digital I/O???), side-mounted seems far superior to rear-mounted.
I've owned every iMac form factor other than the original flat panel with the hemispheric base - the CRT-equipped Lime (1999), the thick-sided white plastic 20-inch Late 2006 (Intel Core Duo), thick-sided silver aluminum/black plastic-backed 20-inch Early 2009, the thin-edged, all-aluminum silver 27-inch Late 2013 (and several others in that factor from later years). I'd be delighted to have a 30-inch with the same design as the new 24-inch. Maybe it'll be the same thickness, maybe a bit thicker to maintain proportion. I guess we'll just have to wait and see.
Yeah, looks are only skin deep (and this thing is so thin it's barely more than skin-deep), but if nobody cared about looks nobody would be complaining about the chin, either.
OK, I was glad to see the chin disappear from iPhone, but the trade-off there was more screen real estate. I doubt that Apple would fill that space on iMac in order to deliver a 4:3 aspect ratio. I'd guess that if the chin went bye-bye there would be nothing but open air to replace it.
Practically speaking? I guess the iMac's chin is driven by thinness. Would there be room behind the display panel for the speaker assemblies, fans, and main logic board? Yes, if the unit was twice as thick as it is. The available photos show, however, that those components are in the chin. You might say, "Chin makes thin."
So queue the "Apple is obsessed with thinness" comments. It's certainly not essential that iMac be that thin - my 27-inch has that deep bulge in the back, and after living with that for many years... the new, totally flat back looks sorta svelte. It also makes it look like an oversized iPad Pro, which isn't necessarily a bad thing.
One thing about the chin is that it helps distinguish iMac from a simple flat screen display. If you have to contemplate how the thing will look when on display in a store, that's not an inconsequential consideration.
Thin was likely the primary motivation for the MagSafe power connector - there's not enough depth to accommodate the familiar IEC mains power receptacle. A lesser manufacturer might have just equipped the thing with a non-removable power cable, but that also necessitates country/region-specific models with the appropriate power plug on the other end. It's still more efficient to produce one, world-wide configuration and drop an appropriately-plugged power cable or power adapter into the box. And as an added bonus, folks love MagSafe and that satisfying click when it leaps from your fingers and fastens itself to the machine. Quick-disconnect isn't as important in a desktop as a laptop, but it'll still prevent some unfortunate accidents. And wall warts/external power supplies do reduce internal cooling requirements and bulk (there's that thin-thing again) even though they do clutter up the externals.
As to the side-mounted headphone jack? Not too many reasons for complaint if you actually use it for headphones - it's a much better spot than the back. As others have noted, thin may have been the driving force of this move, too, due to the depth needed for that jack. However, unless you're an audio pro who's connecting the Mac to an analog audio interface box (instead of a digital I/O???), side-mounted seems far superior to rear-mounted.
I've owned every iMac form factor other than the original flat panel with the hemispheric base - the CRT-equipped Lime (1999), the thick-sided white plastic 20-inch Late 2006 (Intel Core Duo), thick-sided silver aluminum/black plastic-backed 20-inch Early 2009, the thin-edged, all-aluminum silver 27-inch Late 2013 (and several others in that factor from later years). I'd be delighted to have a 30-inch with the same design as the new 24-inch. Maybe it'll be the same thickness, maybe a bit thicker to maintain proportion. I guess we'll just have to wait and see.
Yeah, looks are only skin deep (and this thing is so thin it's barely more than skin-deep), but if nobody cared about looks nobody would be complaining about the chin, either.
It would be neat if larger iMac has the same design as the 24”. I like that we are seeing a bit of the iMac Pro cooling system engineering in the 24”. Decided to wait on the larger model for the specs.
I wonder if Apple will announce the next M chip at WWDC (and the first wave of the next gen M chip Macs there too?)
I wonder if Apple will announce the next M chip at WWDC (and the first wave of the next gen M chip Macs there too?)
Of course we all want to have the latest and greatest Macs, and we want them now. And it’s understandable that people who expected higher-end models to be released this month are disappointed.
But we should not forget that we are dealing with economics and very delicate engineering here, not fairy dust. Whatever Apple sells must make sense to the customer, and it also must make sense to Apple. First, We are talking about a product manufactured at the most cutting edge process ever known to mankind. That TCMS and Apple managed to ramp up the production of these chips into millions is nothing but an extremely impressive achievement. Sure, they could have rushed production of the bigger chips, but these chips would inevitably have worse yields, which means supply shortages across the entire Apple Silicon range. Second, there are component supply constraints. Higher powered Macs will most likely use quad-channel LPDDR5 or DDR5, they have to, in order to meet performance targets everyone expects of them. There is not enough supply yet for the amounts Apple will need. Same for miniLED display backlights.
What Apple does has a lot of business sense. They are focusing on consumer-oriented, entry-level products first in order to drive sales and get to a high adoption rate so that the pro stuff arrives to a well prepared ecosystem. They are reusing the same silicon, achieving incredible economy of scale and gathering data about how these chips behave in various usage scenarios. They proceed slowly, methodically, taking no unnecessary risks, making sure that their financials are solid. They have a plan. And it makes sense.
To everyone waiting - your more powerful Macs will arrive soon. Dint worry
But we should not forget that we are dealing with economics and very delicate engineering here, not fairy dust. Whatever Apple sells must make sense to the customer, and it also must make sense to Apple. First, We are talking about a product manufactured at the most cutting edge process ever known to mankind. That TCMS and Apple managed to ramp up the production of these chips into millions is nothing but an extremely impressive achievement. Sure, they could have rushed production of the bigger chips, but these chips would inevitably have worse yields, which means supply shortages across the entire Apple Silicon range. Second, there are component supply constraints. Higher powered Macs will most likely use quad-channel LPDDR5 or DDR5, they have to, in order to meet performance targets everyone expects of them. There is not enough supply yet for the amounts Apple will need. Same for miniLED display backlights.
What Apple does has a lot of business sense. They are focusing on consumer-oriented, entry-level products first in order to drive sales and get to a high adoption rate so that the pro stuff arrives to a well prepared ecosystem. They are reusing the same silicon, achieving incredible economy of scale and gathering data about how these chips behave in various usage scenarios. They proceed slowly, methodically, taking no unnecessary risks, making sure that their financials are solid. They have a plan. And it makes sense.
To everyone waiting - your more powerful Macs will arrive soon. Dint worry
Probably. No later than September is my guess. They’ll for sure want the “pro” machines available for devs to use their DTK credits on.
There is no chance the larger new iMacs will look like the 24" model. The 24" model is aimed at the general consumer. The larger iMacs will have more of a power focus and the look will reflect that. I expect the opposite look. Dark borders, colors, etc.
JCR wrote:
"More memory. Again a minimum of 8GB provided with the option to expand up to 16GB. That could be fine for the baseline model but for the top tier we should have seen 16GB as the minimum and have the ability to expand up to at least 32GB or 64GB."
I've posted this previously, but I sense that the design of the m1 CPU limits the amount of memory that can be used to 16gb (or possibly 24gb). This may have something to do with the "unified memory" technology as well.
Hence, "the limit" of 16gb with no possibility of adding more.
I also predict that nearly all future variations of the m-series CPU will also have similar "limits" to the amount of RAM installed, and few or none of them will have "expandable" RAM. This includes m-series based Mac Pros or iMac Pros.
The amount of RAM you "have" will be the amount you "buy" when you purchase the Mac.
I could be wrong.
"More memory. Again a minimum of 8GB provided with the option to expand up to 16GB. That could be fine for the baseline model but for the top tier we should have seen 16GB as the minimum and have the ability to expand up to at least 32GB or 64GB."
I've posted this previously, but I sense that the design of the m1 CPU limits the amount of memory that can be used to 16gb (or possibly 24gb). This may have something to do with the "unified memory" technology as well.
Hence, "the limit" of 16gb with no possibility of adding more.
I also predict that nearly all future variations of the m-series CPU will also have similar "limits" to the amount of RAM installed, and few or none of them will have "expandable" RAM. This includes m-series based Mac Pros or iMac Pros.
The amount of RAM you "have" will be the amount you "buy" when you purchase the Mac.
I could be wrong.
The amount of memory is limited by what they can put on the package. M1 uses two LPDDR4X modules in a dual-channel configuration. AFAIK max capacity of such modules is 8GB, so that’s why the limit is 16GB.
Higher end Macs will most likely use quad-channel RAM with some DDR5/LPDDR5 variant. These also have higher capacity, so they might support up to 128GB in four modules (no idea about practical availability though). I agree that we are very unlikely to see modular RAM in these things - it’s just not compatible with Apple’s design goals. They need high performance and high efficiency, which means high pinout and extreme optimization of the electrical connection. That’s just not possible with socketed RAM. It’s the same reason why RAM in GPUs is always soldered. And Apple Silicon memory subsystem is arguably takes more after a GPU than a CPU.
I think you're right, which is making me think twice about waiting for the 27" update. Price-wise there will be a jump up for the new models anyway, and when you factor in Apple's cost for adding RAM, it's going to be out of my budget.
A 16/512 M1 Mini is looking more attractive each day...
I feel I need to defend my point here. We're accustomed to the Intel ecosystem of having a range of CPUs at any given time with a wide variety of price and performance for manufacturers to select from. The more compact, thermally limited devices get dual core i3's, midrange products get quad core i3's or i5's, and higher performance models get 6-8 core i7's and i9's. Apple has taken 4 OS X products (Mini, MBA, MBP, iMac), that had at least 3 levels of Intel CPUs, and put the same processor in all of them.
I recognize that each has improved performance over their Intel predecessors. I really don't understand why Apple bothers having a 7 core GPU M1 base model and an optional 8 core GPU M1. Since Apple offers no Apple Silicon roadmap, we have no idea what an M2 or M3 might be, but A series SOCs are getting faster without dramatic power increases. I think M series can afford to get higher performance with some power increase since they are destined for larger devices.
Apple Silicon certainly doesn't need the spread of CPU's that Intel produces, but I think there does need to be a range of say three SOC's that move forward in performance together for 3 ranges of products. I was hoping the new iMac would have ushered in the first iteration of a higher performing M1. I was pleasantly surprised the iPad Pro received the M1 and not an A14x. I guess it's just a bit hard to wrap my head around the "one chip to rule them all" approach given the history with Intel.
Colors probably not (I can dream. I know the colors are consumer buy bait), but why wouldn’t the larger models have beefier takes on the 24” iMac’s cooling system, speakers and microphones?
Displays not waking up (some have had to disconnect and reconnect their displays), contrast issues with displays and I’ve seen the ongoing Bluetooth connectivity issues mentioned too. Plus, the tinny speakers. The iMac solves all but the bluetooth (and hopefully will resolve the Bluetoot connectivity.)
Last edited:
I'm worried that this madness of thinness above all in desktop continues to so called "pro" line.
Based on my experience with Apple, they don't really deviate from the direction they set forth.
This is a desktop. Design like a desktop please. By going thick, Apple could have removed the chin altogether while keeping various ports options in place. And with M1 thermal envelop, going thick is not going to be like previous iMac's thickest part. Instead, they did weird stuff by going fan in chin with no heat pipe. ?????
Based on my experience with Apple, they don't really deviate from the direction they set forth.
This is a desktop. Design like a desktop please. By going thick, Apple could have removed the chin altogether while keeping various ports options in place. And with M1 thermal envelop, going thick is not going to be like previous iMac's thickest part. Instead, they did weird stuff by going fan in chin with no heat pipe. ?????
If we look at the iMac 21,5'' their 2011 model (still the thick design) had solely Mobile series GPU for choice while the equal 2010 model had GPU from the desktop segment. The mobile GPU has been the history on those since then if I ain't wrong.
The base non-4K iMac 21,5'' also had mobile CPUs from 2014 on. It isn't supplemented by the new M1 iMacs but it shows intent.
In certain ways Apple has already decided for low power, less demanding silicon on their smaller iMacs and kept this course for 10 years.