Will there ever be a new large iMac (Pro)?

[sublunar]

Yes, Apple could eat the costs up front with the margins they have, but that would impact the Mac's profitability for a time and that could mean it goes back to being "ignored" as the C Suite focuses on more profitable parts of the company in the interim.

This would be why I would see Apple consolidating the 21.5" and 27" into one single line below the 27" iMac Pro, and sharing the H series CPUs from the MacBook Pro - less R&D costs and shared component purchasing power. Ultimately the Mac mini would join in this with the desktop sector making up only 20% of Mac sales.

You're still going to have window-resizing issues due to the different effective resolutions. DPI does not affect window sizing, just clarity - a 27" 5K display in HiDPI 2560x1440 has a DPI of 0.1167 while a 27" QHD display at 2560x1440 has a DPI of 0.2335. The 5K HiDPI display is sharper thanks to the much finer DPI, but the windows are the same size because the effective resolution is identical. This might not be an issue for some, but it will be for others (including myself).

I might have missed something but Retina displays have all been the same PPI (hence my calculation on a 24" Retina display being 4608x2592 - 4.6k) and my understanding was that, for example, a window moving from a 27" iMac 5k with a secondary 21.5" Ultrafine LG monitor at the same effective PPI would appear seamless even though the 21.5" may would represent a smaller viewport. There may be a jarring of window sizes if moving to a secondary 27" 1080p monitor became the effective PPI would be different.

For what it's worth, I seldom use a secondary screen like that so it doesn't bother me.

I am pretty sure there are no technical limitations with using a T2 chip with a Fusion Drive. With Startup Security, you can boot a T2 Mac from an external HDD so there should be no reason you cannot do so from an internal HDD. And Apple could easily ship a T2 iMac with a version of macOS that requires it (or perhaps just certain parts) be located on the SSD part of a Fusion drive to work with "Full Security" mode.

I'm guessing that Apple started with SSD-only configurations for T-series chips because:
a) it was easier (since APFS is designed for SSDs)
b) they could exercise full control either through the storage modules being soldered to the system board or using only Apple-sourced blades.

That's a decent point but it's somewhat moot as people have been saying for some time now that Apple Macs should be all-SSD given the price that they are.

When even the Mac mini went with T2 and all SSD (and a massive price increase) with a more powerful desktop CPU instead of sticking with mobile CPU and keeping hard drives in as an option the writing had to be on the wall for the iMac's hard drives.

It's already a no brainer with laptops because of space considerations but I think hard drives are on the way out from desktops anyway so it's going to be inevitable that Apple have to go all SSD at some point.

Hard disks take up valuable space in designs. Without a hard drives the iMac can can be redesigned and while the reclaimed space in the iMac Pro was taken up by the cooling solution there's an obvious opportunity to create a really thin iMac without hard drives in.

 

[Azrael9]

I too think the iMac Pro may eventually be the only AIO Apple offers and that would be unfortunate. Either way I still much prefer the 21.5" size and 4K resolution. 27" and 5K is overkill for me. I don't want a monitor so large I can't see everything on the screen all at once. Meanwhile in PC land, they're making 32" and 43" monitors that are still only 4K.

I wouldn't bet against what you're saying. *sticker shock for the Mac 'Pro' that was £2k, then £2.5k then £3k then doubled in price for budget specs.

4k in PC land is 'just fine.' Especially when you don't have to throw away the rest of your computer when eg. the iMac's gpu cooks. :/

It's about time they had a 'Mac' that you can just plug into a 'Mac' monitor. I remember the G3 Towers fondly. A distant dream. It's what I'd LIKE to buy now. And I'm not alone in that view.

My imac is hanging by a thread. It won't boot from internal or external drive. It's making me wary of buying a new one when they come out. And perhaps building a dual boot PC/Ryzen Hackintosh along with a back up server Mac Mini, external GPU and 4k monitor solution instead. Dual Set Up.

Sure, my imac is 7.3 years old. But to throw away a perfectly good 'rest of the machine' because the gpu (maybe) is fried? A 27 inch 4k monitor from Dell or Ben Q would be an upgrade over my machine's 2500x...display. Kinder on my eyes. The 5k monitor on the iMac is very decent but if the GPU dies...you've had it. My iMac has given me good service. But my preference would be a tower in the 1st instance and still is.

1k for a monitor stand? No thankyou. Can buy a Ben Q 4k monitor and a Mac Mini for a little bit more. 5k+ for a budget specced Mac Pro? I'd be insane to go for that. £2k+ to get a mid-range 'pc'...with 8 gigs of ram and a low end gpu? No thanks. Big bevels and all. And still no SSD as standard? 1TB drives are about £100 now. Quite easy to give the Mac desktops a quality experience. But the emphasis on profits whilst nickle and diming customers. £200 for an extra 8 gigs or memory? :O

Steve Jobs would be rolling in his grave.

Meh. How great for the environment that is. 'Throw it. Get a new one.'

My response is too hold my wallet. I'm going to go dual set up. Apple kind of lost me with the Mac Pro launch. And the cricket chirping gasps as the monitor stand was announced.

Azrael.
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Short answer. I'd very much like a 32 inch iMac with improved cooling.

I'd much prefer that equation was a separate tower and 32 inch monitor.

5k? Smeh. Old hat now. If Apple are the pioneers they say they are...why not an 8k monitor?

Dell sell one. £3-4k. Depending on retailer.

For the other comments above. My original 2008 iMac was a 24 inch monitor. It seemed the sweet spot of eye comfort.

I wouldn't go back after 27 inches. I don't see why a 32 inch size can't be offered.

Remember when Apple offered a little more choice? And had 3 monitor sizes?

I don't see why a trillion dollar company can't offer 24, 27 and 32 inches.

Still with the out of date 21 inch (a bit tight...) and 27 inches.

Choice?

Azrael.

 

[sublunar]

One thing to consider is how large is the actual market for a 24" (unibody) iMac? Apple did offer one, but only for three years (2006-2009) before moving to 27". And when they did that, they made the smaller model 21.5" instead of the previous 20". Why? They had to source a custom panel, anyway, so they could have commissioned LG done a 24" 4K retina panel just as easily as a 21.5" model and chances are a 24" Ultrafine would have sold a fair bit better to MacBook Pro users than the 21.5" model did.

I'm guessing it is because the 20" model was a popular size for a certain segment - students, kiosks, etc. - because it fit better than the 24" model, much less a 27" one. So Apple dropping the 21.5" model for a 24" model would push out all those people again. And it would also alienate all the 27" iMac users who would now have to downsize their screen to 24" when it came time to replace their existing models.

"But there is the 27" iMac Pro for those people!" one might say. A similarly-configured 2019 iMac (8-core i9 / 32GB / 1TB / Pro Vega 48) is just over $4000 so Apple could probably get the 8-core (W-2245) model down to $4499 and perhaps even $3999. And there is a 6-core Xeon (W-2255) they could offer with 16GB and a 512GB SSD and a lower-end AMD 5000 series GPU to hit the $2599 price point of the current i7/RX 580 model.

But Xeons are optimized for multi-threaded operations, not single-threaded. They also can't clock as high as a Core i7 / Core i9 and generally can't hold the "top clock" for as long. Intel designed the W-2200 series Xeon for commercial and corporate workloads, not consumer. So for most general-use productivity software and daily tasks, a Xeon is not only wasted, it's an inferior platform in terms of performance to a Core family CPU.

My fear is that such a strategy could eventually spell the end of the iMac.

The customers for the current 21.5" model will either need to go Mac mini + external monitor or a Mac portable. The former is inelegant compared to an AIO and the latter might be an issue in terms of security or usability (due to using a 14/16" screen instead of 21.5").

The customers for the current 27" model will either need to downgrade in screen size (and performance and upgradeability if Apple moves to mobile CPUs and the standard soldered RAM and soldered storage) or buy an iMac Pro that might perform worse for the work they do.

This, of course, assumes they just decided macOS is no longer worth the new hardware tradeoffs and move to Windows.

I think 24" was seen as a big monitor in those days. They also offered 17" (briefly, before discontinuing) and 20" models at the same time giving the iMac 3 different sizes with 2 SKUs each.

After that the 21.5" iMac was actually a 1080p panel, with the 27" a 1440p panel.

And then later on when the Retina displays came in the 21.5" actually got a surprising update to full DCI-P3 4096x2304 - slightly more pixels than 1080p. The key point was that both monitors had the same 218PPI.

The 32" 6k Pro XDR Display being also 218PPI is the third data point that then proves that, should Apple be consolidating on panels with that density, a 24" 4608x2592 at 218PPI is feasible.

I'd say that only mass market education remains as a significant market and that could be dealt with by allowing a couple of 21.5" iMac SKUs to carry on - the CPU is still used in the Mac mini for probably another 18 months.

Kiosks are more likely to be run by inexpensive TFT panels connected to Windows, Raspberry Pi or Roku boxes these days.

The next series of Intel CPUs (I'm mainly including Comet Lake S here) as a response to AMD Ryzen can only really add more cores/threads - single thread performance isn't vastly improved while multi threaded performance is better but trails Ryzen.

The i9-10900K appears to be 10 cores, 20 threads (base clock 3.7Ghz) with a reputed TDP of over 125W and support for 128Gb of RAM.

This is matched by the Xeon W-2255 which is a 165w part with but can address up to 1Tb RAM and offer 48 PCIe lanes which on the iMac Pro would mean 4 independent Thunderbolt 3 ports. I'd argue at this point that the Xeon would be easily capable of long renders and periods at full turbo given decent cooling.

Apple don't overclock the K series Core CPUs that they put in the iMac - this neutralises the one major advantage of unlocked Core series CPUs over Xeon equivalents. The other advantage Core series CPUs have over Xeon is price, but we don't know what Apple are paying to get their CPUs.

How many people specified the i9 8 3.6GHz Core BTO upgrade on the top Coffee Lake (Refresh) SKU? It still doesn't have the 16 threads that the W-2145 has. The Xeon W2145 in the iMac Pro appears to be under clocked at 3.2GHz though otherwise it would have competed on single threaded tasks.

I'd say that at this stage there's no material difference in instructions per clock between Core and Xeon CPUs of he same family and I'll add that I have no axe to grind against the 65w CPUs but my earlier writings described how Apple could standardise against H series CPUs for volume savings and design considerations.

If all new models happens to continue to include non Pro 21.5" and 27" variants their respective redesigns could still go all SSD with Comet Lake H for a really thin design. But prices going up across the board isn't a good look.

 

[sublunar]

5k? Smeh. Old hat now. If Apple are the pioneers they say they are...why not an 8k monitor?

Dell sell one. £3-4k. Depending on retailer.

That requires 2 DP1.4 cables for 60Hz operation. It's inelegant in Apple's eyes so we're probably looking at a Thunderbolt 4 cable for that sort of thing (and another custom timing controller if it was ever to go into an iMac) in about 2-3 years.

 

[Voyageur]

5k? Smeh. Old hat now. If Apple are the pioneers they say they are...why not an 8k monitor?

Why 8K? What is the point of increasing the diagonal and resolution, while it is possible and necessary to improve the quality of the display. Increase brightness, response, add support for HDR.

 

[sublunar]

Why 8K? What is the point of increasing the diagonal and resolution, while it is possible and necessary to improve the quality of the display. Increase brightness, response, add support for HDR.

Mini LED backlight coming to iMac Pro later this year.

 

[CWallace]

I might have missed something but Retina displays have all been the same PPI (hence my calculation on a 24" Retina display being 4608x2592 - 4.6k) and my understanding was that, for example, a window moving from a 27" iMac 5k with a secondary 21.5" Ultrafine LG monitor at the same effective PPI would appear seamless even though the 21.5" may would represent a smaller viewport.

My Asus 27" QHD gaming display that (also) serves as my secondary iMac 5K display has half the DPI, but windows stay the same when I move them between them.

That's a decent point but it's somewhat moot as people have been saying for some time now that Apple Macs should be all-SSD given the price that they are.

They're not that much more than a Tier One PC OEM (a Dell 7700 with similar specs is about $400 cheaper and comes with a cheaper AIO case and a 4K display). And Apple's upgrade prices are in some cases less unreasonable than the PC OEMs - Dell wants almost $550 to upgrade from the standard 128GB SSD to a 1TB SSD on the 7700 AIO compared to $300 for Apple to upgrade to a 1TB SSD from a 2TB Fusion.

When even the Mac mini went with T2 and all SSD (and a massive price increase) with a more powerful desktop CPU instead of sticking with mobile CPU and keeping hard drives in as an option the writing had to be on the wall for the iMac's hard drives.

The Mac mini's standard hardware configuration change reflected its market change. The mini was launched to serve as an "entry point" for Windows PC users to the macOS ecosystem, but that role ended when the MacBook Air 13" dropped below $1499 Average Selling Price and really ended when the MBA hit $999 in ASP.

Instead, it became an Xcode development platform, media server (including on-the-fly transcoding), server compute module in a co-lo, and such which warranted a move to SSD-only storage because those roles either needed sub-1TB storage or they needed tens or scores of TBs of storage and that was all external.



Apple's market research probably shows the significant majority of "consumer-purchased" iMacs need a minimum of 1TB of storage and many need 2TB. Yes, Apple can gut their margins, but we're still looking at a $350-400 price increase to replace the 2TB Fusion Drive with a 2TB NVME SSD (which is better than the current $700, bit is still very expensive for many people).

And when I say "consumer-purchased" I mean people who walk into an Apple Store and buy a pre-configured model and do not understand how to attach external storage (either directly via USB/TB or a NAS) or do not want to go that route. These are people who just want to have all their storage inside the machine itself and have pictures and some pre-purchased music and maybe videos so they cannot comfortably (or at all) work with 256GB or even 512GB of SSD space.

 

[Moonjumper]

I detect a bout of self-interest there! but I'll play along.

TLDR for people bored of reading my stuff: If Apple want to add T2 to iMac 27" they have to get rid of HDD storage options and this will raise the price of it by hundreds of dollars. Apple have been showing us the future of the 27" iMac for the last few years with iMac Pro.


Firstly, I'll point out that we're now at the stage where 21" monitors are seen as a budget size. Most people have moved on to the 23-24" size screens and that's where 4k panels (at a lower PPI than Apple's definition of Retina) start to be sold. In the Apple ecosystem anyone who finds 21.5" too small either gets a Mac mini and monitor or bites the bullet and buys a 27" iMac.

So in my opinion it's not a case of 27" users being 'forced' to downgrade. It's an upsell for the 21.5" crowd because their Mac is about to get a lot more expensive in percentage terms.

If you don't need 'Pro power', what spec is your 27" iMac please? Is it a Coffee Lake model? Is it i5? i7? Have you upgraded it to SSD or did you need the Fusion Drive for extra storage? If you have $2k to spend on additional monitors I'm expecting that you didn't buy any iMac 27" off the shelf.

If you can afford 2 more LG 27" Retina 5k displays - much less the desk space - to sit next to your 27" 5k iMac I'd consider you to be an edge case. Those LG monitors are still around $1k new (I checked Amazon).

Mind you, only the iMac Pro could accommodate two external 5k displays at full 5k resolution. The 2019 Mac Pro can have 6 of them while the iMac 2019 5k can take just one extra 5k display (or 2 4k displays). The GPU needs extra cooling to be running all those extra pixels.

So you're probably adding non retina 1440p or 4k 27" displays to your iMac and obviously depending on the technology (TN panels are cheap) they are much more affordable. I'll bet that you're buying the 5k for the screen and not upgrading the Fusion Drive to full SSD, am not bothered about i7 or i9, and probably upgrade your own RAM. In any case I contend that you're still an edge case wanting to use 3 screens and not upgrading an iMac any further than stock.

You could run 1440p monitors off a Mac mini, if you really wanted screen real estate, or buy a refurb iMac off the refurb store or a third party retailer if you need big screen 27" on a budget.

I do have self-interest, but I also cannot see Apple downgrading the main feature of the iMac to compensate for adding a T2.

As you guessed several options for my screen set up, and got it wrong, I will explain more.

My iMac is the main screen. I want it as large as possible and as high quality as possible. I use it for the main windows in Unity (a game engine). Note that a 27" iMac is not able to display a portrait iPad Pro 12.9 resolution image at 1:1, but it is still the best option. I also use the screen for Illustrator and Photoshop. The large, high-quality screen makes a big difference. My second screen is an old 27" QHD IPS screen. It is used for extra windows in Unity where the quality is not so important, and for extra information as needed.

Using Unity, Illustrator, Photoshop, Visual Studio, Xcode, Pages, Safari, Audacity, Wings 3D, and others at the same time means I am swapping around a lot. Until recently I was also working part-time as a lecturer, marking required a lot of screen space (work being marked, my document for recording my marking, criterion reference grid, brief, student list, etc.). That is two jobs, both that are easier with lots of screen space, and I doubt they are the only kinds of work with that need. An IPS 4K screen is likely my next addition, unless Apple extends Sidecar to include Macs, in which case my current iMac will become the second screen.

My iMac is a Late 2015 model, although quite a high spec for the year (3.3 i5, M395 graphics, 24GB RAM, 2GB Fusion), but I hope to upgrade soon. I would like to see a redesign before I do.

 

[sublunar]

My Asus 27" QHD gaming display that (also) serves as my secondary iMac 5K display has half the DPI, but windows stay the same when I move them between them.

That's the point of retina though. A 27" 5k display is treated as a 2560x1440 display by default for Window sizing, the 'pixels' are just sharper because they are made up of 4 pixels instead of 1.

They're not that much more than a Tier One PC OEM (a Dell 7700 with similar specs is about $400 cheaper and comes with a cheaper AIO case and a 4K display). And Apple's upgrade prices are in some cases less unreasonable than the PC OEMs - Dell wants almost $550 to upgrade from the standard 128GB SSD to a 1TB SSD on the 7700 AIO compared to $300 for Apple to upgrade to a 1TB SSD from a 2TB Fusion.

Apple's market research probably shows the significant majority of "consumer-purchased" iMacs need a minimum of 1TB of storage and many need 2TB. Yes, Apple can gut their margins, but we're still looking at a $350-400 price increase to replace the 2TB Fusion Drive with a 2TB NVME SSD (which is better than the current $700, bit is still very expensive for many people).

And when I say "consumer-purchased" I mean people who walk into an Apple Store and buy a pre-configured model and do not understand how to attach external storage (either directly via USB/TB or a NAS) or do not want to go that route. These are people who just want to have all their storage inside the machine itself and have pictures and some pre-purchased music and maybe videos so they cannot comfortably (or at all) work with 256GB or even 512GB of SSD space.

My iMac is a Late 2015 model, although quite a high spec for the year (3.3 i5, M395 graphics, 24GB RAM, 2GB Fusion), but I hope to upgrade soon. I would like to see a redesign before I do.

Good points, if Apple were simply going to go all SSD on all price points and weren't going to nickel and dime on storage quantities or how that storage is made up, they'd do away with Fusion Drive altogether and stick with full speed NVME NAND. Apple couldn't reduce total storage below expectation of users who have become used to 1Tb or 2Tb storage in a tried and tested product that's been around for years.

They could just do a price cut on all SKUs and call that a 'refresh' to try and drive demand, say $100 across the board for the iMacs. Or they could attempt a storage bump but they are limited to what they can do.

For example, silently increasing the SSD portion of 1Tb Fusion Drives back to 128Gb for no increase in price across all units would be extremely difficult to qualify if a user doesn't know which Fusion drive they are picking up - and may not even be doable on the basis of the 2018 Mac mini was bumped - using existing BTO options.

Upgrading to 2Tb Fusion also would not happen as it would lead to expectations of 2Tb of storage in successive models - and if these models progress into the T2 era the price increase would be impossible to bridge.

On that basis, and on the assumption that Apple could afford to 'double up' a 512Gb SSD BTO to 1Tb a straight up all-SSD refresh on the 27" models, that looks like this:

Base 21.5" non retina iMac just disappears because you can't order it with more than 256Gb SSD.
Mid tier 21.5" 4k iMac goes from $1299 to $1699 - $400 increase
Top tier 21.5" 4k iMac goes from $1499 to $1799 - $300 increase

Base 27" iMac goes from $1799 to $2099 - $300 increase
Mid Tier 27" iMac goes from $1999 to $2299 - $300 increase
Top Tier 27" iMac goes from $2299 to $2599* - $300 increase

*Top tier 27" iMac actually gets 2Tb SSD because it started on 2Tb Fusion - not sure if that's a correct calculation - but Apple could equally quietly discontinue it if they intend on introducing a price cut to iMac Pro 2017.

That's if Apple do nothing else but bump the storage to go all-SSD. Apple would ordinarily have dropped in new CPUs, perhaps added a FaceID camera, or even the T2, and not charged any extra but a $300 uplift is going to be a tough one to explain to Joe Public who may not connect up the fact that the 1Tb storage has gone from HDD/Fusion to all SSD.

This also assumes that the CPU gets a bump too but it's too early to expect Comet Lake S CPUs to become available.

However, with Mac mini getting stalled on Coffee Lake CPUs could Apple just do a soft storage based refresh on iMac - leaving Coffee Lake in place, ignoring the T2 CPU, but throwing SSD at the solution and selling off the old fusion drive/HDD models in the refurb store or third party retailers?

Upgrading every SKU to 1Tb (or 2Tb) SSD at a reduced cost on most models would in theory be a 'discount' like what happened to the Mac mini.

And 'refreshing' the iMac in May, before WWDC, would give maximum spotlight to an all new 14" MacBook Pro.

21.5" iMac to stay at the same price points?
The 21.5" iMac is sensitive to price shifts and I get the sense that corporate/education users would prefer the unit price to stay the same. If Apple were to stick to the same price point they could bump the base and mid tier models to Fusion Drives (costing $100 each) and possibly drop the top tier model. Or just outright drop the price by $100 for all three to try and drive demand.

So what goes into the gap?
This would make space for the now infamous 24" 4.6k iMac Air in the gap between $1399-$2099. In the face of storage upgrading the existing iMac the argument for a 24" model looks weaker if Apple were to just do straight price cuts.

But as a new product underneath a price increased 27" model it wouldn't have to contend with expectations on base storage or CPU and I'd see it starting with 8Gb RAM, 512Gb SSD, and all that in an all new thinner design.

Apple could also reduce SKUs down to 2 per size as it did in the days when 17", 20", and 24" models had 2 SKUs each.

 

[sublunar]

I do have self-interest, but I also cannot see Apple downgrading the main feature of the iMac to compensate for adding a T2.

As you guessed several options for my screen set up, and got it wrong, I will explain more.

My iMac is the main screen. I want it as large as possible and as high quality as possible. I use it for the main windows in Unity (a game engine). Note that a 27" iMac is not able to display a portrait iPad Pro 12.9 resolution image at 1:1, but it is still the best option. I also use the screen for Illustrator and Photoshop. The large, high-quality screen makes a big difference. My second screen is an old 27" QHD IPS screen. It is used for extra windows in Unity where the quality is not so important, and for extra information as needed.

Using Unity, Illustrator, Photoshop, Visual Studio, Xcode, Pages, Safari, Audacity, Wings 3D, and others at the same time means I am swapping around a lot. Until recently I was also working part-time as a lecturer, marking required a lot of screen space (work being marked, my document for recording my marking, criterion reference grid, brief, student list, etc.). That is two jobs, both that are easier with lots of screen space, and I doubt they are the only kinds of work with that need. An IPS 4K screen is likely my next addition, unless Apple extends Sidecar to include Macs, in which case my current iMac will become the second screen.

My iMac is a Late 2015 model, although quite a high spec for the year (3.3 i5, M395 graphics, 24GB RAM, 2GB Fusion), but I hope to upgrade soon. I would like to see a redesign before I do.

Funnily enough I've been long in the camp where I'd prefer a headless Mac although I think that Apple have sunk most of their time into their laptops (questionable butterfly keyboard decision aside). The iMac design and marketing interests me in terms of what they could have done with the Mini.

From that workload I'm certain that all-SSD storage is far better than the Fusion drive.

The Mini is capable of driving 3 4k screens - and that's before you add an eGPU. You could then choose larger screens to suit you - ones that you can rotate to portrait if you wish.

 

[macpro2000]

Regardless they need to make iMacs go to at least 4TB SSD.

 

[724699]

You know what I would absolutely love to see, and I think Apple needs to release this ... just received my new Pro Display XDR (mated with a full-specced iMac 2019).

iMac Pro needs a matching screen size and bezel design to drive one of these as a secondary display. The XDR's design is just stunning; it's really making this iMac look old at this point (though it's still a great looking computer even in 2020 I must admit!) ... design the iMac Pro around the same screen size and resolution, and they have an absolute winning combination on their hands.

An 8K display is not needed at this point. I see 6K being around for a long time yet. Perfect transition/target for the Pro lineup

 

[XD_Goulart]

The current design might be a non starter for the iMac Pro too - the W22xx Xeons appear to have a higher TDP than the W21xx CPUs used in the 2017 iMac.

This suggests that, unless Apple get a custom (down clocked) SKU that fits within the cooling solution of the existing iMac Pro, they'll be redesigning that too. It's known that Apple use a custom SKU already, and speculated that such a SKU is down clocked for just that reason.
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The earliest an A14X could turn up is September alongside the iPhones. Not unheard of, especially as the iPad Pros won't be using them as they've just been refreshed. It would mean that developers would potentially have less time to get software out for the holiday season unless they give massive clues at WWDC.

Not sure why we don't have an A13X but there wasn't an A11X either - my speculation was that Apple might have decided that iPad Pros won't be on an annual refresh schedule.

On the other hand, it might also have an impact on heavy duty use in a desktop Mac, for instance, if Apple decided they weren't doing iPad Pro CPUs every year - those are the CPUs you might expect to end up in a MacBook (actually I have called an ARM powered laptop an iBook before).

I was commenting regarding the Apple TV, but okay, your comment makes sense...

 

[XD_Goulart]

I expect the Imac to have screens ranging from 24 to 29 and/or 30 inches, the Imac Pro to be 31 inches,and according to rumors, it will have be 31.5 inches(Both with thinner edges please?) and the Pro Display XDR will probably still be 32 inches,at least during the year 2020. The Imac would be a little more expensive with that of course, but it would still be the most accessible Apple computer for the average user, since professional monitors would have much higher and more expensive specifications that would not be necessary for those who do not use Imac for professional use.We would probably have an Imac like the Design of this article here:https://9to5mac.com/2020/03/23/imac...-with-slim-bezels-and-pro-display-xdr-design/

 

[CWallace]

Supply chain rumors imply the 2020 iMac Pro will remain a 27" panel, just with miniLED backlighting to support HDR and probably higher nit brightness.

As such, I don't expect the "consumer" model (the iMac) to have a larger display than the "pro" model.

 

[XD_Goulart]

[QUOTE = "CWallace, post: 28344374, member: 121473"]

Supply chain rumors indicate that the 2020 iMac Pro will remain a 27 "panel, with only miniLED backlighting to support HDR and probably a higher nit brightness.



As such, I don't expect the "consumer" model (the iMac) to have a larger display than the "professional" model.

[/TO QUOTE]

Yes, 31.5 inches was a rumor released in January or February, but Kuo, a generally trusted analyst, guarantees 27 inches for the Imac Pro, meaning that the Imac is unlikely to have a screen larger than 27 inches (maybe 21 , 5 inches will be replaced by 24 inches, however.) Which is a shame, I don't know if the Imac will do well in sales in 2020, but if Kuo is right (usually he is), I will probably expect a Surface Studio 3 (which can be launched in October 2020) than buying an Imac that can be launched in June at WWDC 2020.

 

[sublunar]

You know what I would absolutely love to see, and I think Apple needs to release this ... just received my new Pro Display XDR (mated with a full-specced iMac 2019).

iMac Pro needs a matching screen size and bezel design to drive one of these as a secondary display. The XDR's design is just stunning; it's really making this iMac look old at this point (though it's still a great looking computer even in 2020 I must admit!) ... design the iMac Pro around the same screen size and resolution, and they have an absolute winning combination on their hands.

An 8K display is not needed at this point. I see 6K being around for a long time yet. Perfect transition/target for the Pro lineup

I'm just not sure professionals would like to spend potentially $10k on an all in one computer - I certainly wouldn't want to.

And in that price range, you'd suspect that any reinvention of the iMac Pro in that range would remove the iSight camera if they have been listening to Hollywood studios or other industries where confidentiality is important - although I guess that the Mac Pro has made that a bit moot for the shops that still use Macs.

With the advent of the Mac Pro, the iMac Pro could perhaps afford to drift downwards in price - I would say that a 27" 5k panel with mini LED backlight (and more local dimming zones) would make it a much more compelling product.
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Regardless they need to make iMacs go to at least 4TB SSD.

The MacBook Po 16" allows 8Tb of storage so it stands to reason that the iMac could get that as an option. I'd suggest that 1Tb standard SSD would make 8Tb as an option very logical.

 

[724699]

I'm just not sure professionals would like to spend potentially $10k on an all in one computer - I certainly wouldn't want to.

I'm a professional, and I would spend upwards of $10K on an iMac Pro with all those features. Has nothing to do with being an all-in-one, if it meets the demands of the 'pro'.

People such as myself who use these machines daily to make money, don't mind investing in the best tools possible. It pays for itself in the long-run.

 

[sublunar]

I'm a professional, and I would spend upwards of $10K on an iMac Pro with all those features. Has nothing to do with being an all-in-one, if it meets the demands of the 'pro'.

People such as myself who use these machines daily to make money, don't mind investing in the best tools possible. It pays for itself in the long-run.

But you now have the option of spending (admittedly more than $10k) on a Mac Pro and Pro Display XDR. Wouldn't that be a possibility?

 

[724699]

But you now have the option of spending (admittedly more than $10k) on a Mac Pro and Pro Display XDR. Wouldn't that be a possibility?

Well that's just it. For what I need, the iMac Pro with 8 cores and 64GB of ram, 1TB SSD, Vega 64(X) etc. meets my performance requirements, and comes with a screen built-in. If Apple were to charge even "$2,000 more" for just the screen, it'd still be cheaper than $8-9K for the Mac Pro, plus 2x $5K for dual monitors.

 

[lilcosco08]

Seems like late summer / early fall at the earliest assuming they're going with Comet Lake-S.

I wonder if the 21.5" will get the old gen CPUs again. Either way expecting SSDs to become standard, 16GB RAM in the mid-tier 21.5"s and up, and Navi.

Hoping they at least slim the bezels, but I don't think we'll see any big redesigns until the switch to ARM

 

[sublunar]

Seems like late summer / early fall at the earliest assuming they're going with Comet Lake-S.

I wonder if the 21.5" will get the old gen CPUs again. Either way expecting SSDs to become standard, 16GB RAM in the mid-tier 21.5"s and up, and Navi.

Hoping they at least slim the bezels, but I don't think we'll see any big redesigns until the switch to ARM

If you recall that the CoinX leaker said that there would be a refresh of the Mac mini 'soon' - the mini got refreshed in a surprise move days later.

The mini got a simple storage bump and by some accounts doesn't even get called a 2020 Mac mini internally because it just needed the factories to use different parts from the parts bin when making the same machine.

Obviously half of that prediction has come true, the other half could amount to some sort of refresh which uses existing BTO parts to keep the iMac 'fresh' until some future date. A quiet refresh in May, for example, leaves a door open for a full refresh in October 2021 for example.

With the mini continuing to use the same Coffee Lake CPUs it follows that iMacs get the lightest of refreshes to keep using the same CPUs and parts.

It also makes sense if they are finding demand difficult to gauge as Apple would keep existing machines in the channel at third party retailers with a discount applied.

On a slightly different note, I'm also thinking that Apple may want to avoid going to 1Tb SSD for 27" models because third party retailers might not be able to tell them apart from 1Tb Fusion Drive models. Don't laugh but for that reason I'd suggest a switch to 512Gb SSD and no price increase in Apple Stores and price cut the Fusion Drive models at third party retailers.

This would lead to subsequent further discounts in the refurb store.

It's a supply chain win, retailers don't get confused, and consumers get a choice of discounted Macs which is what is happening with Minis in the refurb store at the moment.

Ironically, the iMac Pro would still require a genuine refresh with all parts available, and Q4 might be the best time to launch that with RDNA2 GPUs likely to be available.

 

[lilcosco08]

If you recall that the CoinX leaker said that there would be a refresh of the Mac mini 'soon' - the mini got refreshed in a surprise move days later.

The mini got a simple storage bump and by some accounts doesn't even get called a 2020 Mac mini internally because it just needed the factories to use different parts from the parts bin when making the same machine.

Yeah, that had me thinking maybe we get a quiet refresh here very soon just swapping fusion drives for SSDs and more RAM (and hopefully RDNA graphics). Then in Q4 we get the comet lake overhaul, custom RDNA2 chips & the iMac Pro

 

[CWallace]

I wonder if the 21.5" will get the old gen CPUs again.

The 21.5" did go from Gen8 to Gen9 (Coffee Lake Refresh) in the 2019 refresh and the model does use socketed CPUs so Intel should have a compatible Gen10 Comet Lake S part Apple can put in.

 

[Azrael9]

The Mac Mini and iPad refreshes didn't inspire me with confidence for any iMac upgrade.

Disappointing both.

Whilst we get more SSD for the money...it's about time to bump the ram to 16 gigs rather than than the $200 dollar gauging for an extra 8 gigs.

And an extra complaint. Integrated graphics. For a machine costing around a £1000 with no screen...there should be better graphics options. IT used to be the machine that boasted that it came with dedicated gpu whilst Wintel equivalents didn't.

To make the graphics worth anything, it's an eGPU chassis and a gpu on top. Expensive way to get graphics on a 'budget' or 'entry' desktop Mac.

About time Apple offered a proper mainstream tower rather than 'just' the reality warping Mac Pro pricing. £6 grand to get terrible specs? *shakes head.

The iMac. Design refresh now long overdue with the obvious successor looking like taking design inspiration from the Pro Display. 16 gigs of ram. SSD as standard. And access to the Radeon 5700XT series. And I'd like 8 core standard (8 cores is mainstream, with 12 and 16 cores threatening to go mainstream real soon.)

iMac Pro. I wouldn't bet against the iMac getting the Mac Mini grey spray and consolidating the iMac line back to single machine. Just with more core options, higher gpu tiers at the top config'.

As for when. Be nice to see something for WWDC. Could do with something inspiring.

Azrael.