None of the rumors of a 23" iMac exclude a redesign of the 27" iMac. And MaxTech and others have argued (quite rightly) that it doesn't make sense to redesign the bottom end of the line and not the top end. It makes sense a chassis/screen change is also coming for the larger iMac.
None of this precludes a production held until Q3/Q4. Indeed, the prior WWDC announcement for iMac Pro was well in advance of production. If memory serves, I think that was also true of the trashcan Mac Pro.
So that's my humble take on these facts. I think it's a redesign, or they would have released it with the mini. The big question is when does the new hotness go into production?
If it's a full redesign of the iMac line then they surely want to wait for all models to be refreshed at the same time as the 23" iMac unless Apple have decided that sales need a boost so they wanted to do a spec bump rather than a price cut. If the sales of the Mac mini were not going to affect the bottom line in their
excellent Q2 results call then they'd have been happy to put it out prior to April 30. But they might have decided very late in the day to put the figures from a spec bumped iMac into Q3 - hence the delay.
If Apple thinks people will be
buying Macs (and iPads) in Q3 to cope with working (and learning) from home then they can help drive sales with at least a soft refresh to make their products decent value (see the mini) when news of WWDC starts hitting tech websites in June - "by the way, Apple recently refreshed the iMac (and mini)...".
The difference between the trashcan 2013 Mac Pro, the 2019 Mac Pro, and the iMac Pro was that Apple had no viable product in that price range at time of announcement.
Apple would never pre-announce a refresh of an existing product line in the price range of other existing similar products and then wait 6 months - it's a recipe for
commercial suicide.
- leaks imply the iMac(s) is/are ready and should be a redesign
- intel cpus are out
- wwdc seems to be scheduled June 1st (leaked date)
- BTO 27" in Canada are shipping June 3rd.
knowing that the leaks are validated by more than one source, i think the release is imminent.
I just tried a BTO 27 in the UK and shipping is similarly in early June (1-4) - even for models with just a 16Gb RAM BTO. Stock models are May 4. Something may be afoot. This doesn't mean that Apple will launch something at WWDC, they might release in the last 2 weeks of May if they don't deem it important enough to interrupt a software developers conference for lightly retouched hardware.
When you say Intel CPUs are out it's more correct to say they are
launched. That's how Intel's site describes it. Apple don't aways use the latest and greatest Intel stuff immediately out the gate anyway - they have their own schedules.
Bear in mind that Coffee Lake CPUs were starting to get replaced by Coffee Lake Refresh CPUs when the Mac mini was launched. I couldn't honestly say at the time why the mini got updated in October 2018 and the iMac didn't. And by the time the iMac was out in March 2019 the 9th generation CPUs were already starting to appear in the wild - just not used by Apple.
And also think again about why the Mac mini only got a storage bump. Surely it can't get replaced as soon as October (the same year) with a Comet Lake model?
Apple could still subsidise a spec bump in the iMacs to boost sales - inserting more RAM would be an obvious across the board thing they could do for instance.
Comet Lake S feels like something for Q3/Q4 this year once Intel get volume production up - that's based on a likely Apple release schedule - there is nothing preventing a late June release for an iMac.
It might line up with volume production of suitable Comet Lake S and a 23" iMac if they are refreshing the whole line. I can't see why a 23" iMac would get released months later if its pricing were falling between the 21.5" and 27" models.
It will be too soon for AMD RDNA2 CPUs (Q4), and for the successor to macOS Catalina (likely October) though.
A few things don't really ring true for me in the collision between all the various rumors that are being discussed.
It seems really off-brand to me to imagine Apple making any sort of ARM strategy announcements at WWDC alongside the release of new, Intel-based iMacs. Especially if those iMacs are a significant redesign. Those two messages are at cross-purposes. Apple isn't going to want to navigate the mixed-messaging that would arise from "best iMac we've ever built" and "ARM is the clear and obvious future for the platform".
Similarly (and unrelated to the above), I have a tough time imagine how Apple would walk the tightrope of selling the world on ARM as a superior solution while at the same time implicitly creating a dividing line between "ARM on the low end and Intel on the high end" among the macOS product matrix. Any ARM announcements have to be paired with "Reality Distortion Field"-level cheerleading for the technical improvements of ARM. How do you accomplish that while in the same breath admitting that ARM is only for the low end of the product line?
I don't pretend to know what conclusions should be drawn, but as a whole package these rumors feel like they're missing something to me.
They don't have to announce what's going on from an iMac point of view. Look at the iPad Pro - The 2020 model gets a LIDAR sensor with no obvious application months ahead of an expected iPhone release. This is so they can discuss developing for LIDAR sensors without blowing the cover off the heavily expected LIDAR array on iPhone 12 Pro models.
Similarly, I don't even think they'll be talking about macOS for ARM at WWDC 2020. The right time to announce a seismic ARM Mac would be at a WWDC - so people could discuss it and coding for it. But the right Mac for that would be an 'iBook' - an
ARM MacBook with 5w A14x CPU in WWDC June 2021 for example. And they
still wouldn't need to discuss how that fits into an iMac.
I'd expect this product to be launched with App Store only (Gatekeeper controlled). And the focus on development would be for that device with a select few developers trusted to make sure they have working ports of their popular software.
Once the idea of developing for macOS for an 'iBook' is out in the wild it's only baby steps to consider coding apps for heavier duty Macs once Apple have figured how how ARM cpus should scale at higher TDPs. Higher clock single core speeds or throw more cores at it? Leave more room for
Imagination Technologies Ray Tracing GPU on chip or design something that would use AMD GPU?
Apple don't even have to discuss what happens to the intel Macs and nobody said that ARM would only be for 'low end' of the product line. For certain workflows (video exporting) ARM could really kill Intel and the low power cores could really help with the portability side of things.
ARM at the moment really lends itself to portable devices hence why the iPad is rightly becoming more interesting. If we're seeing a 12" iBook why not then see a 15" iBook for example? It's not a stretch to see a future product with a 15w TDP or even 28w TDP stretch itself in a larger portable case.
So there's no reason at all why a redesigned Intel iMac wouldn't last an entire product cycle - 4 refreshes - before we see what a 65w ARM iteration can do. Especially one with an
AMD RDNA3 GPU hanging off it in the future.
