
27-inch iMac gets a major update - arafsheikh
https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2020/08/27-inch-imac-gets-a-major-update/
======
burlesona
Solid spec bump. Interesting how much emphasis they put on the camera,
speakers, and mic; makes total sense in the age of Zoom.

I’d also speculate this means iMac won’t be the first computer getting Apple
Silicon. I wonder if it will be the last?

What’s the consensus guess now? Perhaps a new MacBook Air with good
performance but the real “breakthrough” is > 12 hours battery life?

~~~
dijit
It will almost certainly be a low end macbook. In fact, there's a non-pro
'macbook'[0] that already exists which would be perfect, it was discontinued a
year ago, but used ultra-low power CPUs. In fact when they were talking about
them (prior to release) they thought they would have ARM CPU's back then.

They are fanless and have a 5W thermal envelope, which fits in with the
current A12X too.

The major criticisms of the design at the time was: Butterfly keyboard, the
Single USB-C port and the speed of the device (Intel CORE-M is truly, truly
painful). But for a $600-$700 machine with an ARM CPU? that's insanely
competitive, and is in-line with the "basic" macbook branding.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MacBook_(2015%E2%80%932019)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MacBook_\(2015%E2%80%932019\))

~~~
efficax
the 12" macbook is my favorite laptop of all time. Mine is the 2016 version
and it's starting to feel dated and I'm hoping that they rerelease this on the
new silicon first. I'll be smashing the buy button the day it's out.

~~~
PopeDotNinja
I think my favorite computer was my late-2010 MacBook Air. It was such a
departure from the big & clunky Windows laptops I'd owned up until that time.
And of course I have fond memories of my first computer, an IBM PC Jr
(although I really wanted the 2nd disk drive, and copying floppy disks with
only one drive & 128kb of RAM was suboptimal).

~~~
skohan
The Air series we’re solid machines for a good while until they stopped
updating them. It was such a good price/performance/portability balance that I
didn’t miss having a Pro machine for a few years there, even doing relatively
heavy tasks like photo editing and development.

~~~
PopeDotNinja
I have a 2019 Macbook Pro now. The only reason I bought it was a friend really
needed a computer any computer, and I gave her my 2014 Macbook Air. I bought
the pro because it's a bit nicer for mobile development & running VMs.

------
ogre_codes
_Finally_ they ditch spinning media on the base models.

Also notable, the rumored iPad-like style changes are conspicuously absent,
these look pretty much identical to the older iMacs.

Otherwise this looks like a decent bump all around. Notably, the iMac Pro also
got some love (though not too much it seems?)

~~~
PascLeRasc
Massive upgrade for people working at companies whose IT refuses to buy
anything but the cheapest model.

~~~
ddavis
Still only 8GB RAM though, a bit of a bummer.

~~~
jyrkesh
Yeah, and upgrading to even 32 GBs is SIX HUNDRED DOLLARS.

I get that it has to be soldered on or whatever, but I'm looking at faster RAM
on Newegg right now, in brand names, single module DDR4, for ~115.

I really wanna buy Apple stuff, but stuff like this continually keeps me away
when I finally get to the Buy page.

~~~
simonh
The 27” models have user-accessible DIMM slots in a compartment on the back,
so you’re ok to get that RAM from Newegg or Crucial. That’s what I will be
doing.

------
jeffbee
I'm always interested in the differences between Apple's Intel OEM CPUs and
the ones Intel lists in their catalog. There is no 10th-gen Core i9 CPU that
exactly matches what Apple is selling here. In the iMac Pro they are
installing a Xeon-W part that has almost twice as much cache as the standard
part (43MB vs 25MB). They're not saying how much cache is in the new 27" iMac.

~~~
dehrmann
I'm picturing some binning shenanigans on Intel's part and Apple doing enough
benchmarks to pick a minimum amount of cache. Or maybe Intel offered them
something with odd specs that they have too many of?

~~~
jeffbee
Actually is it just marketing shenanigans instead? Are they adding the L2 and
L3 together to get their advertised cache size?

~~~
Dave_Rosenthal
Yes

------
_ph_
The one thing I keep missing on my 5k iMac is some form of video-in. Would be
great if I could connect my MB Pro to it and use the iMac as a display.
Perhaps even in a window and all mouse and keyboard events to the window get
passed to the connected MacBook.

~~~
prewett
I researched why the 5k iMac doesn't have video-in, and it seems that the
reason is that the display has so many pixels that it needs to pieces of
hardware to drive it. Getting the timing and color calibration and what-not
clearly wasn't going to happen externally, so rather than have a suboptimal
experience they just took video-in out. There's also the issue that few video
cards can drive that resolution.

[https://www.quora.com/Why-cant-the-iMac-27-5K-be-used-as-
an-...](https://www.quora.com/Why-cant-the-iMac-27-5K-be-used-as-an-external-
monitor-even-though-it-has-Thunderbolt-3-0-support)

~~~
baddox
There are external 5k displays on the market, including one that Apple has
sold.

~~~
_ph_
Which external 5k displays are on the marked except the one that Apple has
sold and alledgedly LG has discontinued?

------
n3k5
“SSDs across the line with quadruple the storage”

1/4 TB of storage in the $1800 model, 1/2 TB in the $2300 one. Ugh. (So before
the lower-end one had 64GB? [Edit: Nope, 1 TB Fusion Drive, thanks smnrchrds!]
That would be FULL just from installing the one game the press release
mentions.)

What kind of magic fairy dust SSDs are they using that you can't have a
sensible amount of storage space at those prices? Looking at the upgrade
options (which aren't even available for the lower-end model), they charge
$300 per TB.

~~~
avianlyric
> What kind of magic fairy dust SSDs are they using that you can't have a
> sensible amount of storage space at those prices?

The kind where Apple can make a 300% or more margin, knowing that people will
still pay.

Don't think Apple have ever sold SSD upgrades at anything remotely resembling
competitive $/TB prices. Clearly they don't need too because people still buy
their machines.

~~~
byset
As I see it it's basically price discrimination.

Apple wants a certain profit margin for the model as a whole. Yet for
customers who will never pay prices that will give Apple that full margin,
they offer a model at a low price point with a compressed margin, but with a
painful aspect that will encourage customers who can pay to go with a higher
priced unit — here, the painful thing is the small SSD size.

So the idea that the minimal-SSD model is somehow the "real" price and Apple
is selling SSD space at an exorbitant markup, isn't quite right.

You could almost think of it as Apple offering a discount if you'll go with
the smallest SSD, so they can capture more of the market while still keeping
their average profit margins high.

If Apple charged "competitive $/TB prices", the small-SSD option would likely
be more expensive, rather than the larger-SSD options being cheaper.

~~~
kccqzy
Perhaps that's true for people who buy personal Macs, but in several companies
I've worked for, the companies that buy Macs for work almost always use the
smallest SSD option: you don't need a lot of local storage, since most files
will be in company-managed storage systems.

~~~
byset
Sure, there will always be customers for whom the low-price option is perfect.

Outlet malls are another form of price discrimination, as they offer lower
prices for those willing to travel further to get the lower prices. But there
will always be some people happen to live next to the outlet mall.

------
look_lookatme
I wish I could use it as an external display. I would buy one as my personal
machine and then use the display during the day with my MBP for work. Would be
nice in this new world of remote work.

~~~
Someone
Never used it, so I don’t know how well it works, but
[https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204592](https://support.apple.com/en-
us/HT204592): _“With target display mode, you can use your iMac as an external
display for another Mac.”_

~~~
mikestew
From that same article: _" This article has been archived and is no longer
updated by Apple."_

Because Target Display Mode is no longer supported:

 _" Make sure that your iMac is using macOS High Sierra 10.13.6 or earlier.
You can't use target display mode with later versions of macOS, or with Boot
Camp and Windows."_

------
Aaronstotle
I can't believe it took so long for Apple to add SSDs to the basic
configuration. I had the misfortune of coming into a company who purchased
2017 21" iMacs and they were almost worthless with how slow the fusion drive
is.

~~~
sukilot
You can upgrade to SSD. It's not supported but it's possible with normal
tools.

------
thelittlenag
Shipping with 8GB memory by default just seems absurd.

Also, having only 2 Thunderbolt 3 ports seems a little light as well. I would
hope to have had 4 ports at least.

~~~
rbanffy
A lot of Mac users get the computer and never plug anything to it besides a
phone or some USB sticks. If all you want is a computer you can read your
e-mail on, 8 GB is fine. Memory, AFAIK, is upgradable post-purchase in all
current models.

~~~
Dahoon
It isn't on all models unless you pay Apple to do so.

~~~
rbanffy
It was until the previous 27" model, at least:

[https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201191](https://support.apple.com/en-
us/HT201191)

The 21.5", however, is a different story.

------
asadkn
It just feels wrong to buy anything new from Apple with "Intel Inside" \- when
they're clearly going to dump it soon, in favor of ARM (excuse me for not
using the cringey term Apple Silicon).

~~~
dijit
Why does it matter? There will be a period where the Intel Macs are still
supported and probably more stable, and it could be ~2y before your upgrade is
available if it's ARM based.

If you have a retina macbook pro from 2014~ it definitely makes sense to
upgrade to a macbook pro 16" today. The thing will see you through another
5-6y easy.

~~~
freehunter
My fear isn’t around Apple and OS-level support. My fear is around smaller or
indie developers who are already being asked to support macOS, Windows, Linux,
iOS, and Android and now have to support another target. It’s not uncommon to
see these devs not supporting Android or Windows because they can’t keep up.
So how long before those devs drop support for Intel Macs (or don’t support
ARM Macs for several years)?

For most apps it’ll be fine, emulation and cross compiling will be enough.
There will be some apps where this isn’t enough though. When the App Store
switched to 64-bit, how many apps just disappeared, never to be seen again?

I fully support the transition and I think it’s a logical step for Apple, but
it’s going to be one more thing that indie or smaller devs have to worry
about. Which means it’s one more thing everyone on this forum has to worry
about.

~~~
rbanffy
It's trivially easy to build software for both ISAs from within Xcode, unless,
of course, you are playing with Intel or ARM intrinsics or other
pathologically non-portable thing, in which case it's anything _but_ trivial.

It's not much harder than supporting Linux on x86 and ARM.

~~~
freehunter
And yet with the Raspberry Pi being so popular and being on the market for so
long, there are still a lot of packages that don’t support ARM.

It’s trivially easy to compile your iOS app for 64-bit as well, but like I
mentioned... that transition left a _lot_ of dead apps in its wake.

~~~
ogre_codes
> It’s trivially easy to compile your iOS app for 64-bit as well, but like I
> mentioned... that transition left a lot of dead apps in its wake.

Most of those "dead" apps were not under active development and had no income
flow. Making a "trivial" change to an inactive project means rebuilding
software which you have shelved for some time.

If you are actively developing software, adding Intel support to a build is
pretty much just clicking the option to build a Universal binary. Adding a
flag to an existing build a lot easier than dusting off an old app and making
a bunch of tweaks and a new build _with near zero_ chance of return on that
time invested.

~~~
freehunter
Again, my concern isn’t over how difficult it is, its that some developers
just won’t do it.

------
paulpan
This essentially confirms Apple's strategy to just refresh existing
models/chassis without redesigns going forward; the new Apple chips will be
used exclusively for redesigned/relaunches like the Macbook.

Smart move since it increases the appeal of the Apple-powered Mac devices. The
pricing difference will also help, as based on the expensive base
configurations (RAM, SSD as others have pointed out here), it will make the
new devices look that much more attractive.

~~~
skohan
Is there credible evidence the new devices will actually be cheaper? It hasn’t
been the trend with Apple product launches

~~~
spideymans
Apple sells an iPad for $349, and their new iPhone SE, with their most
powerful SOC, is just $399.

~~~
Dahoon
"just"

~~~
EricE
"just"? Pretty ridiculous snark since you can't by an Android device at any
price that's faster.

"just" indeed...

------
gjvc
8GB RAM is pretty derisory for a 2020 machine. Is there a RAM shortage
somewhere I haven't heard about?

~~~
zamadatix
It's so the "starting at" price is low but they can mark up RAM and Storage
upgrades when you actually go to order as if they were the expensive piece.
They are making something like 80% margin when you max out the RAM, I assume
similar for the "SSD storage" of ambiguous type.

Dell did the same thing with the RAM in a 7740 and 7750 I recently ordered
(work and personal), ironically about the same markup.

~~~
josho
I swear that the MBAs are ruining the world. This is the crap that mature
industries pull to grow profit since they've saturated other growth channels.
Instead of product growth, MBAs come up with product bundlings to maximize
profit by obscuring the true cost to customers.

------
bitL
"A computer gets an incremental update."

It's really a great win for Apple marketing that anybody even discusses such a
silly news...

------
frou_dh
When we read "10th generation Intel Core" then we have to go and research
whether than means real 10th generation (like i5/i7 MBA, some MBPs) or just
another rebadged Skylake (6th gen) derivative.

~~~
ajross
All 10xxx parts are either Ice Lake (10nm) or Comet Lake (14nm), none are
Skylake. I mean, if you want to get technical both are "Skylake derivatives",
I guess.

~~~
formerly_proven
The uarch and core differences between Skylake, Kaby Lake, Coffee Lake and
Comet Lake are neglible. The most significant changes were claims of hardware
fixes for some Spectre and Meltdown variants in Coffee Lake, which is still a
really minor change. The minor IPC differences arise from different cache
sizes and interconnect.

------
supernova87a
I still find it fascinating how the choice of Intel chip generation is almost
an afterthought (well, maybe only for a minority, but do most buyers look
carefully? are they aware?) in the difference between models or computers when
you click to buy something.

Is this a strategy of Apple (or Intel) to be able to get people to ignore (and
therefore they can optimize the cost of) the generation of chip used? It's
almost as if they realized people fixate on the GHz figure, and overlook the
chip generation, which (I guess?) must contribute much more to effective clock
speed than a small difference in Hz rate? I even fall into this trap
sometimes.

It is a bit complicated for the casual buyer to have the clock speed which was
the previous metric of "goodness" of your machine now have to be weighed with
the generation of processor. When the name of the processor itself doesn't
provide clear differentiation between generations.

~~~
thomasedwards
I still don’t fully understand this world, I ‘downgraded’ from an i7 to a
slower i5, and my computer got faster. I wish they’d use sensible clear names
for the generations so you can clearly understand what’s better.

~~~
jandrese
The first number after the i# is the generation. i5-5350 is fifth generation,
i3-9350k is ninth generation.

That said, the difference between generations is pretty minimal thanks to
Intel's huge process blunder last decade.

If you want to know which chip is actually faster for your workload that turns
out to be a fairly difficult question to answer. A lot depends on what you're
trying to accomplish and how your code is built.

~~~
supernova87a
And I would point out, the level of chip model detail you gave above isn't
even provided in the buying screens! For some users this is ok -- does the
fact of not providing it give some hint about what level of user is being
aimed at?

I think even for the Mac Pro, they don't go into this detail.

------
fiblye
I bought a 2012 iMac with 8GB of memory as the baseline. We’re more than
halfway through 2020 and Apple is telling us 8GB is still just fine for a
>$2000 computer?

~~~
stuart78
Given their crazy RAM price markups, I prefer to have this option so that I
can buy my own RAM from another source.

~~~
blparker
Is the RAM in newer iMac models upgradable or is it soldered to the
motherboard?

------
rbanffy
Most interesting that, now, the only Mac you can buy with a (SSD-cached) hard
disk is the 21" iMac.

I guess the next update will get rid of any vestigial spinning metal storage.

~~~
savoytruffle
It seems very important to Apple to get the T2 (similar to an iPhone 7 CPU)
controller chip into all the Macs. But it seems unable to accomodate internal
HDD or Fusion drives. And Most of the 21.5" models are bargain basement (as
far as that goes for Apple) models. Fusion drives were an interesting
digression, but obviously not the wave of da future.

~~~
rbanffy
Indeed. With M2 sticks with 8+ GB hard drives become an oddity.

I have a laptop with dual storage and the largest hard drive that fits is 2
TB, but, on the M2 side, it can go way beyond that.

------
m0xte
Well they can quite frankly fuck off with that one.

The 32gb additional memory option costs 4x the price of the entire 32gb of ram
in my desktop. It costs independently 60% of the cost of my desktop pc base
unit just for the upgrade.

The bottom end unit features 256gb SSD (probably soldered) and the next tier
up wants +£200 to go from 512 to 1TiB. My entire 1TB Samsung evo plus nvme
cost £165.

The 5k display isn’t worth it for my use case so I’ve got a 27” iiyama 4K
display I paid £379 for. I suspect for 90% of people the story is the same.

Add the shit show that has been Catalina so far and this is a comedy gouging.

Edit: equivalent spec of my desktop build is £3399 here. I paid £1520 for my
desktop approx: ryzen 3700x, 32gb ram, 1TB ssd, gtx1660, 27” 4K display,
decent mechanical keyboard, decent mouse, Windows 10 pro.

Where is the £1879 advantage?

~~~
supernova87a
Maybe just put Apple out of your mind and don't get so angry about it. They're
clearly not trying to compete for your business / segment of the market.

~~~
chaostheory
I'm also part of the Apple cult for now. Every new computer hardware release
just keeps getting frustrating. The only thing I like about Apple computers
now is just Mac OS. Their hardware has been waning for the past few years.
What people want is an affordable headless iMac in desktop form. They were
just tone deaf when they released a $5k desktop. I don't want a headless
Macbook ala Mac Mini

I still feel good about iPhone, iPad, and Apple Watch at this moment. However,
everything else hardware wise feels like a disaster to me. I mean where is the
home pod mini? Homekit will never be taken seriously or as useful as Google
Home and Alexa, until Apple finally releases smaller, less expensive smart
speakers. "Hey Siri" just doesn't work well on current Apple devices.

~~~
m0xte
This. Also they ship the Mac mini and no reasonable display options themselves
leaving you at the mercy of LG (unreliable and almost completely unavailable)
or 1.5x display scaling on other 4K monitors or a monitor which costs three
kidneys attached to a stand that costs another one.

And let’s not get into the overpriced input devices. Wobbly keys and a mouse
designed much like the furniture at the start of Men in Black.

Gah I’ve just convinced myself to sell the Mac mini and the iMac I already
have now. And probably the iPad I’m whining about this on. Yes I’m a member of
the cult. I have a whole cupboard of white boxes. But the pc pays the bills.

------
saos
> The 27-inch iMac now comes standard with SSDs across the line

Well. Wow.

> Apple today also announced that its 21.5-inch iMac will come standard with
> SSDs across the line for the first time.

Double wow

I'll be holding out for complete iMac redesign with ARM. I'm hoping something
will be announced at their event?

~~~
JosephRedfern
I had the same reaction. It pains me to use a machine that has a HDD... I had
no idea that Apple were selling new, £1000+ machines that relied in spinning
rust.

~~~
sukilot
If Apple sold a decent £1000 machine then they wouldn't sell £1800 machines.

------
_ph_
Nice spec-bump for those, who want to stay with Intel-based Macs a bit longer
(e.g. depend on x86-virtualisation, running Windows). While I was about ready
to upgrade my current iMac in 2020, I am going to try to hold out till the
step to Apple Silicon. The one thing I would hope for would be a bigger
screen. The 27" is a tiny bit too small, especially vertically. Considering
that Apple once sold the 30" Cinema display, the step to 27" always felt like
a step back. When going to a design with less bezels, they really should use
some of the saved space for a bigger screen.

------
pornel
Only the $2300 model has an option of upgrading to 5700XT for an extra $500,
and that's not even a high-end GPU.

~~~
badsectoracula
5700 XT is a very high end GPU, especially the 16GB option (can you even buy a
5700 XT with16GB for PC? I can't find any in the local price aggregator, all
of them are 8GB). It isn't the fastest GPU you can buy, but it is still a high
end one.

If anything, this is the first time i see an iMac which has a good GPU. Though
considering iMac's form factor and my experience of having a PC with a 5700XT
i wonder about thermals.

~~~
kitsunesoba
Yeah the 5700 XT is roughly on par with a 2070 Super, which isn't bad at all
even if it isn't a 2080Ti.

------
graeme
Does the imac pro get the better camera and other features listed?

I used laptops for years until and rsi issue made me have to avoid trackpads.
I can say I’ve been extremely pleased with having a desktop imac. I use an
ipad pro when I need something portable. I like just having a station I can
get in front of that signifies work, and the imac pro fans basically never
make noise.

~~~
pilsetnieks
To the best of my knowledge, most laptops support external displays and
peripherals as well.

~~~
rbanffy
True, but my Macbook enters "hairdryer mode" every time I push it a little
(which is often).

I'd like a quieter device without the constant fan noise.

~~~
graeme
Yup. That was the issue. I tried a MacBook pro with an external before my imac
pro. It did not like it.

I also do audio/video recording, and driving that + my external display really
made the fans spin.

~~~
rbanffy
When the apocalypse started my daughter got my "burnerbook", a Fedora-based
cheap low-end x86 laptop without a fan or hard disk.

I miss the absolutely silent (albeit slow) computing it afforded me.

------
jasoneckert
I definitely agree with the general consensus here that this is a solid spec
bump, and most welcome at that!

And like others, it made me think of their transition to ARM. I know the first
ARM Macs this fall will be their lowend MacBook and 13" MBP line, but at WWDC
they said the Intel to ARM transition would be complete in under 2 years (like
they said with the PPC to Intel transition). And since the PPC to Intel
transition only took a little over a year, it could mean that ARM-based iMacs
may be here next year to replace the current iMac lineup, and I'm dreadfully
curious as to whether they'll be lower performing than this iMac update (which
is quite impressive, performance-wise). Or perhaps they'll use multiple ARM
CPUs to boost performance. Regardless, every time I see a spec bump now from
Apple, I can't help but think of these things.

~~~
ed25519FUUU
Just my speculation, but rather than “lowering the specs“, I think they’re
positioning themselves to release a “budget” option in the $800 range with a
4k screen, which will probably match performance with the low end intel iMac.

Matching encoding speeds with Apple Silicon is probably an easier task, since
they can create on-chip, hardware accelerated encoders, which exist on iPhones
already.

~~~
tonyedgecombe
The current bottom end is $1099 and that's the last model with a low-dpi
screen. I'd be surprised to see the price drop much below that when it gets
renewed.

------
dylan604
Just did the fun "what kind of car could I buy instead" of maxing out the
specs on an Apple computer. 10 cores, 128GB RAM, 16GB GPU, 8TB SSD, 10GB
ethernet comes out to $8799. ~ A used Civic/Corolla I guess. Not as sticker
shocking as the maxed MacPro. Would love to see how the machine performs
though.

~~~
icedchai
Now price out an AMD Threadripper build for the same price and compare the
performance. You'll be shocked how overpriced the MacPro is...

------
martini333
What on Earth are these bezels in 2020????

~~~
fermienrico
I think I might the only one who likes and wants bezels on everything that has
a display. Extra large bezels. Perhaps the only exception would be phones as
they increase the size of the device.

Bezels are important to frame the screen content from functional perspective.
Think of it like a frame for the art work. Black bezels occulude the
distracting edges and background noise from the screen and you have always
have a constant black border. They can be made to look nice as well like some
of those Bang & Olufsen TVs[1] and Sony Trinitron Professional monitors [2].

Contrararily, there is no reason to the opposite besides "aesthetics". Can you
think of any?

Alas - the momentum behind bezels is so massive, it is impossible to reverse
this trend. Same with "borderless" trends in UI/UX.

[1] [http://www.extravaganzi.com/wp-
content/uploads/2010/10/Bang-...](http://www.extravaganzi.com/wp-
content/uploads/2010/10/Bang-Olufsen-BeoVision-10-32-inch-LCD-TV-3.jpg)

[2]
[https://www.proav.co.uk/media/catalog/product/cache/1/image/...](https://www.proav.co.uk/media/catalog/product/cache/1/image/9df78eab33525d08d6e5fb8d27136e95/s/o/son1_9.jpg)

~~~
ezluckyfree
I agree that bezels can look good, and small bezels are nice to frame the
image as you mentioned, but the iMac bezels are neither small nor good
looking.

Also for the record, [2] looks extremely bad.

~~~
fermienrico
[2] Looks extremely good to me. I would pay a hefty premium to get bezels like
this on my current LG monitor (which has 15mm or less bezels).

------
musicale
I can see why they didn't roll this out at WWDC!

Great machine and no Apple Silicon as yet (which may be a huge advantage if
you still need to run Boot Camp or x86 VMs.)

I'm also excited about the nano-texture display. I've learned to live with
reflective displays because I'm addicted to their high contrast and deep
blacks, but nano-texture sounds like the best of both worlds.

Nice that they upgraded the anemic FaceTime camera and pulled the plug on the
low-speed hard disk (even if it was configured as a fusion drive.)

Apple has generally had decent mics and speakers as well, so it's exciting
that they are trying to make them even better. Anyone who has suffered through
horrible zoom audio will appreciate the benefits of good mics (and not using
zoom, which seems to make bad audio even worse.)

------
ianwalter
I'm sorry, I know it's a minor cosmetic thing, but those bezels make it look
so dated that I can't really see it as new. Not that it matters since I will
probably never buy an iMac again after experiencing the issues with dust
getting beneath the glass of my last iMac 5k.

------
fmajid
Presumably you cannot install Mojave on these, only Catalina. I sacrificed a
Mac to Catalina, then wiped it back to Mojave. Hopefully Big Sur will fix the
flaming dumpster fire that is Catalina, but I am not hopeful and working on my
Linux migration plan.

~~~
simonklitj
Curious about the bugs in Catalina that made it useless for you. Have been on
it since the public beta, and haven't really had anything that has made it
impossible to do things I used to do. Care to elaborate? (Edit: I did on
10.15.13 have a bug where I couldn't access files and folders on the desktop,
and had to repeatedly reboot. Downgraded to 10.15.12 and went to 10.15.14 when
that came out and fixed it. Will admit that this was incredibly frustrating!)

------
kraig911
Honestly I want a 21 inch ipad with a stand....

~~~
macintux
I keep hoping for a huge iPad to mount as a drafting table.

------
goalieca
I'm sitting here on a 2012 imac with a fusion drive. This drive never seemed
to give much performance but it absolutely tanked once it converted to APFS.
The computer became unusable to the point that I had to buy an external SSD
and use that as my main disk. Now i'm very disappointed that it doesn't
support Big Sur despite being only 8 years old. I will wait for the apple
silicon because i don't anticipate that intel will be supported for too long.
Apple will make "core features" of their OS depend on something that isn't
shipping in intel silicon sooner than later.

~~~
donatj
How much RAM do you have? I recently upgraded my 2012 iMac from 8gb to 32gb
and the performance is like night and day, I suspect because it has more
memory to use for disk cache. It's a fully usable machine again.

~~~
goalieca
Upgraded to 24GB. It helps restarting applications because it caches.

------
bluedino
Just when you think they've forgotten the iMac. Can't wait for Barefeats to
post the benchmarks, and compare the top level 27" to the Pro. The 27" is
interesting now because you can get 10Gbe.

One gripe is the 27" iMac comes standard with only 8GB, while the 15" MacBook
Pro has came with 16GB standard since 2014... I'm guessing most people are
going to the aftermarket to throw 32-64GB in there anyway. Apple offers the
16GB upgrade (from 8GB) for $200, but you can buy 32GB of RAM for $150 and
install it yourself.

~~~
jdhawk
> but you can buy 32GB of RAM for $150 and install it yourself.

what? Since when did they offer a DIY upgrade path?

~~~
apocalyptic0n3
Haven't the iMac and Mac Mini always offered (relatively) easy memory
upgrades? I've upgraded probably 10-15 of them at work. They just use the
samller laptop modules instead of a desktop module, and (usually?) only
support 2 modules. Mac Pro offers it too, though that's a different style of
computer entirely.

~~~
jeffbee
The post-lamp iMac has always offered user-replaceable SODIMM slots in a
number sufficient to occupy all of the CPU's memory channels. The late 2009
model had 4 on the bottom, the 2015 has 2 one the back, these new ones have 2
and the Pro model has 4 (because the Pro CPU has 4 channels).

~~~
jshier
27" iMac has always had 4 RAM slots.

~~~
jeffbee
I see. I assumed since all the catalog configs are 2-way they only had two
slots, but I just opened mine and it has 4.

------
dopamean
I'll never understand the pricing. $1000 extra to get 64gb of memory?
Incredible. What circumstance leads a purchaser to look at that and say, "ok
sounds great?"

~~~
kccqzy
People who want a Mac but don't need performance.

~~~
dopamean
I meant who shells out the extra 1k and is ok with that.

~~~
kstrauser
My boss. I mean, we don't have unlimited cash to throw away, but let's say I'm
going to keep a new Mac for 4 years (which is a lot less time than I'll
probably _actually_ have it, but we'll round down). I work about 2,000 hours a
year, or about 8,000 hours over the time I'll own it. That $1,000 amortizes
out to be about $0.13 per hour, which is a rounding error compared to salary,
benefits, air conditioning at the office (back in the old days when that use
to be a thing), etc. If that makes me 0.2% more efficient -- say by making
compiles or "docker build" commands run faster -- then the company made a
profit off of it.

~~~
beervirus
But the RAM is trivial to upgrade. Why not just do it yourself for half the
price?

------
city17
Seems like they're going to save the new redesign of the iMacs for the first
ARM releases.... at least I hope, otherwise it's really disappointing.

------
ChrisMarshallNY
Oooh...I'd hate to be the one that shelled out $5K for an iMac Pro. I guess
that critter will be seeing a bump of its own, soon.

~~~
rsynnott
They're more or less at the mercy of the Xeon release cycle for that.

------
GeertB
After 3 weeks of waiting, I just got my new iMac. Paid $4399 before tax. Old
specs, same price as new one with improved camera, 2 additional cores etc. :-(
I can't use Zoom with the camera of the old model, without using a 3rd party
tool, as the color balance is way off making everybody purple/red. Sad.

------
haunter
Likely this is the machine to buy if you want one of the last Intel Macs that
can natively run x86 code

~~~
mvanbaak
erm, no. During the introduction of Apple SOC they stated that they will
produce and support Intel based macs for some time together with the apple SOC
versions.

~~~
kgwgk
They could continue to produce this model for some time without making it any
better.

------
maz1b
As expected. They're not going to do a radical form factor redesign and update
for Intel based chips, they're saving the all new iMac design for the ARM
transition for the extra wow factor.

Not sure if the value proposition is there though for a specced out iMac.

------
omarhaneef
The best thing about the introduction of a new line is that the previous line
is cheaper.

------
karmelapple
> T2 ... makes transcoding HEVC video up to twice as fast as the previous
> generation

So the T2's processing power is used to augment the main CPU and graphics
card's power.

This seems like a new development, but maybe it's been known for awhile?

~~~
perardi
Not new. Obscure! But not new.

[https://appleinsider.com/articles/19/04/09/apples-t2-chip-
ma...](https://appleinsider.com/articles/19/04/09/apples-t2-chip-makes-a-
giant-difference-in-video-encoding-for-most-users)

------
dayaz36
It doesn't matter what they release, they've already Osborne effected
themselves as soon as they announced they're transitioning to ARM chips in a
couple years

------
mschuster91
> iMac Pro now comes standard with a 10-core Intel Xeon processor.

How in hell is Apple squeezing a Xeon into an iMac without the thing either
melting or being louder than a jet turbine?!

~~~
tonyedgecombe
Quiet fans and vents:

[https://www.imore.com/sites/imore.com/files/styles/larger/pu...](https://www.imore.com/sites/imore.com/files/styles/larger/public/field/image/2017/12/imac-
pro-back-vent.jpg)

------
achow
> _..new nano-texture glass option for an even more stunning Retina 5K
> display_

I hope next iPad also gets this textured glass, it would be so much better as
a drawing writing pad.

------
vincnetas
"Up to 65 percent more plug-ins in Logic Pro X." ?

~~~
thelittlenag
I think they mean that you are now able to load/use that many more plugins
than you could before?

------
musicale
Apple needs to bring back Target Display mode, which allows the iMac to be
usable as a monitor long after its internals have become obsolete.

~~~
willio58
Didn’t know this used to be a thing. I’ve always wanted this.

~~~
musicale
It looks like the last iMacs with (Thunderbolt) Target Display Mode came out
int 2014, but the Retina (and later) models don't support it unfortunately:

[https://www.lifewire.com/use-imac-as-monitor-with-target-
dis...](https://www.lifewire.com/use-imac-as-monitor-with-target-display-
mode-2260906)

No reason Apple can't bring it back - it greatly increases the value and
lifespan of an iMac!!

------
reaperducer
Since these iMacs have the T2 chip, does that open the possibility of
keyboards with fingerprint authentication, like on the laptops?

------
P4wl0w
It does not make any sense for me to buy new macs anymore - especially when I
have to run the new macos, which will take SECONDS to open apps that open in
MILLISECONDS when you switch off wifi or just use a good OS.

Also I do not like their beta product experiments they tend to run on
customers since years - I will wait for years before I trust their hard- and
software to be useful for work or even personal things.

If they want me to beta test they should give me money for it.

------
speedgoose
The iMac would be so much more interesting with a touchscreen and a pencil,
like the overpriced Microsoft Surface Studio.

~~~
naravara
I'm not really sure about that. It would probably be useful for artists and
draftsmen, but I keep my iMac pretty far from my face while I would want to
keep a drawing table pretty close. The Studio was really cool as a design
concept, but I'm not sure how well it translated from showroom to daily use
for anyone who isn't a professional artist.

And even for professional artists, I have to imaging the portability of an
iPad Pro probably blows it out of the water for those use cases. Some people
think it's more natural to move their canvas around the pen than vice-versa,
so just being able to move the device/screen around is huge.

------
xhruso00
Is the RAM self-upgradable with T2 chip?

~~~
indianhippie
Yes it is. This might be the last iMac with user accessible RAM chip though.

~~~
xhruso00
I didn't know 21.5' is not user upgradable. Only 27
[https://support.apple.com/guide/imac/install-memory-in-
your-...](https://support.apple.com/guide/imac/install-memory-in-your-27-inch-
imac-apdd768f6349/mac)

------
Tepix
I can't believe they left the big fat bezel unchanged. It makes the machine
look really outdated.

~~~
emdowling
This is likely the final iteration of this design and for Intel processors.
They’ll save the redesign for Apple Silicon. They are definitely road testing
a few new technologies for that future iteration, like the new screen
technology.

------
jmpman
Bring back target display mode!

------
minerjoe
Wonderful computer. How much you wanna bet that in < 5 years they drop support
forcing almost everyone that purchased one to throw it out and get a new one?

~~~
newscracker
Firstly, you have to consider that Apple has said the transition to ARM will
take about two years. So it’s going to have to release a few more Intel Macs
next year too.

For the less than five years bet, if you’re referring to macOS updates, I can
personally bet my entire wealth (which is a decent figure) that you’ll lose.
There’s no way the Intel Macs released this year are going to lose macOS
support for another six years (into 2026), at the very least. The latest macOS
(Big Sur) that’s now in beta supports models that are seven years old (or even
older than that).

If you’re referring to hardware support and repairs, there are standard ages
for each model that Apple uses for that purpose to define what’s obsolete,
vintage, etc. I’m sure these will follow the same cycle.

~~~
minerjoe
Yea, I got the timeline wrong. More like 10 years.

I've worked e-waste recycling and the number of beautiful but unsupported macs
that were dropped off was very sad and to this day I definitely consider Apple
a significant force for evil on this planet, just for the planned obsolecense
ecological damage alone, let alone the right to repair.

I've gotten linux running on a few of them and they are wonderful machines.
Sad that the owners had to throw them in the trash.

------
antonhalim
I am surprised how little bezel is discussed here, Apple has been keeping the
almost 2 inches bezel for a decade.

~~~
LeoPanthera
I don't see the relevance of the size of the bezel on a desktop display that
isn't portable.

~~~
antonhalim
Why not? then why TVs do that?

------
plg
How does it compare for practical speed to an iMac Pro circa 2018? Asking for
a friend ;)

------
super_mario
Interesting machine. But no way would I buy this now. It will be obsolete in 2
years.

------
stickyricky
Its a shame the screen update didn't translate into smaller bezels.

------
theodric
Who would buy an x86 Mac now?

~~~
beervirus
Someone who doesn't want to hassle with ARM software compatibility issues
until the kinks get worked out?

------
jakobov
it needs thicker bezels

------
doener
"SSDs across the line"

Welcome to 2010, Apple.

------
tomcat27
Better camera, that's the only thing I see useful to an average user.

------
gfiorav
My employer has decided to stop offering Macs for work machines. I think the
dev era for Mac might be close to ending

------
Scarbutt
_Apple today also announced that its 21.5-inch iMac will come standard with
SSDs across the line for the first time._

I wonder what took them so long.

~~~
mvanbaak
price. they could sell the iMac pro for $$$ while the 'budget' version used
HDD.

~~~
natch
IMHO they should build some hysteresis into their cost structure, so when
something much better has just crashed in price, they can install that much
better thing even though they may have contracted their parts inventory at a
higher price. They can eat the cost difference in order to deliver a better
machine to the customer. It will be made up in time. For example, over a year
ago (maybe two?) I was able to buy a 1 TB SSD, top speed available at the
time, and a top brand, for just over $100, retail. They probably plan out
their costs ahead of time, so they may have considered the equivalent to be a
$200 part. Ignoring the fact that they don't pay retail, they could eat the
$100 difference on paper, because future inventory will cost them even less.
Sure prices go up sometimes too, but the general trend is down for tech as we
know. Not sure why they are so stingy with putting the best into their
products when I have the dollar cost amounts in front of me and they are not
that high. /rant

------
lovetocode
I bought a 27” 5k iMac a few years ago and it just made me hate Apple more. I
am irritated that they have a monopoly on iOS development.

------
jhatemyjob
ORRR you can just build your own PC and run macOS in a vm

------
wackget
Why is this advertisement written as if it's a news article?

Starting it with `Cupertino, California -` as if it's breaking news and then
launching into a complete sales pitch is just so slimy.

~~~
CydeWeys
This is a typical press release. It's been a standard format for decades.

------
raghavtoshniwal
Really thought they would phase out fusion drives in the next update. Guess
not, still available in the 21”.

------
tambourine_man
Nice. The iMac Pro is getting harder to justify. Specially with that sweet
nano-texture glass coating.

I wonder how they justify charging US$ 500 for the coating on the iMac and US$
1.000 on the Pro Display XDR. 32" vs 27" don't seem enough.

~~~
PStamatiou
Nano-texture is a blessing and a curse in my experience...
[https://twitter.com/Stammy/status/1290673590380244994](https://twitter.com/Stammy/status/1290673590380244994)

~~~
tambourine_man
Yeah, I know. They even provide you with a standard approved cloth, which is
hilarious.

Still, the results are amazing and anyone who dares to even get their filthy
greasy fingers near my screen, let alone touch it, are in for some serious
trouble anyway.

In the case of a nano-texture screen, I should probably require people to sign
an insurance agreement to be in the same room as the device.

------
dschuetz
I saw "Intel" and I laughed out loud. Wow. The nerve Apple has trying to sell
Intel-Macs after announcing the change to ARM!

~~~
_ph_
There are people, who require a new machine now, so it is good that they get
an up to date offering. Also, there are people, who need x86 compatibility
when running virtual machines. Also, as long as Apple expects developers to
support x86 Macs, they need to offer x86-based machines for those developers.

------
Mindwipe
Honestly a fairly mediocre upgrade considering the pricing.

It's good that they've finally improved the webcam, but Apple clearly went out
of their way to ensure people looking to get an Intel Mac because they need to
dual boot weren't going to get anything too compelling.

Edit: Downvotes be damned, it is mediocre. Not bad, because it is a spec bump,
but there are lots of things about the iMac's architecture that are beginning
to show their age and are unchanged here, despite becoming bottlenecks. The
cooling system is a big one, and the storage controller support another.

~~~
bluedino
>> upgrade considering the pricing.

Don't forget it includes a 5K display...

~~~
Jenya_
It includes a 5K display which may become useless in five years? (when Apple
plans to stop updates for Intel based Macs). It seems that iMacs do not
support using them as expernal displays right now. I would prefer 5K monitor
to last a bit longer than five years.

~~~
beervirus
When support ends, install Windows.

------
rvz
So: A 2020 iMac now with 2018 Hardware. Not a NVMe SSD use in sight.

Not exactly a "major update". Looks like the magic on this iMac is already
wearing off and the magicians want their reality distortion spells back.

~~~
tesseract
The iMac had NVMe SSDs at least as early as 2015[1]. Apple has since moved
away from NVMe modules and gone to raw flash chips hanging directly off the
proprietary "T2" system controller chipset. I think it's fair to criticize the
proprietary/non-upgradeable nature of this storage solution but benchmarks
have shown it to be comparable in performance to standard PCIe 3.0 NVMe drives
so calling it outdated is not really a valid criticism.

[1] [https://beetstech.com/blog/apple-proprietary-ssd-ultimate-
gu...](https://beetstech.com/blog/apple-proprietary-ssd-ultimate-guide-to-
specs-and-upgrades)

~~~
jeffbee
They also have a PCIe x4 port on the back of the machine for people who insist
on avoiding Apple's storage controller.

