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Apple updates its iMac line

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Re: Apple updates its iMac line

#241

Post by huffmsa »

scarface74 wrote: post #220
huffmsa wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's nothing wrong with a high profit margin. I'm all for it. I'd gladly overpay for Apple products if they were bleeding edge tech because I love the touchpad. Give me optane + m.2 + SSD, huge RAM, lots of ports, etc. But you cannot claim you're "for the pros" and offer a spinning disk as base storage. Archival? Sure.

The problem in the 80s was that the margins were both ridiculously high and the Mac’s were slow. When Windows became good enough, no one bought Macs and it almost killed Apple. Apple never claimed any iMac was for Pros except the iMac Pro. You are free to choose any combination of memory, hard drive, processor speed trade offs that meet your budget.

I know what happened and I'm concerned it's going to happen again, soon

Re: Apple updates its iMac line

#242

Post by jwr »

todd8 wrote: post #201

It's just frustrating, I switched the household over to Apple devices when OSX came out, and now there really aren't any systems from Apple that look interesting to me. I've been programming since before the (Unix) dawn of time, and Apple devices have been good development machines for me since OSX was released 18 years ago. I'm comfortable on Linux, but the Apple iOS devices and computers are all over my home and in…

I'm curious why you think that. I mostly write code for a living and apart from the notebook line catastrophe (I'm stuck on a 2014 model of a MacBook Pro and waiting for something to come out with a reasonable keyboard and perhaps more than one port that I can use), the desktop line is improving quickly. I've been really tempted by the Mac Mini, I would buy the iMac Pro if I could afford it, and now I intend to get the iMac: as it turns out, it's pretty much the only way to get a 5K 27" monitor. I do need 5K to get three columns of code in a full-screen Emacs (4K is fine for two columns, but three is squeezing it).

So my conclusion is exactly the opposite: while I am frustrated that I have to depend on Apple, because seemingly nobody else can get their act together and produce integrated hardware+software ecosystems that work, I am quite happy with the recent direction they've taken.

Re: Apple updates its iMac line

#243

Post by blueberry_47 »

justjash wrote: post #81
tambourine_man wrote: post #24

Still selling brand new machines with 5400 rpm HDs. In 2019. It undermines the brand. Any Mac a customer buys should have good enough performance. 5400 spinning disk hasn’t been fast enough for a decade.

Yeah, I bought my wife an iMac 4-5 years ago with the standard HD config and it feels almost useless being so slow. My even older MBA with half the RAM and an SSD is much more usable.

My similar aged, non-HD iMac became unusable until I wiped and reinstalled the OS. (I had been upgrading it in place for years).

The process was surprisingly fun, too.

Re: Apple updates its iMac line

#244

Post by vgoh1 »

Proof that Apple has anorexia: 5mm thin on the outer edge of the all-in-one computer and monitor. Thinner than a lot of monitor-only's everywhere else. What is the purpose? Who would not trade a thicker stationary monitor for better upgrade-ability and/or a cheaper price? Look behind your monitor - odds are, it's just a bunch of empty space behind it on your desk. I would love to be a little bird on the wall in the Apple strategy meetings where they decided that iMacs need to be that thin. I still have an old iMac G3 kicking around from 1999. It's over a foot deep, just takes up the empty space behind the screen on the desk - no big deal.

Re: Apple updates its iMac line

#245

Post by Geee »

IloveHN84 wrote: post #233
Geee wrote: post #223

It seems that the price point of i9+32GB+1TB SSD+Vega 48 is about the same price ($5000) as the baseline iMac Pro. Imac Pro comes with Xeon processor and Vega 56 though. Is the iMac Pro better at this price point?

For that price tag, I can build a full server with more pimped specs and that can do much more. 5000$ are too much

There aren't really options if you want the form factor, silent operation and MacOS.

Also, I won't be upgrading my main work computer in at least 5 years. I'm now on 2011 iMac which is still a great computer, but unfortunately can't be updated to the latest MacOS any more.

Re: Apple updates its iMac line

#246

Post by asdff »

ceejayoz wrote: post #59
neuronic wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For the 5k model, an additional 8GB in DDR4 RAM for a total of 16GB model costs +$200 [1]. This is beyond unreasonable compared to market [2]. [1] https://www.apple.com/shop/buy-mac/imac?product=MRR12LL/A&st... [2] https://pcpartpicker.com/trends/price/memory/

Sure, but with a user-accessible RAM bay built into the back of the machine, I can't work up the energy to be too mad about that one.

Only a matter of time before they solder the RAM in the imac like they did in the macbook.

Re: Apple updates its iMac line

#247

Post by bertil »

tosh wrote: post #63

I find it curious that Apple is starting to communicate major product updates decoupled from an event. Just good old press releases. Maybe they already have too many announcements to fit into the narrative of the handful of events per year.

This is not the first time that they have significant updates days before a major announcement.

I suspect that Apply keeps a lot of options for things to talk about until the last days. They wait for every key aspect of the announcement to be confirmed (which can be days earlier). That allows them to focus on the expected change if they are ready, or, if there is a last-minute issue, they can talk about spec upgrades to fill the hour, or rather to ramp up the announcement (e.g. “With all that memory, HD videos are going to look _gorgeous_. And you know where you can find HD videos? Boom! New VOD service!”). It’s consistent with descriptions of how Steve Jobs would scrape large segments of his keynotes at the last minute.

Re: Apple updates its iMac line

#248

Post by turtlebits »

todd8 wrote: post #201

It's just frustrating, I switched the household over to Apple devices when OSX came out, and now there really aren't any systems from Apple that look interesting to me. I've been programming since before the (Unix) dawn of time, and Apple devices have been good development machines for me since OSX was released 18 years ago. I'm comfortable on Linux, but the Apple iOS devices and computers are all over my home and in…

Since you're using a desktop, what's wrong with the 2018 Mac Mini? Upgradable RAM, storage and GPU can be added externally. Dual 4k support out of the box or a single 5k should be enough for your single monitor?

Re: Apple updates its iMac line

#249

Post by jwr »

aczerepinski wrote: post #105

I really wish I could buy a headless Mac with similar performance (including a real video card) and price. The mini doesn't quite meet my needs and the pro at $3k+ is way too expensive. These specs look good (although I would greatly prefer SSD) but I really don't want an extra monitor on my desk.

I'm curious: why would you want a headless machine with a real video card?

If, as I'm guessing, you want to connect an external monitor, what would be your monitor choice (and how would you connect it) to get 5K?

From my research, the iMac (or iMac Pro) was pretty much the only way to get a working non-crappy 5K setup.

Re: Apple updates its iMac line

#250

Post by infotogivenm »

vgoh1 wrote: post #244

Proof that Apple has anorexia: 5mm thin on the outer edge of the all-in-one computer and monitor. Thinner than a lot of monitor-only's everywhere else. What is the purpose? Who would not trade a thicker stationary monitor for better upgrade-ability and/or a cheaper price? Look behind your monitor - odds are, it's just a bunch of empty space behind it on your desk. I would love to be a little bird on the wall in the A…

As a counterpoint: Aesthetics matter to a non-trivial percentage of computer users. I love the iMac’s design and it was a pretty big selling point to me and differentiated the model from the other available desktops. I use an arm-style mount and couldnt be happier with the overall lack of wires and thin aesthetics.
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