XMac next week?

Do you think Apple will release an xMac or do you want Apple to release an xMac?

Because you know logically that Apple will not release an xMac, right?

I think the odds are greater that Apple drop the Mac Pro than release an xMac. But I doubt either happen.

I think it's the same issue spoken about between Jobs and Ballmer at the recent D8 conference. Jobs said that people would use PCs less and less and more mobile devices like the iPad and Ballmer said that it's more accurate to ask what we define to be a PC. PC hardware will get more powerful and compact as time goes on so people will always use PCs but the form factor changes.

This applies to the mid-range Mac because 5 years ago, we would ask for an affordable mid-range tower and today, the Mac Mini will exceed the performance of the machine we wanted back then. Obviously the lines change for some people but not everyone. For me personally, I am getting a bit tired of being stuck with 2 cores on anything less than £1600. Intel's 6-core/12-thread chip would be awesome.

However, I don't want it inside a 19kg £1900 aluminum behemoth of a workstation. My original line was set at £1000 for a quad core and Apple haven't delivered. I would stretch to £1500 for a 6-core and be content with just 2 drives, a single or no optical, just 2 PCI slots and 30% smaller/lighter enclosure.

On the other end of the scale, the Mac Mini improvements might hit 2.8GHz with a 320M GPU. This performance isn't too bad and would be around £700 and would actually match the entry i5 MBP aside from the GPU which is only 50% faster. If that was all that's on offer then I'd probably get that and still be frustrated at a lack of an affordable quad.

So, I think the best we can hope for is one of those two things: either a fast Core 2 Duo with 320M in the Mini or a cheaper, smaller 6-core Mac Pro. Knowing what Apple have done in the past, even this may be unlikely because they like to push the Mac Pro outside the iMac price range and they like to hold the Mini down so that it encourages people to buy their iconic iMac.

Apple is all about low-volume, high-margin with their PCs. No way do they want to go up against Dell et al with a generic xMac box. Best we can hope for is:

1. Cheaper "entry level" MacPro at $1500
2. High end "Gamer" Mac Mini at $1000

Personally I think a "Gamer" Mac Mini is more likely, since Valve is now bringing games to OS X by means of Steam. But even I would only give a 1 in 3 chance of happening.

It seems to me that ship has sailed. There used to be a $1500 tower Mac, that was eliminated. For a few years after that, there used to be a $2000 tower Mac, that was eliminated too.

What is getting the spotlight next week is the iOS line. Even the Apple Design Awards this year are only being given for iOS-based products. There are sessions that cover Mac OS X technologies, they just seem like they are treated as low-priority sessions.

I wouldn't even put much faith in even hearing about Mac OS X updates at the keynote, though it's possible there will be a segment on it. A mini update would be nice, but it is a good idea to curb your expectations on that, because it's not even a year yet, and it once went 1 1/2 years before getting an update.

It's called the iMac. No, I don't want an all-in-one either.

These were G5s, Apple was not in trouble then. Given that desktops in general are stagnant, I would say yes, needs are different, people don't need desktops as much anymore. I think Apple doesn't care either.

Apparently you need it not Apple.


Exactly! And as each year goes by, Apple needs this product even less.


Yep. They seem to be needing notebooks.... and smart phones.

With Valve releasing Steam for the Mac it makes sense to me for Apple to release a desktop computer geared more toward consumers instead of professionals and price it around $1500 and it will sell.

Apple gives each machine an identity though. The Mini is small, the iMac is all-in-one, the Mac Pro is a powerhouse. Something slightly bigger than a Mini has no identity and it doesn't have many advantages because you still won't fit a desktop-class chip in it.

If they could make a Core i7 quad cube then it would have a label but from looking at the internals of the Mac Pro, you realistically can't make a desktop that has a volume less than about 60% of the size of the Mac Pro but that's still about 20 times the volume of a Mini.

Once you get up to the desktop chips, you jump from a 25W CPU to at least 85W. An XBox 360-sized PSU lying on the floor doesn't look too good so they'd want to put it inside the machine but then you have to beef up the cooling and the internal volume considerably.

If you go for high end mobile chips then the price goes up considerably.

I think the big problem is the component manufacturers as they aren't building parts that allow these mid-range, compact machines to be built. You'd need an affordable 55-65W quad core. The only option would be the old Core 2 Quad but current dual i7 mobile chips are faster so you go to all the bother of building a mid-range model that costs more and you find that it really has no benefits besides drawing more power that the majority won't need (not green) and it has no compelling design element.

We aren't more than 3 years away from having mobile chips that will satisfy the mid-range Mac crowd and while performance requirements move on too, I think we're hitting that point where an 8-core 2GHz CPU paired with 2 successive generations from the Radeon 5xxx series in a box the size of a Mini will be enough for anyone. It sucks to have to deal with slow hardware in the mean-time but that's the way it has to be.

I think a more realistic bet would be for the Mac Pro to shrink. It'll still be expensive but it'll last a long time. I'd easily take a 6-core 12 thread Mac Pro for £1500 with a mid-range GPU over a 320M Mini with even a 2.8GHz Core 2 Duo so long as it was smaller and lighter. It would last me 3 years instead of upgrading every year to the latest Mini and this way, I can hold out while mobile chips improve. It would be good if they threw AppleCare in with the Mac Pro package too.

Mac mini and AppleTV would conceivably remain as they are, AppleTV only 2011 may transition to ARM-based thingy.

I vote "no" on yet another XMac thread!

XMac. The idea that just will not DIE.

That ship is never sailing.

Something like a 2.66GHz Core i7-620M paired with a 330M or Radeon 5650 would be nice in a higher end Mini. That chip seems to be around the same price as the Core 2 Duo. They could even have just two models - have the normal model with a dedicated GPU, one HDD, possibly no optical and the server with no dedicated GPU - just Intel HD graphics and two HDDs.


I update regularly because I need more than the Mini offers, that doesn't apply to everyone and resale doesn't matter as the people buying them would buy a machine of some sort so it's still greener to have them use low power devices. Plus, I'd personally rather own a 6-core, 12-thread Mac Pro than a 2-core, 4-thread i7 mobile Mini.

Let's be honest, people who want a faster Mini just want as much performance as possible for the money. Even an i7 mobile Mini with a 330M won't satisfy for long. It would obviously be better than what they offer now but the question isn't can they offer something better because the answer almost always is 'yes, they could' but they just won't because they never do.

If they put an i7 in the Mini, no one would buy the entry Core 2 Duo iMac.

Are you forgetting the momentary shortage of 13" MBPs back when they did the last update? People will buy a machine with the slower chip if it suits what they need or want.

Wizard this is a dead horse... Apple focus has shifted... remember its Apple Inc now not Apple Computer. Apple will only be interested in social gaming and they have the platform. The ipad.

It's the dead horse that just will not die!

Let me inject a little optimism. With OS X for the first time having credible Tier 1 game support (Steam), if Apple were to ever introduce an xMac, this year would be the time.