Leaked iMac parts suggest Apple set to release new model with thinner design - Page 4

They will have to make the move sooner or later. We have pretty much hit the wall with the current SATA standard. On this one I disagree, if Apple is to make a move into TV they need to support broadcast / cable input on the iMacs as small screen TVs. Not everyone wants or needs such an option though so there is little sense in including the interface in all Macs. This leads to the need for a slot. Why a slot, for a clean dongle free appearance.

Of course these days TV /Cable interfaces hardly amount to much more than a couple of chips so maybe they will just build in the support and not bother with interface cards.

 

What about this?

 

That remains a pretty big if.

Expected yes and frankly a sound reason to wait. Actually you are right in the sense that a standard is needed for PCI Express interfaced SSDs but somebody has to lead here. My primary concern is to get the industry onboard with a switch to PCI-Express so that we can move past the performance wall as hardware becomes affordable. As stated else where the idea for the slot is to enable TV support. In effect iMacs would become Apples iTVs (in the smaller sizes) as well as computers. The additional expense of the interface circuitry isn't a big deal. My biggest concern is to enable support for both broadcast and cable support. Slots would be nice here because of the different approaches take by cable companies.

In case you are wondering I think it would be foolish of Apple to enter the TV market with IP only based "sets". That may be the future but old habits die hard and frankly many people are just plain cheap. I know right now I'd not be excited at all if Apples coming TVs didn't have backwards compatibility.
I'm actually not seeing Touch at all in OS/X. It is just a terrible solution human factors wise. What I'd really like to see is Siri moved to OS/X with some of the AI running locally. That has far more potential interface wise than any touch solution.

Very interesting but a bit late. Several companies are already working on straight PCI-Express interface chips that would effectively eliminate much of the SATA infrastructure. Frankly while interesting this strikes me as an attempt by traditional storage manufactures to hang on to their customer base as the world moves away for magnetic storage. True. I'm not sure much of the speculation about apple and television has any basis in fact. However these days one doesn't add much in the way of electronics to support television. I could see Apple slipping in such support to gradually enter the market.

 

Nope, not just him. Lots of us would like to see Apple take the same moves with the iMac that they did with the retina MacBook Pro: lose the optical drive, build as many internal components together to maximize thinness, and bond the glass to the display for better picture quality and fewer reflections. And it sounds like that's what we're going to get! Sorry.

 

It's a desktop. There's no reason for this nonsense. Yeah, drop the ODD. Yeah, make the screen with the same process as all your others. But it doesn't need to be the thickness of a piece of paper. It needs to be more powerful.

Two days to go...

 

I'd love to see a thinner design.  Less bulk on my desk.  Many people have desks shoved up against one another; better for them, too.  The mall down the street has the current model on the floor next to each escalator; it's bulky as heck (but nice).  Would be better if they were thinner.

 

Going to buy popcorn for the show...

 

It already is more powerful than ever.  It already is more thinner than it ever was historically.  The thinner it's got the more powerful it's become.

 

It's just a 'laptop' on a stand.  When apple have had the opportunity to shave mms off the stand or shape the design they've done it.  The iMac is the pioneer of dropping legacy tech'.  Floppy disk.  

 

Optical is next judging by the laptops.  Maybe even HDs...for SSD.  Who knows with Apple.  But we can look at where the momentum is.  Laptop is the new desktop for Apple.  And that's where their sales and design effort is.  Supply and demand.  In fact, they pioneered their own shift to laptops from desktops even more aggressively than the PC market did, I'd argue.  And the 4:1 sales ratio for Apple Macs reflects this...and the move away from clunky ass tower products.

 

Tech' is shrinking.  Apple doesn't do mainstream towers.  Nothing in the last 13 years says they do or will.  Ivy bridge and dropping Optical...allows them to shave off more bulk for the forward looking sexiness they're renowned for.  Expect it to look more like rMacbook Pro rather than the comparatively hulking beast we have now.  There's no need for Apple to have it so thick.

 

...and yes.  I'm a 'desktop' man.  But I'm not seeing where this fully upgradeable tinkerbox Mac Midi is going to come from given Apple can't even upgrade their flagship desktop in 15 months?

 

Nothing much has changed with the Mac desktop.  In how long now?

 

If I could get a 27 inch iMac that looked like the sexy beast rMacbook?  I'd take it.  I doubt it will be THAT thin.  But it's going to be thinner.  The forum guys on here are insignificant next to the consumer gadget iOS/Mac resurgence who get a lot of power for a premium price and are prepared to pay it.  The iOS devices are much cheaper due to volume.  ...but Apple used volume to help them price the Airs with more of an edge.  So it's not all bad.  (Looks at Pro and Mini for examples of WHAT?  ARE?  THEY?  DOING?!)

 

Lemon Bon Bon.

 

Desktop CPU, desktop HDD. Hardly a laptop.

 

 

And they're wrong to put their focus there.

 

 

About a year. Yeah, that's it. It's changing constantly.

The desktop cpu was relatively recent.  The quad cpu took ages to come to the iMac.  A legacy of it's thermal design limit.   It has a laptop gpu.  So yes.  For a large part of it's 'flat design' life, it's been a laptop on a stand with laptop parts.  Though the i7 desktop version was welcome...

 

It's just a laptop on a stand... :)

 

Wrong to put their focus there?  Says the ant to the masterdon.  Lol.  For about ten years now.  With record Mac sales.  And supreme design innovation.  But most of all, record profits.  And they sit proudly ahead of desktops in the Apple stores.  I guess you can think Apple is 'wrong.'  They don't care much.  They're laptops are way ahead of their desktops.  With little sign of that changing.  And I don't like laptops.  But their just 'new' era desktops.  Most people, most children...I know just use them on tables.  Laptop.  Bit of a misnoma that.

 

Specs wise?  More than a year for the iMac.  Lots more.  Mini?  Even more.  'pro'?  A languishing multi-year joke.  As for the line up?  It's been that way since PPC.  You must be looking at some other apple desktop line up to use the word 'constant' along with the word change.  Alt' universe perhaps...maybe there we'll have a desktop line up with reasonable prices and an X-Mac.  It's not going to happen in this universe.  :P

 

Lemon Bon Bon.

"Desktop CPU, desktop HDD. Hardly a laptop."

 

Hardly a desktop either some might say...

 

Lemon Bon Bon.

And as for the iMac not being a mid-box.  Well.

 

*Shrugs.  It occupies the 'mid ground' in Apple's desktops.  Regardless of conventional comparisons.

 

The Mac was never a conventional desktop.  It invented the desktop as we know it.  So it's quite comical to say it's not this or that.

 

It offers 3/4s the gpu power of most PC set ups...and an i7 cpu that takes some beating...and a beauty of a 27 inch screen.

 

The top end is compelling value compared to the mac pro.

 

The iMac is THE Mac.  It's what the original Mac dreamed of being.

 

It's a stunning machine.  It will in simple evolutionary terms become more powerful than ever.  And with Haswell Xeon 10 cores next year with comparable thermal badges to the current chips then who knows where the iMac can go.  That's up to Apple, I guess.  But the iMac got 2 cores then 4...so I guess 6 or 8 or more isn't out the question...

 

The days of needing a whole room to send man under neath the radiation belt are over.  The days of need a big honking box are other for the vast majority of users.

 

The 'workstation' like the desktop like the laptop like the tablet will morph what we think of as a computing device.  The iMac has been encroaching on the Pro's territory for a while now.  And the top end iMac smacks the entry 'pro' good and proper for performance bang for buck value.

 

I don't doubt there'll be a new 'pro' in 2013...but I'm guessing Apple will pull it's design around a bit.  Long over due.

 

The iMac is going to become even better with Haswell and the Radeon 8xxx class gpu.  That, SSD and 8-16 gigs of ram and you have a sexy beast of a machine.  All that in a 2inch enclosure.  Impressive.

 

Lemon Bon Bon.

 

The primary feature of calling a desktop a desktop and it's "not a desktop"… 

 

Something like that.  It's primary feature is a screen and that's powered by a laptop gpu.

 

The iMac levitates above the desktop too.  It floats by virtue of a stand.  ...with all the parts 'glommed' behind the monitor. :P

 

It's a work of art.  But the 'Mac' was never a typical 'desktop' *(whatever one of those is...Apple doesn't make them.)

 

Lemon Bon Bon.

You could say with the move to trackpads and the 'launch pad' in Lion that it's more of an iPad on a stand than ever...

 

...all in time, perhaps?

 

Lemon Bon Bon.

Most desktops really aren't anyway, because you really need to put the main unit underneath the desk or waste desk space on something that really fits better under the desk anyway.

Which is another reason why Laptops don't often cut it on he desktop. Installed right "desktops" free up desk space for other goodies.

I'm not sure why not, my desktop keyboard takes more desk area than a laptop. Even with a smaller keyboard, my monitor isn't going away. I could get a monitor arm, but I haven't found one that I trusted and liked.

Also, a laptop can be closed and shoved into its carry bag, vs. needing to have a place to stash the monitor, mouse & keyboard

 

Well, we know where Apple stands now. :) We can revisit the "nonsense" label after they've been on sale for a quarter!