So The iMac Is Next, Right?

I could see the emac dropping $100 and the top two models dropping $200 would be nice and kinda make a position of nice easy hardware gain at most price points with no major gaps and less runover of product lines

The eMac is late, 2 years too late. In a year, they should hit commodity prices (sans superdrive). Apple needs to start blowing these out a UNDER 799. They don't have to give it a great update, it just has to get cheaper.

The 17" iMac is a horrible deal right now. A G4 tower plus third party LCD offers much better performance and expansion for less money. Both 12" powerbooks offer spanning and mobility for less or equal money, and even the 15" Ti 867 could be seen as a better deal if you favor mobility over DVD burning. And then, if you favor DVD burning, you could do worse than an eMac with nearly the same screen real-estate.

The 17" iMac needs to come down to 1299, the 15" to 999, and the eMac to 799, just to start. Why anyone would choose a combo e/iMac over an iBook, or a superdrive over the 12"PB is beyond me. The PB actually offers MORE display flexibility than the either of the AIO's while still offering portability.

I can pick up a superdrive 12 for over 400 Canadian less than an iMac. I would say that the iMac needs to come down in price by AT LEAST that much for a superdrive version. In 6 months I'll be able to get a 17" LCD retail for that much, good ones are already down to 600 Canadian (Retail)

I dissagree, I thnk we will see the MPC7475 at whatever clock rates they make an appearence and a price reduction. I do not expect to see any change in video cards. Apple has been traditionally very slow to put it's money into expensive video cards, and since they only really benifit "Gamers", Apples traditional customers will not need higher performance video cards. Yes a faster video card is nice but it is not a deal breaker.

I think the Xserve (updated to G5) or PowerBooks (update to 7457 G4) will be next, leaning slightly towards the Xserve going first only because I don't know how close Apple is to being able to get the 7457s in quantity.

After Xserve and PowerBook... then the iMac. Sooner if updated 7457 G4, a little longer if G5. Running at 1.2 or 1.4 GHz with a single G5 processor, I don't think heat will be a problem for the iMac. As a mid range product with a high price in the eyes of many consumers, the iMac could really use the bang-for-your-buck boost of a G5. If it's at all practical to for Apple to redesign the mobo quickly and get a sufficient supply of G5s from IBM, they should go for it.

Keeping the iMac at 1.2-1.4 GHz, single G5 processor, and having less expansion should be sufficient differentiation from the Power Mac line, so I don't see any strategic difficulties with quickly moving to the G5 in the iMac.

Not happening, take a look at that heat sink and bus on the PM's again.

iMacs will never be substantially faster than PB's.

I don't think I've seen a single post by you that isn't about prices

Matsu's post about the iMacs being too expensive for the features is completely true. They are horrible machines when it comes to price/performance. They need a price reduction and a 19 inch LCD on the high end.

iMacs are horrible deals right now, and I would expect them to be upgraded in the next few weeks before school begins.

Did I say that it wasn't?

Yes, it is not the cheapest machine and you can get a PC with better numbers, but I still think the 17 inch iMac is a nice computer. A machine that I happly push to people. Of course I wold agree that with a 200 MHZ bus and a 7457 it would be an even better deal. If you people like PC so much, go buy one. It is all about what you want.

actually no. How cheap can you get a 17" widescreen LCD for?
(I have priced them, they are very expensive and usually lower resolution).
that is probably the biggest cost on the 17" imac.

The Power Macs will run up to dual 2.0 GHz G5s. Their heat sinks could well be overkill for what's currently slated, leaving room for speed bumps before the 90 nm die shrink. I don't think you can use the heat engineering of the new Power Macs to guess what the thermal issues might be for single 1.2-1.4 GHz G5s in an iMac.

As for the bus speed, it would scale with the processor speed down to 600-700 MHz. Perhaps a small performance trade-off could be made (creating a further distinction between the Power Mac and iMac lines) where an intermediate bus controller throttles the effective bus speed down to 300-350 MHz... still fast enough to benefit from DDR RAM better than the old G4 PMs did.

Yes. I think they are overpriced too. After all i can buy a pc clone for half price AND still run all the iApps,OSX and the apple music store correct?

The broken record plays on....

iMacs perfectly priced? Nope.
When comparing apples to orange PCs do people _constantly_ leave out the best of breed iApps and the OSX user experience? Yep.

While unique and a looker...the imac2 is need of some fundamental addressing. Something is stopping it from being in the same ballpark as the original iMac.

My guess?

Cost. Cost. Cost.

Only 1 model under a k. Pathetic. The iMac2 needs to be where the eMac line is. From bottom to top. LCDs and specs of the iMac don't cost THAT much.

I kinda agreed with Matsu's post. Apple have got to work harder on forcing eMac and iMac2 pricing down...with upgrades!

Sales figures do not lie.

The POWERMac G5 dual 2 gigger is 3rd on Apple Store sales charts. Hmmm. Why? Good spec. Good price.

iMac 2? Poor spec. Poor price.

Lemon Bon Bon

I don't think Matsu is saying the iMac is expensive compared to a PC, he's saying it's expensive compared to the PowerBook 12" and the PowerMac - and it lacks the portability of the former and the expandability/upgradability of the latter.

I'd love a display with an arm like the iMac's, but I'm not willing to sacrifice the expandability. I did once (with the Cube), and now I want a tower.

hopefully the focus during steve's G5 presentation on price/performance comparisons with dell's means that they're aware of the "overpriced and underspec'd" perception of apple, and will try to work on that in their consumer lines as well.

if apple can get their hands on a bunch of the 1.0-1.2 GHz PPC 970's, the lower heat and power consumption might allow them to push the next gen processor into 'books and imacs before waiting for the 90nm switch.

back to lurking -
matty-o

Bingo, I've been saying that since forever, hell, if you've got a display anywhere in the house, even a 1.6GHz G5 is worth strecthing to meet over the iMac.

Why would I recommend any portable from the 867Ti down to the iBook, and the 1.25Ghz single G4 tower, if I thought they were horrible deals. The iMac is a very weak offering relative to the rest of the line-up, that's all

Maybe a Cube or 'Matsu' Mini-Tower concept with a monitor on an iMac like chrome arm instead of those polycarbonate peg legs.

ie separate the monitor and Cube the dome. And you got Cube the iMac 3.

?

At least the Cube had limited expandability.

There's a reason why the Powerbook 12 inch is on of Apple's top sellers...

Lemon Bon Bon

I think Apple could take that entry eMac down to $599.

So the matrix would then look like this:

$599 G4 GHz eMac/256/32 MB Video/CD
$799 G4 1.25 eMac/256/64 MB Video/Combo
$999 G4 1.25 eMac/512/64 MB Video/SuperDrive

$1199 G4 1 GHZ iMac FP 15/256 MB/64 MB Video/Combo
$1599 G4 1.25 GHZ iMac FP 17/512 MB/64 MB Video/SuperDrive

$1,299 G4 1.25 Power Mac tower, etc...

I doubt that the 17" panel is too costly any more, or that it's aspect drives up the price. Square 17" panels can be had for as little as 600-650 Canadian, and the same 17" widescreen panel has recently popped up in a 1999 laptop (albeit a 10 pound one!). Just this afternoon, in my local Costco, I saw the same panel used in Widescreen flat panel TV/Monitor for 1000 Canadian. When you strip out the remote, speakers, RGB, Scart connectors from the TV component, the panels itself obviously isn't anything to much more costly than a 15"

It actually has less surface area than a square 17, and since panels are paid for by the square inch, I suspect it costs less than the better 5:4 17" displays.

A 17" digital LCD at various retailers is around $500 American. So yes, I can believe your argument that Apple could charge less for their screens. That was a Sony, but it's probably, spec-wise, close to what Apple's LCD are.

Apple needs to figure out a way to create a monitor like the iMac LCD screen - almost floatable with a solid base (but not the iMac as the base ). Just having the adjustable kickstand in back is not all that good when you sit and eye-level is 20" or so higher than the desk. Neck strain galore, from looking down at it all day long!

I wonder if a different version of the 17" display might be used that has deeper, richer color. Isn't it time for a GPU that goes a bit beyond the GeForce4 MX? I also wonder if there could be something other than a matte white base. If the iMac moves to the G5, a metalic base would be better, and with more or bigger holes.

A 1.2 GHz G5 is certainly possible in an iMac. The heat dissipation is 19W for the chip. That's very close to what the 7455 does at 1 GHz. Just use a 600 MHz bus and DDR300 memory. I don't know if there is such a thing but DDR266 can be upscaled a bit.

If there could be a G5 iMac this year, maybe it'll be announced in 2 weeks at MW and ship in August.

If there isn't going to be a G5 iMac this year, maybe the 7457 would have to be used at up to 1.3 GHz. These, then, would be the sort of boring, ho hum specs:

$1699
17-inch widescreen LCD
1.2GHz PowerPC G4
Radeon 9100 IGP
64MB DDR video memory
256MB DDR266 SDRAM
80GB Ultra ATA hard drive

If a G5:
$1899
17-inch widescreen LCD
1.2GHz PowerPC G5
Radeon 9100 IGP
64MB DDR video memory
256MB DDR300 SDRAM
80GB Ultra ATA hard drive

No way we'll see a G5 iMac to undercut Power Mac sales. That sucker is #1 in sales at the Apple online store for good reason. It has been 4 long years since Apple gave us something leading edge; they ain't gonna piss that away to iMac sales.

Hope so. I'm hoping my family will update from a B&W G3 300 and 1.6ghz Win2k PC. The price is more important than anything else like Matsu says. Look at the gigantic gaping gap of a gap between the G5 and everything else. The G5 must be more than 5x faster at most things than the iMac! Wow! There is going to be a tidal wave of updates coming this summer I believe. It will be awesome if Apple does it right and keeps prices going down. eMacs need to just get cheaper. iBooks need to get faster and/or cheaper. iMacs need to get MUCH cheaper and MUCH faster. 1.42ghz G4 should be the bare minimum but somehow I think Apple will be stupid and have 1ghz on the lowend. PowerBooks same thing, it would be nice to see 1.25 on lowend but I bet it'll be 1ghz on lowend.

Yeah but the #1 seller is the dual 2 gig. Power users are snapping them up. I don't think a 1.2 GHz G5 iMac is going to steal sales from that crowd.

OTOH, you're probably right. But then, what does Apple do about slumping iMac sales? Would it be enough to use the 7457 at, say, 1.2 GHz and lower the price to $1699? Maybe.

The iMac will definitely NOT go G5 before the "pro" line of Powerbooks. The iMac, eMac, and iBooks are low-end machines. The Powerbooks and Power Macs are the "pro" market. So if we see a G5 in another machine, it's going to be in the Powerbook...

I can't wait till Moto is out of the picture.... Looks like we're going to have to deal with them for a little while longer though...

Damn, that sounds so reasonable, it must be true. If we're stuck with G4s, I hope we get a price break.

Oh yah, all that consumer criz-ud will get updated.

First of all, you left out the Xserve... I'd say that that's first before the PowerBooks for the G5.

Also, I wouldn't call the iMac low-end. It definitely makes for a middle tier between the Power Macs and the eMacs.

Power consumption and heat are going to keep the G5 out of the PowerBooks for a while. Now, while G5 vs. G4 makes for a convenient way to distinguish pro vs. consumer, it's hardly the only way to make that distinction. If the G5 can be engineered into an iMac first for an afforable price, why hold back just to maintain some artificial pro vs. consumer distinction?

The PowerBooks have been good sellers for Apple. The iMac 2, after a brief initial surge, has not. Which of these products needs a sales boost more?


All this said, another G4 update of the iMac, especially a 7457, wouldn't surprise me. But I think a reasonable case can be made for G5s getting into iMacs sooner than PowerBooks. The situation is hardly as cut-and-dried as you'd like to make it out to be.

Upgrade issues aside, Apple would do well to reconsider what configurations they force buyers into. Most glaringly, Apple doesn't allow you to purchase a 17" iMac WITHOUT a SuperDrive. Just giving users that option would allow them to knock $200 off the price and make the iMac a much better value. While the SuperDive is a great thing to offer, many of us won't take advantage of it. As far an I'm concerned, it's $200 to no benefit of mine. Add a modest speed-bump and price reduction to a 17" Combo-Drive iMac, and I'd buy. But for now, Apple just isn't offering anything that I'd want to purchase.

Really? Hasn't Apple followed this path for years now... It seems they bump the Powerbooks and then shortly after, they update the iMacs. I could be wrong, I'm just showing what Apple has done and predicting their next move. If the iMac gets the G5, you can guarantee the Powerbooks will get them as well. I'm still sticking with a G5 laptop before a G5 iMac.... makes sense.... "first 64-bit PowerMac" "first 64-bit laptop" Something for home, and something for on the go.... they don't need another G5 iMac to put that to good use

I agree, putting the G4 in the iMac has not affected PM sales, poor performance did that. Poor performance of the iMac will kill it too, so they will migrate to the G5 as soon as possible. I don't buy into the argument that Apple will sit back and watch iMac sales plument if it can stop it by including the G5, Apple wants to loos it's reputation for cool slow computers asap. It will have to deal with the PB problem as a seperate issue, the G5 as present is simply not suiatable for portable use so they will have to use the MPC7457 or Mojahv. However, I expect to see the 7457 and 200mhz bus speeds in both after MWNY in July. Mated with Panther both PB's and iMacs will gain a significent performance boost. Just improving the FSB has a disproportionate effect on preformance.

With the arrival of G5 in a month or two it clears the way for substantailly faster G4s in the iMac. A 1.4 Ghz with L3 cache substantially faster than a non L3 1.0 GHz G4.

When the second generation towers arrive early 2004 or so probably with dual CPUs it opens up for the G5 in the iMac

An alternative is to use the botton of the barrel IBM 970 CPUs says the 1.0 to 1.4 GHz ones. Quite useless for IBM as they compete against Intel Xeon and AMDs Opteron. But those 970 would still be a huge leap forward compared to the G4.

If Apple will go for a speedbump G4 and then G5 or go for low speed G5 right away depend on both supplies of chips and heat constrains and other issues with the iMac.

But the G4 to G5 transition is very different from the G3 to G4 as the G5 offer substantial performance gains from the start. Apple has the very best reason to make the transition they possibly can, namely profit

Apple's "path" has for the past few years been very constrained by Motorola. They now have more options.

I could be wrong, I'm just showing what Apple has done and predicting their next move.

There are new factors to consider besides past behavior.

If the iMac gets the G5, you can guarantee the Powerbooks will get them as well.

You say this as if the engineering issues mean absolutely nothing. The iMac's enclosure does limit its heat dissipation somewhat, but as a desktop unit it's going to be much more flexible about such things than a PowerBook.

I'm still sticking with a G5 laptop before a G5 iMac.... makes sense.... "first 64-bit PowerMac" "first 64-bit laptop" Something for home, and something for on the go.... they don't need another G5 iMac to put that to good use

Consider these premises, admittedly some just guesswork:

• The iMac can handle currently available 1.2-1.4 GHz G5s, the PowerBook cannot.
• iMac sales need much more help than PowerBook sales.
• Using G5s at 1.2-1.4 GHz would improve the perceived value of the iMacs, without encroaching on Power Mac territory.
• Apples engineering can quickly put together a viable iMac G5 mobo using currently-available G5s, well before doing so for the PowerBook, which is likely waiting on 90 nm versions of the 970.

Are you saying that even if all of the above were true, Apple would still let the iMac languish with the G4 for as much as a year or more, waiting for PowerBooks to catch up, just to follow a particular pattern, just to maintain some artificial G5 = pro distinction, just to be able to use particular slogans at particular times?

that's just as full of baseless assumptions.

Value/cost has been the number one indicator of sales success. iMacs cost too much, the G4 platform will still be cheaper than the G5 over the next 12-18 months.

Apple favors a CPU distinction between pro and consumer, and Apple has typically positioned the PB as a higher performance offering than the iMac.

You will not see G5 iMacs untill after 2004 is through.

G5 iMacs will be available by Summer 2004. Apple has said they will be at 3Ghz by then. That makes it easy for them to ship 1.6Ghz iMacs that won't come close to cannibalizing Powermac Sales(by then PM will be 2.4, 2.6 and 3Ghz)

Nah, Motorola is here to stay. Remember how long the original iMac held out, with a G3, and see how the iBook still makes use of it. By staying with a somewhat antiquated technology, Apple will be able to preserve margins which they love, yet add features and lower prices, which consumers love.

There will be a third desktop tier by the end of '04, you'll see. There is already one there, the leftover G4 tower, which is really more than a leftover, it is a purposeful continuation of the them with the aim to drive prices down, a cube, basically, but a better deal than the cube ever was.

Seriously, 1299 for a single 1.25Ghz G4 with 1MB of L3 is not a bad deal, not great, but better than the iMac, I could buy a 3rd party 17" display and still come out ahead with tons of expansion and a much faster CPU.

When the G5 platform comes down enough in price, it will go into this tier first -- headless (expandable) mac -- NOT the iMac. The eMac (which I lump together with the iMac, may not even exist by the end of 2004, depending on what Apple can do with iMac prices.

The line-up will look different (if Apple does it right)

G5 PowerMac 1999-2999.

G5 "Headless" 1299-1699

iMac G4 899-1299

eMac ? 699.

They've already inserted a tier between the iMac and PM, if anyone cares to notice, and they've commented on it, it's a long term intention of theirs to develop a product for that space. That product WILL cost more than an iMac and it will be FASTER, and it WILL (eventually) feature a G5.

This frees the iMac to be what it always had to be in order to have success, AN AFFORDABLE MACHINE. That's the whole point of an AIO, to get you everything in one package, you pay once and it's all there. LCD's were a tad too expensive for Apple when they launched the FP, but they're getting cheaper by the minute, and are quite cheap already.

Everything said about G5 iMacs in this thread ignores the reality of what Apple has done and what they are doing. IT IS NOT HAPPENING THIS YEAR OR NEXT, mebbe LATE '04, more likely Jan '05, NOT before.

And it makes sense to get the AIO's down in price as much as possible. Then, you will have CHOICE. Wanted it all integrated, buy the iMac. Want more power and flexibility, buy the "Headless" machine (mebbe it'll even be a cube) and get the "pro" CPU but you have to shell out for a seperate display. A comprimise middle tier.

I guarantee you, that the lineup will look like this

G5 machines:

PM
Xserve
Headless
PowerBook 15 and 17
mebbe 12 ???

G4 Machines

iMac
eMac
iBook
mebbe PB12 ???

That's the way it is, I'm right, there's no use crying about it

Assumptions, yes. Baseless? No... I think I've laid out my reasoning fairly well, and it's at least on par with much of the speculation done on AI. I think even better.

Value/cost has been the number one indicator of sales success. iMacs cost too much, the G4 platform will still be cheaper than the G5 over the next 12-18 months.

Sure, keeping the G4 and lowering the cost would increase value/cost. But so would keeping prices the same and adding the G5.

Apple favors a CPU distinction between pro and consumer, and Apple has typically positioned the PB as a higher performance offering than the iMac.

But Apple has add fewer choices, and not very good ones, when it came to CPUs up until now. I think it's just as "baseless" to insist that this CPU distinction must be carried forward under new conditions as if it were an inflexible policy carved in stone.

Besides, I don't think that history totally agrees with what you've said:

Sep. 1999: First Power Mac G4
Jul. 2000: 9 months later, the Cube is introduced with the G4. PowerBooks still have the G3. The Cube, although too pricey for many at first, was certainly more of a consumer model than a "pro" system.
Jan. 2001: 15 months after the first G4 Power Mac, 6 months after the G4 went into a consumer system, the PowerBook gets the G4. Why? Because the cooler-running, lower-power 7410 finally came along.

Apple waited to update PowerBooks for engineering reasons, and in the meantime, put their best CPU into a more consumer oriented product.

You will not see G5 iMacs untill after 2004 is through.

Perhaps this is true. Putting the 7457 G4 into the iMacs and lowering the price isn't an unreasonable course of action. All I'm pointing out is some good reasons for a G5 in iMacs sooner rather than later, and I think I've got my bases covered at least as well as you do.