The next iMac - Page 3

According to the MacWorld posting about the Core 2 Duo chips this morning, Intel expects most systems carrying the Core 2 Duo chips to be available next week. The article focused on HP systems, but it would be nice if Apple followed suit.

I don't think that we will have to wait 2 months for Apple to release a computer with these chips most of the work is already done and I'm sure that Intel will want Apple to release computers using these chips as soon as possible. Apple had the fastest growing market share last year, so it will be great press for Intel when Apple systems using the new chip are released. Also Apple's computer releases generally receive more press attention than other computer makers, who rely much more on Intel to advertise the chips and hold the BIG press events.

My guess is that a Conroe computer will be released in the next two weeks, Morem released the first week or so of September. I wouldn't be surprised if there is a case revision (major design change/direction) with the second generation Core Duo chips, but I think that is more likely in January. Whether the iMac gets a Conroe or not I'm not sure, I've seen good arguments against it but think that it makes sense for Apple to find a way to make it work so that all their desktops are 64 bit and stay competitive with desktop's from their competition.

i would like the black only if the keyboard and mouse came in clear/black instead of clear/white and im not crazy about the silver stand...

Has anyone had any issues with the integrated screens in the new iMac 20"? I'm so used to using the 23" stand alone monior, first with my PowerBook G4 and then with a new MacMini (unfortunately the G4^3s couldn't handle it) that I still wonder at the value of integrating it all into one frame. OK, I know it is thin and small in footprint, and I guess I can now run the 23" from an iMac. Just don't have a big enough desk in my Manhattan apartment or tiny university office!

Are you saying your g4 mini couldn't power a 23"? My wifes mini does just fine with her 23".

No, it is the G4 Cube that cannot. It runs a 22" cinema display perfectly and did fine with the original 15" one, but the newer displays (and the first Cinema HD's, too) did not work with the Cubes. The Mac Mini is fine; indeed, I'm tying this on one now.

This just came to my mind so forgive me if it's a little out there -- it is late. Anyway, what if the next iMac isn't an iMac at all? Apple has been changing all the product names to include Mac. The PowerBook became the MacBook Pro. The iBook became the MacBook. The PowerMac is changing to the MacPro. What if the next iMac, which could potentially come out at any moment with a Core 2 Duo chip in it, is just simply Mac. Still with a screen but most likely a slightly different design -- in tune with the cinema display perhaps. But the name would be simply Mac. Apples desktop product line would be the Mac Mini, the Mac, and the Mac Pro with notebooks MacBook and PowerMac. I can see the ad's now: "Mac's Back" or something like that. What do you think? Am I on to something or is it just late and I've lost it?

You're late. This bad idea is almost 8 months old, already.

I am so tired of all those people who consider "Mac" a good name for the iMac or any other desktop product between the Mac mini and the Mac Pro.

Every Macintosh computer is a Mac.
Apple wanted all of it's Macintosh products to have the "Mac" moniker in its name.
iMac has already Mac in its name.

iMac is Apples bestselling desktopcomputer.

iMac is such an important name to Apple, that they ditched the eMac productname in favor of iMac for an educational only product.

If you think you'll get a conroe based iMac for a similar price that you'd pay for a the current iMac you are mistaken. Every conroe PC that I see is priced above the current iMac and Apple never sells similar hardware for less than other big name OEMs.

I predict a Merom. It's got the right price and the right temperature.

I don't know. The 2.4 Conroe is around $300 which is about where the current pricing lies. I don't think they would put the 2.6 or the C2Extreme 2.9 in but I think the 2.4 in the 20inch is not that far off. Temp wise, it's a little cooler then the G5 is it not?

Merom is almost twice as expensive as a similar clocked Conroe. So I don't understand your conclusion.
I don't expect a 2.4Ghz in the 20" iMac this time around.
2.13Ghz at best.
It will be much, much faster than the current offering.

I agree. That gives Apple room for incremental speed bumps until the core 2 replacement arrives.

I was looking around for the Yonah prices when that chip family was released, but was unable to find them. If I remember it started out at just over $200 for the Core Solo. The bottom end Conroe is $183. They are as much or less than the Yonah's when Apple started selling them. Apple didn't use the bottom end chips in the iMac either, they used the mid and top end chips. If I recall correctly the new Intel Core 2 Duo 2.13 ($224) and the 2.4 ($316) are no more than the initial prices for the 1.83 and 2.0 Core Duo Yonah's back in January. I'm thinking that they may even be less since the Yonah's had the Core Solo and 1.66 Core Duo taking up the bottom two tiers of their pricing.

Also remember that the price of LCD screens has dropped quite a bit in the last year, and indeed in the last 6 months, so there should be a bit of room for an increase in the price of the processor with the decrease in price of the display.

Dell's Core 2 Duo tower priced at $1595

• 20" Monitor
• 1GB RAM
• 320GB Serial ATA 3Gb/s Hard Drive
• Dual Drives: 16x DVD-ROM Drive + 16x DVD+/-RW w/ dbl layer write capable
• 256 M Nvidia Geforce 7300LE Video Card

Add $50 for the 2.13 and $150 for the 2.4 Core Duo processors.

iMac 20" 2.0 at $1699

• 250 MB serial ATA HD
• ATI Radeon X1600/128MB VRAM

Based on the price of the chips, and the example of Dell's sample computer above there is more than enough room built into the lower level components of the Apple system and Apple's higher price to add in a 2.4 Ghz Core 2 Duo chip in the 20" iMac and still make a profit on it. Dell's has twice the RAM, larger HD, twice the DVD drives, and a much beefier video card. Apple may increase the standard RAM but won't put in dual optical drives. They may upgrade to a 256 M video card, but I wouldn't be supprised if they didn't. I'm not saying Apple will top the iMac out at 2.4,but they definatly have the room for the component price of those chips in the top end iMac.

Really? sorry about that. Don't listen to me.

Yeah, based on the processor prices it looks like the logical step would be putting the 2.4 into the 20" and the 2.13 into the 17" -- given that the still offer a 17" version that isn't the EDU iMac. Hopefully we'll know for sure pretty soon.

what are the odds that they do change the look of it??

That's a good explaination.

The reason I don't think Apple will put a 2.4Ghz Conroe in the next generation 20" iMac is:
- How many room for upgrades is left. A $900 Core 2 Extreme is not an option, so Apple can upgrade in januari to the 2.67Ghz and after that they have to look for something else. I don't know what Intel has to offer for mid 2007 and beyond.
If I am wrong (and I hope I am) and Apple releases a 2.4Ghz 20"iMac this summer/fall, Intel should have an impressive roadmap ahead.
- The 2.4Ghz has 4MB cache, that's a large step up from Yonah.
- I am conservative about the processors Apple will use for the MacPro.

I am inclined to think similarly about this. I expect Apple to be rather conservative in the following months or year, in regard to updates in the consumer lines. Especially when there is no reason to not do so. The current (and even more so the next) iMac delivers more processing power than the average user needs today.

Ok speed bumps are expected right?
But is a redesign expected? Or is that all just pipe dreaming?

Look at the numbers, 2002 iMac G4, 2004 iMac G5 design, 2006? I know theyre probably going to give us a new Mac Pro or whatnot, but I think we need a new design for the iMac, nothign big, just similiar to these mock designs people are making.

Fisrt when Yonah was released I don't believe that the 2.13 chip was available, so Apple used the fastest chip in the iMac at that time. Second the chip prices should fall by January, they did with Yonah about 4-5 months after their release. Third, even if Apple uses the 2.4 Ghz Conroe in the top end they still have room for growth in that chip line. Fourth, the Conroe is not the end of Intel's chip development, there will be something else to replace it in 6-12 months, even if it is just a minor speed bump to just above 3.0 Ghz on the top end.

Now, I'm not saying they will use the 2.4 in the high end iMac, but component prices and similar models from Dell show that they can do so for the price that they are charging for the high end iMac. Now if they do not then the iMac should come down in price if they are going to release models that are competative in their target markets. Given the extra's for the Dell model above that Apple would not add to the imac will more than make up for the $50 difference in the faster processor, and that Apple is not likely to offer 1 GB RAM as standard then a "Fair" price for a 2.13 iMac would be no more than $1599, and a better price for it would be $1499. Given this the 17" should probably drop in price to $1199 or $1099. That leaves room for Apple to release a new "high end" model with a 2.4 in the $1899 or $1999 price range.

Even if they do release a 2.4 Ghz iMac Apple still has room to release 3 Mac Pro's using Conro'e, starting with a 2.4 in the low end and going up to the 2.93 in the high end. Everyone expects that Woodcrest will be used in at least one of the MacPro's, so it is more likely that they would leave the 2.4 Ghz to be used in another model which today can only be the iMac. Of course they could release a new "Cube" or headless or pizzabox model that fits inbetween the iMac and the MacPro.

Apple needs to gain market share, right now they seem poised to do that in the consumer space, no the pro space. Their cross marketing with the iPod and laptops are pointing in this direction as well as their current focus in advertising. They are not going to grow market share unless they release computers that are competative in their target market. That is not to say that Apple cannot be the most expensive in that target market, but it cannot be so much that consumers won't switch. Don't forget that a they may have to replace a bit of software that will create a bit of an overhead in addition to the price of a computer. $100 more for an iMac over a similarly marketed and speced Dell will be OK, but $200-400 and people will be looking at Dell.

Agreed.

Came across this link where the conroe 2.9 ghz was trested against various machines. Oddly a dual 2.7 ghz g5 power mac was included in this mostly pc comparisson test. Anyway, the dual core Conroe outperformed the dual processor dual core Opteron systems in many tests. Unbelievable to me. A dual core conroe beating 4 core opteron systems. Link below

http://www.digitalvideoediting.com/a...jsp?id=53163-1

Real question is will they drop the i and just call it Mac like the rest of the Intel processor Mac's.

uhm... no

The rest of the Intel processor Mac's aren't just called Mac either:

- MacBook
- MacBook Pro
- Mac mini
- iMac
(and soon)
- Mac Pro

As you see they all have an appendix to their Mac.

Read this thread again for additional commentary on this great subject.

As you can see though your list is consistent aside from the naming scheme of the iMac.

None of the latest Intel Mac's have a prefix like they use to:

PowerBook
PowerMac
iBook
iMac

Aside from Mac mini which is a new breed of computer in the product line and I think they already had the naming scheme thought up for the Intel based Mac's before this one came out.

If that were going to happen chances are that it would have been done back in January. Apple has a lot of time and money invested in the iMac brand, and it is a VERY recognizable name today. It also links the product with the iPod.

That being said, I realized while typing this that the new Mac commercials are not iMac commercials they are Mac commercials. The ones that show the iMac don't have the iMac name, just an apple with MAC next to it, so Maybe Apple is planning on getting rid of the "i" in Mac.

Look, we've been there. Logically, you're right: there's MacBook and MacBook Pro, so there should be Mac mini, Mac and Mac Pro. Unfortunately, there's two flaws with that:

1) iMac is a hugely established brand, much like iPod. They're not gonna kill it unless they come up with something better, and just "Mac" isn't better, because:

2) Having both a platform "Mac" and a computer "Mac" is greatly confusing. It's already confusing now in that many people I meet think that "iMac" is the new name for what used to be called "Macintosh": the platform. But naming the two exactly the same would be much worse.

People put too much importance in this. On the other side of the isle they say they have a PC, and you assume that they are running Windows on it. Platform doesn't matter to most people in the way that you are suggesting. All they need to know is that they need to get a version that is OS X compatible, or Windows, or whatever.

So?
The only consistency in Apples new naming scheme is that it has to have "Mac" in the name.
They did that, end of story.
If they need a product between the Mac mini and the Mac Pro they 'll come up with a creative solution as long as it isn't just "Mac".
MacBook and MacBook Pro are newer breeds than your Mac mini.

This discussion doesn't make sense.
There are very good reasonable arguments in this thread why Apple shouldn't and wouldn't use a "Mac"only moniker for a product.
And some stupid lingual consistency reasons why the should.

I quit.

I wasn't sure where to post this. A common problem here where many forum topics overlap. But here it is:

http://www.tgdaily.com/2006/08/01/fi...uo_benchmarks/

For those looking for a new iMac, it seems that stock is running a bit tight. It was mentioned in an article I read earlier that the 17" model was a bit scarce, and at the UK store, the 20" model will now take five days to ship, even in standard spec. Update on Monday anyone?

23" here we come!

I'm still hoping for 19" & 22" iMacs,
and 19", 22", 27" Cinema Displays with iSights.

That's a lot of odd sizes. Except for 20", and 24", the even size screens never seem to be popular, and have usually been replaced with one just 1" larger.

12 with 13, 14 with 15, 16 with 17, 18 was never popular at all,

Not odd, or won't be soon:

Newegg has plenty of widescreen 19" displays:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...SubCategory=20

...whereas 22" is predicted as becoming poular:
http://www.engadget.com/2006/06/29/m...lcd-for-vista/

...and 27" will be offered soon by Dell:
http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=1466

I did not even know it existed.

I agree with you, the 19" has definitely taken over as the new 17" and the 22" is the new 20", so to speak.

I think that the 22" sounds good.. I'm sure taht there should be a big difference like the 17" vs 20" for Apple to go with the 22" instead of the 23" if in anycase they come up with it.. I don't see the current "chin" iMac fading away anytime soon, sure therea re lots of us that would love a 22" or 23" beefed up iMac but i guess that we'll settle for the 20" for now.. what i would like to see is more power on the iMacs: more ram @least up to 4GB and a more powerfull video card not just video ram but more powerfull one's.. this babies are for gaming too.. the black imac mockup looks very nice.. i guess we'll have to wait and see..

Fow now my 20" will do it for me..!