Apple's next-generation iMacs to add a touch of grace - Page 7

Is this LED-backlit panel destined for the next iMac rev?

Thanks for that link (although it's a shame the writers don't seem to appreciate the difference between screen size and resolution - "22 inch not wide enough for HD"? "24 inches a better width to support Vista's sidebar"? ). This is great news - up until now, the largest screen with L.E.D. lighting that I was aware of was 13" or so (widescreen). I was therefore expecting, with the next update, for the 15" MB Pro to go L.E.D. backlighting, but not the 17". This announcement would suggest that it is at least possible to get the 17" lit with L.E.D. backlighting.

As for the iMac - L.E.D. backlighting is more expensive at the moment, so I don't think we'll see it in an iMac. Hopefully the next update to the Cinema Displays will have it, though.

I hope so but I don't think Apple can afford to go LED at iMac sizing.




Oh God I know I'm going to love LED backlighting. Frankly I'm surprised about the Contrast Ratios that Samsung is claiming here. I would have thought that they'd be higher than 1000:1

Infact after checking out Samsungs sight I'd guess that this number is incorrct. I bet the CR is 10,000:1 which is more inline with LED technology.

You're mixing up OLED with LED-backlit LCD.

LCD is still LCD, and inherently has contrast issues.

OLED is where the real breakthrough in contrast ratios comes in.

Dude, I just got a 20-in iMac...like on April 5th, my b-day. Does Apple have any type of exchange policy if they come out with new ones right after my purchase? Any help would be greatly appreciated.

That would depend on how the LED backlight is implemented. If you have one LED per pixel, that provides real possibilities for improving contrast.

No I'm pretty familiar with both. LED backlighting for LCD improves contrast rations greatly because an LED can shut all they way off so that blacks now can truly become black. Anytime you see a LED based backlight you should see a corollary bump in Contrast Ratio because of this However CCFL backlighting has gotten much better as witnessed by the 15,000:1 ratios of some panels

56 inch 10,000:1 CR DLP

56 inch 4,000:1 CR DLP

Taking this technology and placing it in a LCD TV is much more expensive.
Samsung's LNR460D is supposed to be shipping but at around $8000 so I'm
not thinking that any large scale LED based panels will be affordable for the foreseeable
future. I love that they are thinner, cooler and have no mercury though.

Good point, I wondered if this was something that was going to start off at the pro level and work its way down. I don't know how much this is going to cost.

Edit: I notice it has 250cd/m2 brightness. Isn't that dim compared to today's iMacs and Cinema Displays? Aren't they in the 400cd/m2 range now?

That's right. But, now we're really talking expensive!

Also, the power use would be much too high. This would essentially an LED monitor behind the LCD screen.

What companies are talking about is sections of the screen being turned up or down. not ideal, but likely good enough.

Yes, but it doesn't really matter. Ultimate brightness specs don't matter unless you are in a very high lighting situation.

Generally, once you correct the monitor for color, the brightness comes way down. LED backlighting loses less brightness over its lifetime than flourescent does, so you won't be turning it up as much as it ages.

I'm in need of a new computer that I hope to keep a few years (this Dell is 6 years old)I'm hoping (yet not holding my breath) that Apple releases a mid-priced, mid-powered tower soon. I don't need the power and HD/RAM options of the Pro, nor do I want to pay for them. If I were to "settle" for a new iMac, I can forget about new screen technology like SED and OLED. I'd have to replace the whole computer instead of just the monitor.

Sure, if you want to pay $50,000 in patent licensing fees to BrightSide

Besides, they don't make LEDs that small unless you're going for an OLED panel.

Right, but with LED, it's still one backlight, that's on or off. In other words, if you have one white pixel on the screen, then the back needs to be fully on. This means that all those "black" pixels are a nice gray.

On those TVs, they're essentially lying to oyu about the contrast ratio: they're comparing the black when it's fully off, to the white when it's fully on.

It's completely irrelevant: you only care about contrast ratio when there's an image on the screen. Manufacturers that play that game are flat out lying to you.

LED doesn't offer any effective contrast ratio benefits over any other backlight technology.

Has the uneven color fading issue been resolved for OLED? I recall that blue fades the fastest, and since people seem to like their displays to have a bluish tint, then that's a problem.

A member since 04 and over 500 posts do you really need to ask this?

Anyway, in a word, NO. Apple doesn't do trade-ins but I think they do (or did) have a 30 day satisfaction guarantee (maybe not anymore so you'd need to check). That being said, I wouldn't be holding my breath for any of this speculation to become reality (not in the next 25 days at any rate)...

Dave

It's always going to be true that blue fades fasteat.

Today, even after all the development, greens fade faster than reds. It's in the nature of the higher energy bands.

But, once they get to over 10 thousand hours, it begins to get better. From what I know, the blue is up to almost 30 thousand.

But, as OLEDS fade fairly slowly altogether, the color can be adjusted over time. Mostly, we don't use our monitors too much above 150 cd/m², so there is plenty of room.

Even with CRT's, the blue is a problem. That's why we can't adjust them to 5,000k properly, and have to settle for 6,500k. It's why the Europeans had 6,500k as their standard for so long, and we have been moving to it here as well. Only monitors such as the Barco's were brightenough to go to 5,000k.

Thanks. Yup, I needed to ask, because, believe it or not, it is my first Mac since having one (Apple II GS) as a kid). I've been using Macs (with OS X) at various employments over the years, but never got around to getting one at home.

But this totally answered my question so thank you.

My guess is that the screen slab will be 'thinned' once the hard drive is replaced with a 'flash' and bits like usb keyboard and mouse ports, which contribute to thickening the slab, are built into the pedestal.

I'm hoping there will be touch screen capabilities. I think its possible with iphone going that way. Even if it is just in a limited sense, it will be a quantum leap in static design.

Look: http://ThunkDifferent.com

Touch: http://Trolltouch.com

Nobody is replacing the hard drives in iMacs with flash drives.
That's ridiculous, and these silly rumours must stop before expectations get out of hand.

iMacs are Apple's gateway to the Digital Lifestyle. High-resolution photos, High Definition home movies and buying lots and lots of movies and music from the iTMS means that iMac hard drives need more space than ever.

Flash tops out right now at 32GB or so, and the smallest hard drive in an iMac is 160GB.
Not to mention the problems with wear and tear from daily use and pricing issues.

Flash may have its uses in narrower markets and portable computers, but iMac hard drives aren't going anywhere anytime soon.

This talk isn't just isolated with desktop computers. I've read to many comments across many forums of people expecting--and wanting--NAND in the video iPod. To think that Apple would more than halve the capacity while doubling the cost is just insane.

Touch screen is intriguing and probably underestimated.

We think of using the touch screen as we do our mouse now - and that would not function very well. Your hands would get tired, it's slower than grabbing the mouse, etc. We HAVE to think of it this way because the OS is designed for mouse input.

The iPhone changes that - you can do things a mouse can't do. It's not a major thing though.

So lets reinvent an iMac just quickly.
Version 1: Looks kind of like a 24 inch laptop - with a screen integrated with a keyboard, at a slight angle. Then we put on a new OS with resolution independence so you can use that iPhone zoom function to zoom WAY out and see all your documents (like expose) or zoom way in to get into the minutae.

Then we set users on it. They play. They lose some documents etc on the infinitely sizeable screen. So we need some new interface paradigms to stop that. They find some movements very cumbersome. They also use the system in some ways we didn't expect AT ALL.

Version 2: The size of the screen changes, the angles it can be turned to, positioning of keyboard. The OS is redesigned. Then we set the users on it... and learn a whole lot more.

Oh, we don't just have users playing with their music, browsing the web, & writing word documents... they're watching TV, making movies, slideshows, pushing things to iPods & AppleTVs, networking with other machines, etc.

edit: version 2 is deliberately vaguer since I don't know what was learned in version 1. Imagine what version 3 would be, or version 4! (you'd want to be on the 4th iteration before looking at genuine paradigm shifting products).

Anyway, if Apple is building touch screen and redefining the interaction... it could delay things a bit for hardware and software. And the 1st generation won't be perfect - and could sink, swim, or fly Apple (though Apple wouldn't be betting all their horses on it... would it?)

i would much rather some small screen with a pen (8inch) that sits at the side where the mouse was so that i can use my hand as a pointer.

kind of like a tablet but a screen.

Ah, the voice of reason. Quoted for truth.

Since the other thread has been locked, I post the link to the original rumor here:

New iMacs at WWDC?

Looprumors can be wrong as often as they like, they tried to suggest that iMac would be updated at NAB too, but those quacks certainly didn't explain why that would happen when there was nothing about it to update yet, and didn't explain how iMac even fits in with the Nab show. There wasn't even one on display there that I remember.

Now that Santa Rosa-based systems should be trickling out any time now, if not already, I think it's more likely that any possible near term update to the iMac would be announced a couple weeks before or a couple weeks after WWDC rather than bother developers with an update that doesn't apply to them.

http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=7154

Sure, Looprumors is not exactly what we call a reputable rumor site, so let's see another one:

Death knell tolls for 17-inch iMac



So, what are we being left with here? Just the 20" and 24" model? Of course it is not the first time that the flat panel iMac line has "only" two display sizes. But if this is proved true, it may potentially be a problem for many people, unless the new prices take care of that.

If it's only the 17-inch that uses dithering then maybe that's why they are getting rid of it. The 20" display quality isn't that great though and it looked to me like it was sparkly too.

Nonetheless, if they drop the price on the 20" and the design is really nice, I could see it being a popular move. If they don't reduce the price, they are going to have to fill that big gap bewteen it and the Mini with something.

There would still be three options.

Just like the MacBook, the bottom configuration (20") would come in two flavors, one of which would be a stripped-down, school-ready edition. The 24" would be the premium choice, like the Black MacBook.

I believe he was referring to monitor sizes.

Two sizes had been the norm from July 2002 when the 17" P79 swivel head iMac was introduced up until September 2006 with the 24" iMac.

When we can get around the NYC Bd. of Ed. attempts to force laptops upon us, we buy 20" iMacs.

17" has been passé for a while now.

LCD prices have been dropping steadily. There's a new article at audioholics.com stating that LCD prices have hit an all-time low and may be starting to rise again.

So, it might even be possible that Apple will introduce a larger LCD screen if the costs are low enough. 27" TV/iMac, anyone?

may be 19" coming

19" 1440x900
22" 1680x1050
and
24" 1900x1200

what is the next size 27"? Dell has one monitor 27" 1900x1200

i used 17" 1280x1024 about three years and 19" @ work the same resolution for about 3 months, i like the 19" more than 17". At home using 20" ACD.

scaling up the size is nice though i am in early 30s it is easier to read in 19 than in 17"

advantage
1. more space for cooling and additional RAM slots

disadvantage
2. Bigger footprint and shipping costs

That seems to be too close together for Apple.

Apple likes to differenciate more. That's why there was a 17, a 20, and a 24 iMac, and a 17, a 20, an old 23, and then a jump to 20. I can believe Apple will change to a 24, as that is what's being made in quantity now, rather than the older 23" size.

20" is pushing 19's out.

Yes, of course. The point is not exactly display size but price. If Apple manages to keep a 20" version priced if not exactly at least close to the existing 17" model, then it is OK. But the 1030 euros price tag of the existing 17" low end model is rather a dream today at 20" in Apple land. Seen from another perspective, this is perhaps one of the reasons Apple is going to drop the 17" model.

Yes, I was referring to that as a means to offer more varied price options.

If the 20- and 24-inch only story is true, I can already imagine what Apple will be doing:

20-inch: 2GHz
- 1GB of RAM
- 250GB hard drive
- GMA X3100 graphics
- possibly no Bluetooth or Apple Remote

20-inch: 2.2GHz
- 1GB of RAM
- 400GB hard drive
- 128MB ATI Radeon HD 2600 (256MB option)

24-inch: 2.2GHz
- 2GB of RAM
- 400GB hard drive
- 256MB GeForce 8500 GT (256MB GeForce 8600 GT option)

I don't even want to speculate on prices, though. Apple can easily build a $1299 (or even $1199) 20-inch iMac if it wants to. But can it crack $999? Only if component prices are low enough (particularly LCDs). And I hope Apple doesn't stick its base model with a Combo drive. This is 2007!