Apple lowers price of 5K iMac, adds new $1,999 configuration

Posted:
in Current Mac Hardware edited June 2015
Apple on Tuesday unveiled a new entry-level $1,999 configuration for its ultra high-resolution 5K iMac while dropping the price of the top-end model to just $2,299, making it easier for consumers to get their hands on Retina-quality displays for the desktop.




The new $1,999 configuration comes with a 3.3-gigahertz quad-core version of Intel's Core i5, an AMD Radeon R9 M290, 8 gigabytes of RAM, and 1 terabyte of internal storage --?though it does not offer Apple's Fusion drive as standard. It also adds twin Thunderbolt 2 ports.

Meanwhile, the top-end model maintains the same technical specifications as before while shaving $200 off of its price. It went on sale last October for $2,499.

"Customers love the groundbreaking iMac with Retina 5K display, and now with a new lower starting price, even more people can experience the best desktop we've ever made," Apple marketing chief Phil Schiller said in a release.

The iMac with Retina 5K display represents Apple's first move to bring ultra high-resolution displays to the desktop, after years of use on its iOS devices and MacBook line.

Alongside the new 5K iMac configurations, Apple also revealed an updated lineup of 15-inch MacBook Pro laptops. The new laptops feature Apple's Force Touch trackpad and faster flash memory.

Trade in your old Mac

Readers planning to purchase Apple's new 15-inch MacBook Pro, 27-inch iMac, 12-inch MacBook or otherwise may want to lock in a cash buyback offer from AppleInsider partner Gazelle on their old model, before payouts fall. See our previous coverage on Gazelle's buyback programs for more details.
«13

Comments

  • Reply 1 of 51
    philboogiephilboogie Posts: 7,675member
  • Reply 2 of 51
    Wow this might become my work from home machine after all.
  • Reply 3 of 51
    rob53rob53 Posts: 3,241member

    I'm glad I'm not the only one having issues seeing the Apple store page. I got through to it another way. They dropped the higher end non-Retina iMac, added a lower end Retina and dropped the price of the upper one. I can get Apple products through a special deal offered to retirees so my configuration comes out almost $200 less than it used to for the top end iMac 5K. I already bought my additional memory months ago then held off buying the iMac. Now it looks reasonable. Getting an quad i5 would be ok but I've seen what a quad i7 can do on a MBP and it isn't that much more.

     

    edit: I get a 17% discount, that's why the price is low.

    edit2: the full website finally shows up.

     

  • Reply 4 of 51
    There is a typo in the beginning: "AMD Radeon R0 M290"

    It should read R9 M290.

    That being said, can domeone explain the difference between the M290 in the $1999 model and the M290X in the $2299 model?

    Thanks for posting this quick.
  • Reply 5 of 51
    thewhitefalconthewhitefalcon Posts: 4,453member
    There is a typo in the beginning: "AMD Radeon R0 M290"

    It should read R9 M290.

    That being said, can domeone explain the difference between the M290 in the $1999 model and the M290X in the $2299 model?

    Thanks for posting this quick.

    The X likely has more compute cores or a higher clock speed.

    Surprised they kept around the non-Retina 27", they must think the $200 is worth it.
  • Reply 6 of 51



    In Canada, the cost of configuring a Retina iMac is more expensive across the board.

     

    Old prices...

     

    The cost of this configuration has increased from $4014 to $4249, an extra $235.

     

    Education prices have increased, too.

     

    Previous education price for the above Retina iMac as $3654; it's now $3879, a price increase of $225.

     

    The high-end 3.5GHz (regular) iMac is also no longer available. Instead for the same price Apple offers a slower 3.2GHz i5 processor. A similar iMac, albeit with a retina display, is an extra $450.

  • Reply 7 of 51
    4fx4fx Posts: 258member
    I hope this is just a stopgap until they can release a truly upgraded system later this year. I'm in the market for a new iMac, but I always make it a point to only buy computers when they are newly refreshed.
  • Reply 8 of 51
    rob53rob53 Posts: 3,241member
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by TheWhiteFalcon View Post



    Surprised they kept around the non-Retina 27", they must think the $200 is worth it.

    If you look closely at the "New" Retina configuration, it looks like the lower end old iMac with a new display and TB2. It still comes with a 1TB hard disk as standard. The New iMac has fewer upgrades so you can choose either the lowest costing 27" iMac at $1799 or start adding options and go all the way up to $3768 (list, all options including AppleCare). This is a nice range and should allow potential buyers the ability to find something in their price point.

     

  • Reply 9 of 51
    davidosus wrote: »

    In Canada, the cost of configuring a Retina iMac<span style="line-height:1.4em;"> is more expensive across the board.</span>


    Old prices...

    <img alt="" class="lightbox-enabled" data-id="59170" data-type="61" src="http://forums.appleinsider.com/content/type/61/id/59170/width/350/height/700/flags/LL" style="; width: 350px; height: 426px">

    The cost of this configuration has increased from $4014 to $4249, an extra $235.

    Education prices have increased, too.

    <img alt="" class="lightbox-enabled" data-id="59171" data-type="61" src="http://forums.appleinsider.com/content/type/61/id/59171/width/350/height/700/flags/LL" style="; width: 350px; height: 434px">

    Previous education price for the above Retina iMac as $3654; it's now $3879, a price increase of $225.

    In the U.S. it went down by $200. That config here would be $3549. Edu pricing is the same.
  • Reply 10 of 51
    rob53rob53 Posts: 3,241member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by davidosus View Post

     



    In Canada, the cost of configuring a Retina iMac is more expensive across the board.

     

    Old prices...

     

     

    The cost of this configuration has increased from $4014 to $4249, an extra $235.

     

    Education prices have increased, too.

     

     

    Previous education price for the above Retina iMac as $3654; it's now $3879, a price increase of $225.


    That's what happens with the US dollar finally gets strong again. This is also why there are so many cars from BC driving across the border into WA to buy gas and many other things.

  • Reply 11 of 51
    adamwadamw Posts: 114guest
    Yes, I like the price being lowered on the 5K iMac.
  • Reply 12 of 51

    The high end Retina iMac with a AMD Radeon R9 M295X was said to run very hot at over 100° C when under load...

     

    Link

     

    I wonder if this has changed?

  • Reply 13 of 51
    inklinginkling Posts: 768member
    This customer doesn't "love" any iMac. I owned one and learned to loathe it. I'm one of the creative professionals that used to be important to Apple. I live in a small college town far from any Apple store. Fixing a broken Mac though a local third-party, they tell me, will take about a week because they can't keep parts in inventory. I can't afford to be not working for that long.

    For those in my line of work, the all-in-one design of the iMac is a disaster waiting to happen. Everything is in one virtually impossible-to-repair box. If one thing breaks, the entire system is down for that week. As a former electrical engineer, that stinks. It's like owning a plane that has every hatch and engine access point welded shut.

    That's why I use the latest-but-one Mac mini. It's so ideal for what I do, I thought of sending a pizza coupon to the design team at Apple in thanks. Because its modular and accessible, I can fix problems myself quickly. And because the RAM was user-replacable, I was able to upgrade mine to 16 Gig for less that what Apple would have charged me to upgrade an inadequate 4 Gig to 8 Gig. Do the bean counters at Apple think we're so stupid we don't know of rip-offs like that? No, we know and we loathe the game they're playing.

    That Mac mini has more than enough power for my use. I can have several Adobe apps running at the same time with no memory issues and the CPU use rarely rises about 10%. There are far better ways for me to spend my money than spending it on a pricey Mac Pro.

    Yet what is Apple doing? It seems to have forgotten that we creative professionals exist. More and more, Apple's Mac products seemed to target people who're like the Eloi in H. G. Wells The Time Machine. Their Macs are simply entertaining toys. When that iMac breaks, they buy another. And its for them that Apple is turning the once useful Mac mini into little more than a duded up Apple TV, with soldered in RAM.

    Apple is forgetting an important part their market, people like me who stuck with them through the difficult early-to-mid 1990s. We need a Mac mini that's a useful tool not a silly toy.

    Apple doesn't have to give it a large advertising budget. They'll still sell lots of iMacs to the Eloi. But they shouldn't forget a crucial part of their customer base.
  • Reply 14 of 51
    therfmantherfman Posts: 52member
    Canadian prices for the Retina iMac had not been fully indexed to match the new exchange rate. The best example was the High end 15" MBP and the retina iMac. Both were the same price in the U.S., but the MBP cost $300 more than the iMac in Canada.

    Today, they cut the U.S. Pricing, but the price for a 3.5 GHz retina iMac remained the same in Canada, so the price difference more accurately represents the currency difference.

    Regardless, there is no new tech here, and the best deals to be had are in the refurb store.

    I'm surprised they used an M290. The M290X was already somewhat underpowered for a 5k display.
  • Reply 15 of 51
    icoco3icoco3 Posts: 1,474member
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by fruitstandninja View Post



    There is a typo in the beginning: "AMD Radeon R0 M290"



    It should read R9 M290.



    That being said, can domeone explain the difference between the M290 in the $1999 model and the M290X in the $2299 model?



    Thanks for posting this quick.

     

    Emphasis mine...one must be careful pointing out typos others make.

  • Reply 16 of 51
    icoco3 wrote: »
    Emphasis mine...one must be careful pointing out typos others make.

    Fair but for one, I'm not being paid to write. Also, I'm no grammar Nazi. I only pointed out something of factual error that has relevance to the story. I meant nothing by it.
  • Reply 17 of 51
    There is a typo in the beginning: "AMD Radeon R0 M290"

    It should read R9 M290.

    That being said, can domeone explain the difference between the M290 in the $1999 model and the M290X in the $2299 model?

    Thanks for posting this quick.

    The letter X? ;)

    There's little info on the M290 mobile core, but the desktop 290 GPU is a slightly de-tuned 290X. According to this site, the performance loss is minimal; the 290 and 290X share a lot in common. I assume a similar difference exists between M290 and M290X.

    http://www.techradar.com/us/reviews/pc-mac/pc-components/graphics-cards/amd-radeon-r9-290-1196709/review
  • Reply 18 of 51
    mstonemstone Posts: 11,510member
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by Inkling View Post



    This customer doesn't "love" any iMac. I owned one and learned to loathe it. I'm one of the creative professionals that used to be important to Apple. I live in a small college town far from any Apple store. Fixing a broken Mac though a local third-party, they tell me, will take about a week because they can't keep parts in inventory. I can't afford to be not working for that long.



    For those in my line of work, the all-in-one design of the iMac is a disaster waiting to happen. Everything is in one virtually impossible-to-repair box. If one thing breaks, the entire system is down for that week. As a former electrical engineer, that stinks. It's like owning a plane that has every hatch and engine access point welded shut.



    That's why I use the latest-but-one Mac mini. It's so ideal for what I do, I thought of sending a pizza coupon to the design team at Apple in thanks. Because its modular and accessible, I can fix problems myself quickly. And because the RAM was user-replacable, I was able to upgrade mine to 16 Gig for less that what Apple would have charged me to upgrade an inadequate 4 Gig to 8 Gig. Do the bean counters at Apple think we're so stupid we don't know of rip-offs like that? No, we know and we loathe the game they're playing.



    That Mac mini has more than enough power for my use. I can have several Adobe apps running at the same time with no memory issues and the CPU use rarely rises about 10%. There are far better ways for me to spend my money than spending it on a pricey Mac Pro.



    Yet what is Apple doing? It seems to have forgotten that we creative professionals exist. More and more, Apple's Mac products seemed to target people who're like the Eloi in H. G. Wells The Time Machine. Their Macs are simply entertaining toys. When that iMac breaks, they buy another. And its for them that Apple is turning the once useful Mac mini into little more than a duded up Apple TV, with soldered in RAM.



    Apple is forgetting an important part their market, people like me who stuck with them through the difficult early-to-mid 1990s. We need a Mac mini that's a useful tool not a silly toy.



    Apple doesn't have to give it a large advertising budget. They'll still sell lots of iMacs to the Eloi. But they shouldn't forget a crucial part of their customer base.



    A lot of whining, although I understand your frustration. Living in a rural area has its pluses and minuses. It is best to have a backup machine if your use case is mission critical. I have a couple backups. The iMac 5K is a beautiful machine. I absolutely love it. Mine is fully loaded and runs several Adobe apps simultaneously without issue.

  • Reply 19 of 51
    mstonemstone Posts: 11,510member
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by 4fx View Post



    I hope this is just a stopgap until they can release a truly upgraded system later this year. I'm in the market for a new iMac, but I always make it a point to only buy computers when they are newly refreshed.



    Clearly they will update it with a new processor at some point. It is up to Intel and Display Port.

  • Reply 20 of 51
    frank777frank777 Posts: 5,839member
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by mstone View Post

     



    A lot of whining, although I understand your frustration. Living in a rural area has its pluses and minuses. It is best to have a backup machine if your use case is mission critical. I have a couple backups. The iMac 5K is a beautiful machine. I absolutely love it. Mine is fully loaded and runs several Adobe apps simultaneously without issue.




    Yes, but he has a point. Apple recalled the iMacs a couple years ago and I lost mine for six days.

     

    For a creative professional, that's a frustrating experience. Even if you have a backup machine to check the web and email, all your files are on the iMac. Ideally there'd be a low end version of the Mac Pro and a 27" screen to cure this problem, but so far not.

Sign In or Register to comment.