New iMac - Inside-Out

[arn]

Here is a link to (http://homepage.mac.com/WebObjects/FileSharing.woa/wa/default?user=registereduser&templatefn=FileSharing1.html&xmlfn=TKDocument.1.xml&sitefn=RootSite.xml&aff=consumer&cty=US&lang=e) an Flat Panel iMac Service PDF file. It's a Draft version, but provides instructions as well as detailed pictures of the Flag Panel iMac in various stages of being taken apart (for Service).

You can even see the blue-round motherboard.

[Durandal7]

Even the motherboard is classy.

[Unregistered]

From the looks of things the factory installed memory stick is actually quite easy to change, all you have to do is take the four screws off and ba da bing raise the dome and its right there, push the button and boing there it is.

not so hard in my opinon.

[Unregistered]

what a great post! Thanks for the pdf.

[Unregistered]

Is there something like this for the PowerBook G4? I'd be interested in it, if for no other reason than to know more about how this thing is laid out on the inside.

-mikey

[dricci]

The factory ram does look easy to change, however what's this "Thermal" stuff you're suposed to have to re-apply each time you open it up? Sounds like that could be a problem.

[davidc2182]

sheesh could they make it harder to get to the innards of this thing? thermal pads? thermal paste? they really dont want people messing with the innards of the new imac, what ever happened to the simplicity of the cube or the tower, even the old imac wasnt this complicated...........:confused:

[Onyxx]

its actually not as bad as it may seem. Thermal paste is pretty easy stuff to buy and apply. Hey if thats all it takes to keep my 1800 dollar iMac from turning into an expensive lump of silicon slag and plastic, I have no objections. Not to mention that it only has to be applied to areas usually acessed by the average consumer. If you want to dable with your iMac thermal paste isnt such a sacrifice. And as to the original iMac being simplier to take poke around in, that is just simply not the case. Between the risk of massive electrical discharge from the cathode ray tube (the screen) and dealing with the flimsy plastice latches that the chasis hooks onto, the new imac (iMac 2?) is a hardware hacker's dream.

[eyelikeart]

Originally posted by Unregistered
Is there something like this for the PowerBook G4? I'd be interested in it, if for no other reason than to know more about how this thing is laid out on the inside.

-mikey

simply turn it over and take out the 8 screws on the bottom.....lift the casing off....and there u go!

[Unregistered]

The interesting part is it's designed to be strapped to the top of your head and the screen flips down in front of your face.

[eyelikeart]

so it would be like "virtual-reality iMac?"

[Phaedrus]

The chassis of the thing looks BEEFY. Explains why it's so heavy. Underneath that plastic veneer is a steel dome Apple calls the "Farady cage." I almost wish they had chromed that too, and left the plastic off.

[cplmd]

From my understanding - there are two DIMM slots - one within the dome and generally not easily accessible to mear mortals and one on the bottom - easily gotten too by removing four screws.

In addition to that one DIMM slot on the bottom it's also how you access the AirPort Card slot.

This was suppose to address the issue of ease of expansion that the original iMac was criticized for.

I had my new iMac fitted with a 512 MB chip on the factory side leaving the second slot open for another 512 MB later.

[G4scott]

The factory installed memory is just a good ol regular piece of RAM! None of that SODIMM stuff. That shouldn't be too hard to change.

Is the picture of the inside of the iMac supposed to have white lines going through it?

[Falleron]

Why is it that Apple charges so much for adding the extra RAM at the store? They seem to charge twice as much as other sources! They know people want 1Gb so they make a big profit for upgrades!

[blakespot]

Originally posted by dricci
The factory ram does look easy to change, however what's this "Thermal" stuff you're suposed to have to re-apply each time you open it up? Sounds like that could be a problem.

That's why there's an SO-DIMM slot down there...

Is it really worth the small $$ you'd save in doing a do-it-yourself swap of the internal DIMM (and acquiring thermal paste and the properly sized pads, and a torx wrench if you lack one) vs. going with a massive SO-DIMM?


blakespot

[blakespot]

Originally posted by Falleron
Why is it that Apple charges so much for adding the extra RAM at the store? They seem to charge twice as much as other sources! They know people want 1Gb so they make a big profit for upgrades!

Take it or leave it but I've heard from numerous sources that Apple signed deals w/ memory fabricators with a locked price that ran for a certain amount of time. As a result, the RAM must be sold at a certain price. If this is true, they may not be making a profit on the RAM at all.

But you'd have to be crazy to buy anything above the base amount of RAM from any computer manufacturer. Hell, you can get 256MB of SDRAMM on a DIMM for $36 right now.



blakespot

[blakespot]

The new iMac is one staggering piece of engineering. Amazing that they could do all that in that small, oddly shapen container. Very impressive.


blakespot

[IndyGopher]

Most of the responses here seem to be in regards to adding or changing memory, which is of course understandable. I think most of the people reading a board like this that are interested in getting an iMac are probably not in the "normal" consumer range... we're more prone to take stuff apart just to poke around. What *I* see, looking at the exploded iMac, is that the screen appears to be a perfectly standard LCD panel. I will need to check voltages of course, which aren't mentioned in the service source material (at least this draft) but I bet grafting a generic LCD onto there would be quite simple. The only remaining question would be if the iMac is slavishly devoted to 1024x768, or if it would detect a screen's ability to do higher. (I have an 18" panel with a native resolution of 1280x1024 that I would love to stick on there.) Any comments on whether this would work?

[boomertim]

I don't understand how you can have 1 gig of ram.
Page 94 of the PDF says that the factory ram is a PC 133/up to 512 of ram. It also states that the user side can use only PC 100/ up to 256 of ram. This is a total of 768 meg of ram.

Can you tell me how to get 1 gig out of that!

Or is the PDF wrong/ and you can put a PC100 512 SO Dimm in the user space.

???????

[Unregistered]

I think when Jobs said the computer can hold 1GB of ram that he was talking about the future.

If you go to Crucial's website and take a look in 144pin PC 100 chips they only offer up to 256MB!!

This is a serious let down. It looks like the PDF file is right. Maybe at some point in the future you will be able to find a 512 144pin chip.

Does anyone know of any other source that offers it in 512MB (it could simply be a very rare chip)

Thanks,
DJ

[Falleron]

The superdrive model at the apple store allows you to configure the imac with up to 1Gb of RAM. However, this seems to change from day to day. At the moment the apple store only allows you to configure only up to 768Mb!

However, there is an option there of having 1 512Mb DIMM there! Therefore, they must exist.

[IndyGopher]

Originally posted by Unregistered

This is a serious let down. It looks like the PDF file is right. Maybe at some point in the future you will be able to find a 512 144pin chip.

Does anyone know of any other source that offers it in 512MB (it could simply be a very rare chip)

Thanks,
DJ

512MB SO-DIMMs are not difficult to obtain.. I have 2 of them in my PowerBook G4. Other World Computing ( http://eshop.macsales.com ) is where I got mine, but they are available from many sources. The only question I have is whether or not they will fit. As SO-DIMMs go, they are pretty tall. Comparing the size of the cutout in the shielding for the SO-DIMM in the iMac (an unknown) to the size of the Airport card next to it (a known size) strongly suggests that they will indeed fit, but with not a lot of space left over. Although, to be honest, even "just" 768 Megs of RAM is a pretty impressive amount of memory for an iMac. With the limited screen real estate, how much more memory can you use? There's a limit to the number of programs you can effectively interact with at once. Most users will not be running a lot of background services on their iMacs. (But as I said in an earlier post, "most" people aren't going to be taking their iMacs apart within an hour or 2 of unboxing them, while I suspect most people on here will.)

[IndyGopher]

Originally posted by Falleron

However, there is an option there of having 1 512Mb DIMM there! Therefore, they must exist.

The "1 512M DIMM" option in the Apple store refers to the internal 168-pin DIMM, leaving the SO-DIMM socket empty. So, while 512M SO-DIMMs are available, your reasoning for their existence is faulty. I find it strange, however, that the Service Source material states the internal DIMM is 133MHz, while the SO-DIMM spec is for 100MHz memory. We know the system bus is only 100MHz, so I wonder why the 133MHz is there. Simply using 133MHz because that's what they have on hand for the towers, I understand, they are perfectly backwards compatible. But I don't understand why they would state it as though it were a requirement. Probably to give hardware geeks like me yet another reason to experiment inside their iMacs. Or maybe Apple bought stock in a thermal paste manufacturer, and they want us to continually disassemble them and use more paste.

[cplmd]

I am curious as well...
When I ordered last Monday, I was lead to belive that a 512 MB 1 DIMM would be on the internal slot, leaving the "user accessible" slot open, and to quote from the Apple site Tech Specs:

"128MB or 256MB of SDRAM expandable to 1GB;
one factory installed 168-pin DIMM and one open user-accessible SO-DIMM slot."

So, anyone with Apple know what gives???

In customizing an iMac, 768 MB is the max allowed - hmmm.....

[lucs]

is there any way to change the video card?

[Unregistered]

-----
but I bet grafting a generic LCD onto there would be quite simple. The only remaining question would be if the iMac is slavishly devoted to 1024x768, or if it would detect a screen's ability to do higher. (I have an 18" panel with a native resolution of 1280x1024 that I would love to stick on there.) Any comments on whether this would work?
-----

the native resolution could very well be hobbled in firmware, so beware!

[chrismear]

Someone wanted to see service manuals for the PowerBook G4? Here (http://home.wanadoo.nl/manual.man/manuals.html)'s a load of them.

[britboy]

i may just have completely missed it, but where is the graphics card supposed to be? I can't see it anywhere in the pdf file.

[Unregistered]

Originally posted by britboy
i may just have completely missed it, but where is the graphics card supposed to be? I can't see it anywhere in the pdf file.

In integrated systems like an iMac or a PowerBook, the video is supplied by video chips integrated into the motherboard chipset.. there is no separate "card" like one would find in a tower. This also of course means there is no upgrading the video chipset without swapping mainboards. As for where the chip is on the board, I couldn't get the pictures to enlarge enough, clearly enough, to see which were what.

[Unregistered]

Is that a second ATA bus I see? Anyone know what speed that ATA bus is?

[britboy]

as far as i know it's ATA/66 5400 rpm. That's according to the discussions on the apple web site.

[Unregistered]

Where is the internal microphone

[IndyGopher]

Originally posted by Unregistered
Where is the internal microphone

In the display

[kiwi_the_iwik]

At least the Cube was expandable - it appears as if you're stuck with what you've got with the new iMac.

A Cube can give you:
1.5Gb of STANDARD easily accessible Ram
Dual-Processor capability
A hefty Internal Hard Drive
A 22" LCD Display
A REPLACEABLE Graphics Card (some report using a GeForce 3!)

One of the only benefits I can see with the iMac is the Superdrive - but then again, burn-times are slower than some external firewire drive models out there.

Check out "The Cube vs. The New iMac", at the Cube-Zone website (www.cube-zone.com) for more comparisons!

[cplmd]

Originally posted by kiwi_the_iwik
At least the Cube was expandable - it appears as if you're stuck with what you've got with the new iMac.

Well, first off, they don't make a cube anymore - so it's hard to expand something you don't have......:p

60 GB is hefty enough for me - esp given the servers I have for network attached storage that make storage basically infinite

One of the only benefits I can see with the iMac is the Superdrive - but then again, burn-times are slower than some external firewire drive models out there.

I think you miss the target audience of this - it's the people who want to plug in the power cord and the dsl cable and go - plug in a camera and burn it to a dvd all with about three mouse clicks.

Could you trade a faster burner, more Mhz processor, bigger display - sure - but each one raises the price and thus shrinks the audience who can afford it. Strange as it may seem, there are people who don't live to take computers apart, tweak them or the software that runs on them ;) - they just want an appliance that works.

[Crotalus]

Does anybody know where I can get a manual for the iBook? I wanna see if I can change the built in RAM.

Ciao,

Crotalus

[IndyGopher]

Originally posted by Crotalus
Does anybody know where I can get a manual for the iBook? I wanna see if I can change the built in RAM.

Ciao,

Crotalus

Well, having soldered ram chips piggy-back to the internals of an Atari 520ST, I strongly suspect you COULD add to the internal RAM on an iBook.. but I really would not recommend it. Also, any manual you would find for the iBook would not cover something like that. You can of course add or change whatever SO-DIMM is in the upgrade slot, but this would not increase the "maximum" RAM on the machine.

[crassusad44]

Originally posted by Unregistered
I think when Jobs said the computer can hold 1GB of ram that he was talking about the future.

If you go to Crucial's website and take a look in 144pin PC 100 chips they only offer up to 256MB!!

This is a serious let down. It looks like the PDF file is right. Maybe at some point in the future you will be able to find a 512 144pin chip.

Does anyone know of any other source that offers it in 512MB (it could simply be a very rare chip)

Thanks,
DJ

512 SODIMM is not hard to get buy. how on earth do you belive the TiBook can get to 1 GB, and the iBook to 640?
Yes, you guessed right, with a 512 144-SODIMM. Theese chips are a bit expensive though...

And I should know, since I sell these chips (and Macs also of course)...

[sparkleytone]

the cube remark is 'tarded. what about the LCD joker??? anyways, the HD looks pretty standard to me, meaning i can put whatever i want in there. and no, 60 gigs is just not enough for me.

unbelievable engineering.

[thegrungy]

I've got queries in to our Apple sales and engineering reps about this. No answers so far.

The engineering rep said that the draft copy of the Service Source PDF is just that - a draft - and not necessarily up-to-date.

From the verbage in the draft version, it does appear that Apple may have gone back to voiding the warranty for those who mess around (too deeply) inside of the box.

"Note: There are two RAM expansion slots. This describes installing a memory module in
the internal memory slot located on the main logic board. It uses PC133 168-pin DIMMs
up to 512 MB in capacity, requires removal of the main logic board and can only be
installed or replaced by an Apple Authorized Service Provider."

[Ensign Paris]

Its a classy machine for classy people. ITS a FANTASTIC design!

[mrob]

The link doesn't work anymore. MacFixit had the same link and they also acknowledge it doesn't work anymore. Can anyone provide a mirror?

[BillGates]

Buy a tower.

If you really need to expand the iMac be creative. Yank the CD, DVD or what ever removable media drive you buy and put it in an external firewire to ATA case. Yank the 5400 RPM HD and put two faster larger drives in there and stripe them. If there is a second ATA bus on the logic board you should get great performance otherwise it will just be ok performance. Put a GIG of RAM in it. Look for some software that will let you go beyond the 1024 x 768. SwitchRez comes to mind. Then attach a display capable of diplaying the resolution to the external video port.

If that isn't enough expandability buy a tower. A Mac tower that is!

[kiwi_the_iwik]

This is what really makes me laugh...

All but 5 minutes ago, you were all speculating as to what the Macworld Expo was to unveil to the awaiting Apple Public - siting such improvements as G4's into the GHz range, GeForce 3's as standard, a BIGGER (?) LCD Monitor to the 22", and even G5's.

I know we all love Apple, and their products ARE built to last (Heck - I've still got an '84 Mac that boots up as if it was new...), but I want Futureproofing. I bought my Cube a year ago because it had the possibility for expansion, and with that, perhaps a prolonged life expectancy - let's face it; computers ain't cheap!

Now, some of you I have read in other threads (who have previously said the exact same thing as me) are now praising Apple for putting out a non-expandable desklamp (albeit, currently quite a POWERFUL desklamp). I mean, even the whole IDEA of having a non-upgradeable graphics card, plastered on the motherboard, seems to be a bit annoying - especially when the GeForce 4 is due to be released soon.

This is a big step backwards from the Cube. It's not that I don't like this new iMac, because it is a nice machine. It's just that I want the OPTION to upgrade - beyond installing memory and an Airport card. Not by much - just a little. An AGP slot and perhaps one PCI would make the PERFECT machine.

I KNOW you all want this, too - I've sifted through so many comments from the members and guests of this site that scream out in bold letters - "BIGGER AND FASTER IS BETTER! FEED ME THE G5! I'LL BUY 2!"

Now - tell me I'm Lyin'...

[BillGates]

kiwi_the_iwik it appears you have the answer. You purchased a cube because you felt it was expandable, futureproof. Unfortunately not too many other people bought one. Six million people purchased the iMac, which has never had an upgradeable video card. What did that tell Apple?

The first thing I expect to hear is that the tower is too much money. We want it all. Inexpensive, expandable in every way, faster than anything else, cool designs, reliable, small, etc. And why not? We're the consumer, we always get what we want!

Until that is possible (and profitable) Apple has given us a couple choices. Somewhat expandable at a decent price (iMac) or very expandable at a premium price (PowerMac).

I expect Steve and the rest of Apple is working their asses off to get the G5 into the PowerMacs. It sounds as if some of us think they are intentionally holding it back. That is nuts. Apple more than anyone wants their systems to be the best.