Rip Those Macs Open

[TigerClaw27]

R.OG: If you put it back together without using the adhesive tape, how secure is it? (I'm thinking the old 27" iMacs were held together with just the magnets, perhaps that would work here too?)

[R.OG]

Originally Posted by TigerClaw27

R.OG: If you put it back together without using the adhesive tape, how secure is it? (I'm thinking the old 27" iMacs were held together with just the magnets, perhaps that would work here too?)

Without adhesive tape the screen will fall off ripping out the LVDS connector. I personally would not rely solely on magnets due to the weight of the 27" panel, you would also have to glue some kind of metal to the back of the glass. The older imacs had a metal trim on the back of the glass.

[Gelite55]

Originally Posted by R.OG

Without adhesive tape the screen will fall off ripping out the LVDS connector. I personally would not rely solely on magnets due to the weight of the 27" panel, you would also have to glue some kind of metal to the back of the glass. The older imacs had a metal trim on the back of the glass.

Exactly. Did you see the 2012 iMac teardown on YouTube. These guys are some of the best in the world. They even had a hard time and didn't show them putting it back together. You really don't want to open it unless you got $1,300 burning in your pocket.

[R.OG]

Originally Posted by Gelite55

Exactly. Did you see the 2012 iMac teardown on YouTube. These guys are some of the best in the world. They even had a hard time and didn't show them putting it back together. You really don't want to open it unless you got $1,300 burning in your pocket.

I have already put a 21.5" imac back together with vhb tape and it looks perfect.

[Gelite55]

Originally Posted by R.OG

I have already put a 21.5" imac back together with vhb tape and it looks perfect.

I'm not willing to do it to mine. I'd love to pop 16 GB of RAM into my 21.5" iMac.

[johnnyturbouk]

Originally Posted by R.OG

Without adhesive tape the screen will fall off ripping out the LVDS connector. I personally would not rely solely on magnets due to the weight of the 27" panel, you would also have to glue some kind of metal to the back of the glass. The older imacs had a metal trim on the back of the glass.

outstanding posts rog

i think me be getting a BTO 27" iMac, 8gb ram, 1tb hdd
upgrade to 32gb ram, 512gb ssd
1tb lacie little big disk for storage as tb
2nd minitor (dell 2713)

[rw3]

Apple Service Providers will be able to get their hands on a 20 pack of VHB strips for each model. I'm sure you will find them available online at some point. Every time the display comes out, you must replace the VHB according to a third party Apple tech that I'm friends with. This means that the old VHB must be removed from both the display itself and the rear housing.

[MacFoodPoisoner]

Originally Posted by R.OG

The stand is mounted from the inside. No more VESA mount for the new 27"

I refuse to believe this.

I can't effing take it with the morons at apple anymore. We are waiting for years for them for a screen with less glare or matte, even more years for an ergonomic stand, and what the hell do they go and do? They take away vesa mounting, as if all of us are giraffes and we can have our eyes at the level that the stand for the imac is...

Unbe-effing-lievable. Every damn manual or ergonomics says top of screen as eye level. The imac can't let you lower the screen to do this, and they take away the only way you can do it via vesa mounting it to a proper stand...

Friction welding and all that jazz, someone needs to de-friction weld their heads from their behinds at apple.

Great tear down Rog btw.

[johnnyturbouk]

Originally Posted by MacFoodPoisoner

I refuse to believe this.

I can't effing take it with the morons at apple anymore. We are waiting for years for them for a screen with less glare or matte, even more years for an ergonomic stand, and what the hell do they go and do? They take away vesa mounting, as if all of us are giraffes and we can have our eyes at the level that the stand for the imac is...

Unbe-effing-lievable. Every damn manual or ergonomics says top of screen as eye level. The imac can't let you lower the screen to do this, and they take away the only way you can do it via vesa mounting it to a proper stand...

Friction welding and all that jazz, someone needs to de-friction weld their heads from their behinds at apple.

Great tear down Rog btw.

i sense disappointment my young padawan

[MacFoodPoisoner]

Originally Posted by johnnyturbouk

i sense disappointment my young padawan

i am so pissed off with them man, I was just about ready to order this mac... why do they have to do something right (the screen) and then screw up something else so badly. Are they serious? I don't mind lack of firewire, lack of odd, lack of two standard ports, thin speakers etc. but for crying out loud these machines are used in businesses and other establishments were vesa and ergonomics are indispensable, what are they smoking at apple these days? Do they just go, let's just drop vesa, our stand might be the epitome of non existent ergonomics, but let's chuck vesa mounting out of the windows too... Jesus christ...

[jmcgeejr]

Originally Posted by R.OG

I have already put a 21.5" imac back together with vhb tape and it looks perfect.

what vhb did you use? a link to the stuff on amazon would be much appreciated

[Gelite55]

I don't even know if I'd trust somebody else to open my Mac.

[JVo]

Originally Posted by MacFoodPoisoner

i am so pissed off with them man...

This will probably be the best workaround for VESA mounting:

http://www.imacmount.com/

I have emailed the guy who makes these to express my interest in giving him whatever measurements necessary to help him get the 27" version out the door. It's tragic that now that desk arms are much more affordable and I was planning to get one, my new iMac won't be able to be easily attached the way my 2007 one could have been.

[tubbymac]

Originally Posted by R.OG

Before someone starts lecturing me about the status of my warranty, let me show you a picture. Im going install a 3770 i have laying around so i had to remove the cpu.

Hah awesome! You sir have balls of steel.

I'm so tempted to pick up the 27 inch BTO with the 680MX upgrade and then rip the puppy apart and install an SSD myself. I'd probably stick in a 512 GB Samsung 830 as well and it would be the perfect machine for me. The fact that it passes the hardware diagnostic test too and has no fan issues is just gravy on top.

[WilliamG]

Originally Posted by tubbymac

Hah awesome! You sir have balls of steel.

I'm so tempted to pick up the 27 inch BTO with the 680MX upgrade and then rip the puppy apart and install an SSD myself. I'd probably stick in a 512 GB Samsung 830 as well and it would be the perfect machine for me. The fact that it passes the hardware diagnostic test too and has no fan issues is just gravy on top.

I'm going to do this if I can summon up the courage. I know it sounds like I'm not grateful to R.OG, but man I wish there were pictures of how much tape etc to use when re-applying the strips. Just.... the more info the better, you know?

[MacFoodPoisoner]

Originally Posted by JVo

This will probably be the best workaround for VESA mounting:

http://www.imacmount.com/

I have emailed the guy who makes these to express my interest in giving him whatever measurements necessary to help him get the 27" version out the door. It's tragic that now that desk arms are much more affordable and I was planning to get one, my new iMac won't be able to be easily attached the way my 2007 one could have been.

Thanks for trying to help, I really appreciate it!

I am aware of the stand, as I'd already researched my options for the 21.5" model. My problem is that I can't lower the mac with this stand as I ll have to keep the foot. The imac already doesn't go as low as I d like it to due to the chin even if it were vesa mountable ( I like to keep my eizo with the fabulous tri stand with the bezel almost touching the desk), with that vesa mod from imacmount you can't lose the foot, so basically you can only get the imac to go even higher....

I am exasperated with apple, really, I am thinking of going with the previous gen imac and getting a macframe after taking off the glass so I can vesa mount it. It's just so disappointing that after waiting and waiting for retina or at least for an imac where they 've taken some steps to treat the glass a la crt's 15 years ago, that they go and eff up so badly with the vesa stand.

Although people had hinted that due to them making it thinner the vesa mounting might have to go due to lack of space... But what can you say about a company who's ceo says with a straight face that he only uses on screen keyboards?

[WilliamG]

Funny how some people complain it's not low enough. For me, I can't get the darn thing high enough, so I was hoping to VESA mount it to my desk using a desk mount to get it higher. Guess I won't be doing that, phooey!

[tubbymac]

Originally Posted by WilliamG

I'm going to do this if I can summon up the courage. I know it sounds like I'm not grateful to R.OG, but man I wish there were pictures of how much tape etc to use when re-applying the strips. Just.... the more info the better, you know?

If you want to make it easy you can just cut the strips the same length as the original adhesive from Apple that you will have to peel off in the first place. You can eyeball it and cut the strips shorter based on how much stronger your replacement adhesive is. The stronger the tape the less of it you need. There's nothing wrong with being overly cautious and using a lot of tape - you just want to make sure the screen never falls off. More tape won't hurt anything - it will just make it more of a pain to take off if you need to open your machine again.

Originally Posted by WilliamG

Funny how some people complain it's not low enough. For me, I can't get the darn thing high enough, so I was hoping to VESA mount it to my desk using a desk mount to get it higher. Guess I won't be doing that, phooey!

Yeah I have the same problem - I'd like my iMac higher not lower. The ghetto student-style solution is just to stack some textbooks underneath the machine. Looks nasty but works

[WilliamG]

Originally Posted by tubbymac

If you want to make it easy you can just cut the strips the same length as the original adhesive from Apple that you will have to peel off in the first place. You can eyeball it and cut the strips shorter based on how much stronger your replacement adhesive is. The stronger the tape the less of it you need. There's nothing wrong with being overly cautious and using a lot of tape - you just want to make sure the screen never falls off. More tape won't hurt anything - it will just make it more of a pain to take off if you need to open your machine again.



Yeah I have the same problem - I'd like my iMac higher not lower. The ghetto student-style solution is just to stack some textbooks underneath the machine. Looks nasty but works

I think it would be acceptable if you had hardback copies of the Steve biography stacked underneath.

[Imaginethe]

Originally Posted by tubbymac

Yeah I have the same problem - I'd like my iMac higher not lower. The ghetto student-style solution is just to stack some textbooks underneath the machine. Looks nasty but works

There is this from TwelveSouth http://www.twelvesouth.com/products/hirise_imac/ although a tad ugly for me.

Although, you could use books and make the desk higher

[MacFoodPoisoner]

Originally Posted by tubbymac

If you want to make it easy you can just cut the strips the same length as the original adhesive from Apple that you will have to peel off in the first place. You can eyeball it and cut the strips shorter based on how much stronger your replacement adhesive is. The stronger the tape the less of it you need. There's nothing wrong with being overly cautious and using a lot of tape - you just want to make sure the screen never falls off. More tape won't hurt anything - it will just make it more of a pain to take off if you need to open your machine again.



Yeah I have the same problem - I'd like my iMac higher not lower. The ghetto student-style solution is just to stack some textbooks underneath the machine. Looks nasty but works

go to imacmount you can still both do it with the mod vesa mount.

[johnnyturbouk]

Originally Posted by Imaginethe

There is this from TwelveSouth http://www.twelvesouth.com/products/hirise_imac/ although a tad ugly for me.

Although, you could use books and make the desk higher

that is horrid, i expect better from 12-south!

i have a few old world atlas and Britannia encyclopaedias from the mid 90s stored away, might finally find a use for them


PS - -MacFoodPoisoner is correct, which idiot at apple thought it was a smart idea to remove the vesa mounting.

<grabs cloak, pitchfork and torch light> all i can say is:

OFF WITH THEIR HEADS

[bill phillips]

Originally Posted by Kirkle

Shortly after the release of the 21.5" iMac these forums, and other corners of the internet, were a flutter with "teardown" images. Have no machines ended up in the hands of those people who are, no doubt, eager to tear them open and have a look inside?

It seems like the 27" has had a more clandestine release than its little brother: some people are getting them, some aren't. Currently, the Apple site says that iMacs aren't shipping until January; rather than an offical release, the iMac seems to be trickling out.

There is nothing wrong with people being made to wait for a product (it builds character ), but I know that many people are still on the fence about buying a new iMac due to concerns about the details of the 27-incher's internals.

Will it be easier to replace the HDD in a 27" than in a 21.5"? Is there extra room for an additional drive somewhere? Will OWC find some way to drill an eSATA port into this machine as well?

I would certainly like to see some "teardown" porn featuring this machine, and I imagine that I am not alone. Hopefully, one of these lucky early recipients has a penchant for deconstruction and a camera close by.

seriously!! lets go already!!!!! Im with you bro

[Tri-stan]

Originally Posted by bill phillips

seriously!! lets go already!!!!! Im with you bro

I am waiting to see what happens as well! I am glued to the fence at the moment.

[joe-h2o]

Originally Posted by bill phillips

seriously!! lets go already!!!!! Im with you bro

Did you not read the thread?

R.OG has been doing exactly that for the past 6+ pages, including swapping out the CPU for an upgrade, putting in a Samsung SSD, and taking close up photos of the logic board.