23-inch iMac on September 12th?

[Bengt77]

The perclock speed difference of Merom and Conroe, aren't even noticable. Less than 2% difference. A 2.33ghz Merom would be faster than a 2.16ghz Conroe.

can you point us to any benchmarks that back you up on that?

cuz if that's the case then the real differential is only monetary and considering apple would have to use new mobo's maybe its 12 of one and a dozen of the other...

Seconded. Where are the benchmarks that say so? If what you state is true, then (and only then) I'll actually consider an iMac. If not, a headless Mac it'll be.

I want to refer to this fabled 'headless Mac' as simply a 'Mac', but I'm finding actually doing so rather hard. Isn't there a better name? xMac doesn't cut it for me, and neither does aMac. Something like Mac midi? Or Mac Pro mini?

 

[MacsRgr8]

23" = cool

Merom = not cool

Conroe = would have been cool

Good grfx (i.e. nVidia 7800, ATi X1800 or better) = would be even cooler.


Here's to waiting and hoping!

I wonder if the form factor will change this time.... black too...?

 

[Bengt77]

Conroe will likely exist in the Mac mini, the MacBook, and most certainly the educational iMac.

What really irritates me is that by over simplifying their product line Apple has gaping holes in terms of performance. I already own a 23" Cinema display, but the mini at $800 vrs the Mac Pro at $2400 leaves quite a bit of room for something in the middle. Like a mini tower with a single core 2 duo and upgradable graphics priced around $1300 - $1600; or a Mac Pro that can be configured that way. That's what I need.

Emphasis added to make clear that I take it you probably meant Merom where you wrote Conroe?

 

[ed233]

The perclock speed difference of Merom and Conroe, aren't even noticable. Less than 2% difference. A 2.33ghz Merom would be faster than a 2.16ghz Conroe.

I believe you're incorrect.

 

[MacinDoc]

The difference now is that there is no crippled Mac Pro. The low end PowerMac was always crippled in some way to the mid and high end. There would always be an old motherboard, slower bus, less RAM...

This time the machines are consistent all the way across. Why? Because with the Woodcrest/Conroe differentiations they can actually create different categories.

Pros -> faster bus, 2 CPU (Woodcrest). Mac Pro
Prosumer -> Mid bus, 1 CPU (Conroe). Mac
Consumer -> Slower bus, quiet, one piece, slower CPU (Merom). iMac
Budget -> Slowest, minimalist comptuer, old tech (Yonah). Mac Mini

Seems pretty obvious. The hole left in the product line is the biggest yet, but the processor steps are VERY clear and not overlapping each other.

mini (Yonah) < iMac (Merom)< Mac (Conroe) < Mac Pro (2xWoodcrest)

The only problem with this is that the Core Duo chips are not less expensive than the Core2 Duo ones, and in at least one case are more expensive. For example, the Core2 Duo 1.66 GHz costs the same as the CURRENT price of the Core Solo 1.4 GHz, and less than the Core Duo 1.66 GHz. So, it's time for Core2 Duo across the board.

 

[hdsalinas]

I dont remember where I downloaded these images from (if any of you know please post link) but they are amazing. It makes LCDs look like CRT.

I almost fooled my cousing into thinking it was the next imac

Maybe this is the future of the imac in years to come.

 

[heffemonkeyman]

Conroe will likely exist in the Mac mini...

No way, the mini's form factor is too small to take a desktop chip any time soon...

 

[absurdio]

i don't think this rumor will come out to be true because this might take a lot of people from getting Mac Pro, unless this iMac comes out to be north of $2500, at which point nobody will buy this.

There's a lot of things that distinguish the Mac Pros from the iMacs besides screen size. The biggest is potential for upgrades. There's also FW800, the dual disc drive, and better graphics processors. So, no, I doubt a comparatively cheap iMac would be robbing Apple of their Mac Pro sales.

 

[iMikeT]

I'm already going to get one.

 

[heffemonkeyman]

23" iMac HD

My prediction for 23" iMac REV 2

iMac HD

- 23" 1920x1200
- Conroe
- Black
- Blu-Ray Superdrive
- CableCard Slot
- 2 x SATA II 3Gb 500GB Hard Drives (1T RAID), that slide into the top like the MacPro...
- Dual-Link DVI out
- DVI IN (For connecting external HDDVD/Blue-Ray Players, Digital Cable Tuner boxes, Xbox360, PS3 etc to that beautiful screen!)

My dream machine...

 

[MIDI_EVIL]

Engadget's mockup:

Beautiful!

I've never liked the iMac until that. It's amazing just how much the chin makes a difference!

Rich.

 

[daneoni]

Im not a fan of the chin either, it forces me to look further up than i would an ACD. Honestly, i still think the iMac G4 has the best design for the iMac series thus far.

 

[w_parietti22]

Apple aren't stupid.

Apple isn't, but you are.

23" iMac would be awesome... no chin please!

 

[wmmk]

not going to happen. if this had a good graphics card, it's jeapordize the MP. it it was just a 20" iMac with a big screen, it's no big deal.

 

[Dont Hurt Me]

Beautiful!

I've never liked the iMac until that. It's amazing just how much the chin makes a difference!

Rich.

Chin sucks,sorry as do non upgradeable graphics other then that iMac is a nice machine I just wish Jobs would pull his head out of his a.. and have Tv tuners as options I mean they cost what 10 bucks? Come on apple stop pissing off the gamer and Tv watcher.

 

[xDANx]

hopefully this 23 inch one adds something more than just a bigger screen....such as component RGB input which would allow me to hook my my xbox 360 to play. that would RULE.

of course, that is unlikely.

does anyone actually know how to use iMac screen to play xbox 360?

Elgato Systems

check out the eyetv hybrid...i have an evetv ez that i use to play ps2 and gamecube games on my 20" imac...works beautifully. they don't make that product anymore...but the hybrid is smaller and performs the same function (as well as being able to watch analog or digital tv).

 

[thegreatluke]

This would be great if ol' Steve made it a true media center Mac.

If He could pull off:
-TV tuner
-Decent/good graphics card
-$1999 US price
-Less noisy SuperDrive
-Case doesn't scratch up so easily
that would be awesome.

 

[freiheit]

Dual Core Mac Pro

23" seems a bit much for the market the iMac targets. I'd rather see a Mac Pro with a single Core 2 Duo processor, 4 or 8 GB RAM capacity and otherwise identical to the "quad core" Mac Pros.

EDIT: 23" seems a bit much ... unless the market for the iMac is shifting to a media center PC. Then 23" seems quite reasonable.

 

[EagerDragon]

Sweet

Sweet specialy at the same price at the 20 incher.
I can see people doing a lot more movies and photo editing on these babies.

 

[EagerDragon]

wait one.....

if the screen grows to 23 inches then the insides are bigger, wonder if there will be a second internal disk drive bay then or a slot to upgrade the video.

 

[x86isslow]

so what?*What makes you think that Apple would be earning any less by selling 23" iMacs than Mac Pro's?*It doesn't really matter to Apple that do they earn X million dollars selling Mac Pro's or iMacs, as lomg as they do earn money.

As to this being a home-theater setup... sorry, not gonna fly. While 23" is a big size for a monitor, it's still a lot less than the 32 - 42" televisions people have.

"Home" is a loose term, often meaning *dorm rooms*. I've yet to see a dorm room that can accommodate a 42" TV…

 

[Matt T]

If these reports are true then I'm VERY disappointed. An AU$2000+ desktop computer should NOT have a mobile chip inside it. If Merom is what Apple plan to use, they should reduce the iMac's prices by a few hundred dollars and offer an upgrade to the 2.33GHz Merom for the 20" model - otherwise, I'm going to be ****ed; I've been waiting for a Core 2 Duo iMac for months.

 

[thegreatluke]

If these reports are true then I'm VERY disappointed. An AU$2000+ desktop computer should NOT have a mobile chip inside it. If Merom is what Apple plan to use, they should reduce the iMac's prices by a few hundred dollars and offer an upgrade to the 2.33GHz Merom for the 20" model - otherwise, I'm going to be ****ed; I've been waiting for a Core 2 Duo iMac for months.

Just because it's a mobile chip doesn't mean it's not fast.

Tell you what - you send me your computer, and I'll send you a 367 MHz Pentium III machine. Deal?

 

[Groovey]

I really wish they would upgrade the MacBooks with Merom, and neither would I mind seeing a proper GPU in it too. That would make me happy, and about 1450€ poorer very soon.

 

[gnasher729]

I believe you're incorrect.

Merom and Conroe have exactly the same architecture. The chips do exactly the same operations, clock for clock. Conroe comes with higher clock speed for the memory bus, but that has minimal impact on memory latency (faster bus doesn't make the memory any faster); it will mostly affect benchmarks that measure memory bandwidth - and I mean benchmarks, not applications.

2.33 GHz Merom ist most definitely significantly faster than 2.16 GHz Conroe. The advantage of Conroe is that the 2.4 and 2.66 GHz versions are quite affordable, most definitely compared to 2.16 or 2.33 GHz Merom.