Apple Launches $1099 21.5-Inch iMac With 3.3 GHz Dual-Core i3 Processor for Educational Institutions

[MrDc2]

That's extreme. If I was running a school, it would have nothing better than 2006 iMacs (G3s if they didn't use so much power). What the heck do you need a 3.3GHz dual core processor for in a school?

If public schools end up buying these, I will lose all remaining respect for any politician requesting extra school funding.

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Is that statistic real? I'm pretty sure a lot of schools in California at least use Macs primarily or a mix.

Yeah that's a BS statistic. My elementary/middle school used 100% Apple. And that was from like 1991 - 2000. I visit every once in a while and they are still 100%

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Umm, you know you cannot compare a Mac, which is a factory-built machine to a custom PC, right? This is same as you can never compare Bugatti Veyron's engine to a true purpose-built dragster's engine, but it doesn't mean Veyron's engine has to be junk.

Also why do Apple need to support an single OS for 10 years like M$? Apple is a company not a charity. Also I don't see a reason for not switching to Win 7, because of steep license fee or Windows 7 failed? I am not sure about license fee but sure Windows 7 is usable.

M$ may have very well technical support to their software and OS but if they cannot sell new OS to schools and enterprise this means M$ still fail.

The only reason M$ still offers support on XP is because they charge $80+ dollars per service call.

 

[tevion5]

Why do you use a Mac when PCs are far better?

Macs are easier to use and harder to screw up. That's why they're used in schools. Kids know even less about computers now than they did in the 80s.

Your not going to force people to become computer geeks. Those with no interest will carry on knowing nothing. Nothing stops us on the other hand from googling to our hearts content

I think the OS has very little to do with that experience. Heck you could learn coding on a friggin' chrome book of you were really adventurous!

 

[thehustleman]

If schools are being cheap why even get an apple PC when you can simply get a windows PC for way less?

I love Apple's PC's but if budget is my first priority I wouldn't go near it

 

[Derpage]

Terrible price. Utter rip off.

 

[MrDc2]

Ah, anecdotal post with no factual information.

A support call to Apple costs $19. A support call to Microsoft is $80 at the least, and can cost more depending on the issue.

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As a 15 year old your stereotype greatly irks me. There seems to be a notion that my generation is filled with good-for-nothing obese dimwits that only know reality TV and sugar laden snacks. I would argue every single child today knows more than kids in the 80's knew about computers; we are routinely telling our teachers how to use the computers and how to fix them. Your statement totally disregards the fact that we (my generation) has been using technology since they popped out of the womb. Talk to any youngster and you'll realize you've underestimated them.

Yep

 

[Yamcha]

That's actually pretty expensive for what your getting. You're down to a dual core processor, 4GB memory, integrated graphics, & wired keyboard + mouse..

I would rather spend the extra $200 to get a much better iMac..

 

[thomas.kawel]

Budget conscious schools

All schools are budget conscious. Ridiculously budget conscious.

Wouldn't it be great if there was a $99 (or otherwise significantly reduced priced) iMac/Macbook available for educational purposes?

 

[Fatalbert]

On an iMac like that, students will surely enjoy Safari being snappier.

 

[cclloyd]

Don't know why budget-conscious schools don't buy PCs. PCs are far better than Mac even though I'm a Mac, iPhone, and iPad user.

My school has 4 of them for the many users who have macs at our school. (It's insane the MacC and iPhone:Android ratios. It's like 10:3 and 50:1)

 

[oopodoo]

"The Mac's take ages to set up initially and I have to manually intervene on each one with admin passwords for software updates etc."

You're failing to make use of the capabilities of OS X. I can't tell you how to do mass software updates without having to use an admin password on each terminal, but it absolutely is possible.

 

[InfoTime]

Your not making sense, Windows XP based Machines have been supported for over 10 years, and PCs and Macs are made of the same Asian built parts, Macs are supported for 5 years tops, a Windows Machine is supported twice as long. Lots of schools still use XP and are just switching to 7 10 years later..

Microsoft discontinued mainstream support of Windows XP on April 14th 2009. Extended support will end next year on April 8th 2014. They stopped selling XP at retail on June 30, 2008 and preinstalled on October 22, 2010.

http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/products/lifecycle

April 8, 2014 is going to be the new Y2K. Microsoft will stop issuing updates to plug holes in XP at that time. As new exploits are found all these machines are going to get whacked.

If you had to run an unsupported OS, which would you rather have XP or some Mac OS X variant?

 

[bungiefan89]

You really don't have a clue do you?

I think he DOES have a clue. A lot of young people these days are using computers, but their knowledge is mostly limited to surfing the web on a browser, using an occasional USB flash drive or word processor, and just managing everything else through their itoys and android devices.

It's usage of computers, but it's a far cry from real computer literacy. Most of the kids today have no idea what RAM is or the difference between an HDD and an SSD or what Java is.

 

[InfoTime]

You may think PCS are cheaper, but in the long run they are far more expensive to maintain and keep working properly. I don't recall ever seeing an IT tech doing anything to any of the Macs and we had over 500 in the one building. It was a daily occurrence them going round fixing crashed PCS though in other parts of the college LOL. They also have to run constant updates on the PCS and make sure all anti virus stuff is working correctly.

Even in the long run I do not think they will cost more. Work field IT for some hospitals. Come across Macs. Still have to service them just like I do the PCs. Do I service more PCs? Yes... but we have a lot more PCs than Macs. I hardly see hardware issues at all. Even the 4-5 year old Dells are still chugging along. If I ever run into problems 9/10 it is a software related hangup related to our old Archiac XP Image. However the Win 7 machines require far less work. If it ain't software well then it would be a fried PSU from our constant surges or a worn out HDD. Something Macs aren't magically immune to.

You realize that it sounds like you're providing evidence to support his point?

 

[Giuly]

Am I the only one who would appreciate the a new eMac, which brings the Mac to students around the world who otherwise would've bought a Windows PC?

Yes, the eMac was replaced by a lower-tier iMac, which is what this topic is about. Yet, I mean a completely different, lower cost polycarbonate design, with maybe a 24" screen and Mac Mini-esque power around $899.

I see the problem, never mind.

I would argue every single child today knows more than kids in the 80's knew about computers; we are routinely telling our teachers how to use the computers

Been there, tried that, didn't work, bought a fountain pen and learned the Spencerian hand instead.

 

[iSayuSay]

Actually, it's "Mac", not MAC. Back to school for you friend.

And $1099 for a powerful computer is a good price. Back when I was in school, Macs cost upwards of $5000.

Powerful?? LOL

So so i3 CPU
Integrated graphic (on a dekstop machine?)
4GB of RAM
500GB HDD

All for $1099 when $1299 base 21.5" gives you twice more than that.

Powerful? Barely

 

[bawbac]

A support call to Apple costs $19. A support call to Microsoft is $80 at the least, and can cost more depending on the issue.

Who calls an OS vendor for support?
That's why you have an IT dept.
Configure PC, image and deploy via PXE server.
It's also easy to create a single image that can be deployed to various PC hardware/types/manufactures
OS setup/maintenance is trivial and so is PC security if you know what your doing.

Maintaining PC's isn't rocket science or require excessive frequent manipulation/corrections like some here believe.

 

[chuckles:)]

Kids know even less about computers now than they did in the 80s.

False.

 

[maxwelltech]

Why don't the schools buy Mac Minis? The baselines ones are only $599, and the $799 models with Core i7 quad totally destroys this computer. All the school needs to add to these are $100 20 inch monitors + $10 Dell-made mouse and keyboard.

 

[iSayuSay]

$18,000 for $600 PCs and $30,000 for iMacs. The extra $12k is spread over a 4 year life span, so $3,000 a year more. That school's budget is probably close to $5 million a year. Big deal.

Yep it's actually a BIG DEAL since Apple creates cheapo iMac for educational purpose.

If school annual's budget close to $5M, why not getting 100 units of 27" iMac with 680MX, i7, and 768GB SSD.

What's with the $1099 iMac? No school wants it. Yeah bro, sure

 

[sseaton1971]

Key word - old college. Old PC's, the times have changed!
I admin both Macs and PC's in a work environment. The PC's can all be remotely managed and set up to be auto. Even auto out of the box (connect it to the domain and the rest basically just happens). The Mac's take ages to set up initially and I have to manually intervene on each one with admin passwords for software updates etc.

At least the Macs in the school will give someone a job

Wow... You are a really novice Mac admin, then. You can do all the same things in terms of remote management for Macs as well. And many systems are completely free. I use DeployStudio and Apple Remote Desktop to manage almost 900 Macs in our school district. We used to use Casper, but I haven't had the need the last couple of years. I am going to implement Munki to push updates to users since it is free as well. Btw, once I have my modular-built image, I can deploy it via multicast to dozens of Macs in a matter of about 20 minutes (for ALL of them!) using the free DeployStudio. That is pretty quick, if you ask me!

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If you want to prepare for a job out of college you better know Windows and the Windows version of Office (which is so much more powerful than Mac version).

Accounts, Engineers all use Windows and mostly software editions of "Apps" that only run on Windows.

With today's economy being a Mac person is a crutch!

Who needs to go to college to learn how to use Office, unless you are going to a community college to gain skills for working in an office? Your argument is so 10 or 15 years ago!

 

[InfoTime]

How long ago were you at your old college? Please don't compare 10 to 15 year old Windows systems against today's Apple OSX.

Why not compare them? You do. XP as of today is 11.5 years old.

(quoting another user saying that "Compatibility with each OS upgrade is much better on a Mac as well.")

This is a ludicrous claim, considering that XP from 2001 is still the most popular OS. Is any Apple stuff from 2001 still useful?

Could that be because it took Microsoft 8 years to ship a suitable replacement for Windows XP? And when they did you couldn't do an in-place upgrade you had to do a clean install (from XP to 7).

 

[ufwa]

And where was this greatly long lasting support for 98 and 2000 hmm? They were only released instantly before XP and yet got thrown out quite quickly. The only reason they kept supporting it was because they had to.

Win 98 was available June 25, 1998 and EOL was July 11, 2006. That's 8 years, 17 days

Windows 2000 was available February 17, 2000 and EOL was July 13, 2010
That 10 years, 4 months, 27 days

Apple isn't even close.

Tiger lasted 4 years, 4 months, 13 days
Leopard lasted 3 years, 7 months, 28 days
Snow Leopard currently checks in at 3 years, 6 months, 6 days. Apple still sells it but its got a long way to go.

 

[zhenlek]

How about Mac Mini

How about Mac Mini?

Very attractive price for hardware that's equal to MacBook Pro 13"

 

[MagnusVonMagnum]

i3? Shouldn't this thing cost closer to $400 than $1100?

What happened to the "We don't sell cheap garbage" line of talk? I guess it died with Mr. Jobs. But then Macs have had crappy graphics for ages now so they were never worth their price in that regard. You shouldn't have to spend almost $3000 to get a graphics card found on $800 PCs.

 

[buysp]

Love the eMac at school but you must be insane to pay that price unless your school (Private) has deep pockets!