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iMac With M2 and M2 Pro Chips Could Arrive Soon, Says Latest Conflicting Rumor
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Apr 2021 iMac 24" M1 is now 30 months old.
iMac 24" M2 refresh could have came out in
- Jun 2022 MBP 13" M2 making it 16 months old
- Jul 2022 MBA 13" M2 making it 15 months old
- Jan 2023 Mac mini M2 & M2 Pro making it 9 months old
- Aug 2023 was the 25th anniversary of the 1st iMac making it 2 months ago
From M1 chip to M2 chip was 19.5 months apart.
Assuming refresh from M2 chip to M3 chip will also take 19.5 months then it will come out Q1 2024 before April 2024.
iMac 24" M2 refresh could have came out in
- Jun 2022 MBP 13" M2 making it 16 months old
- Jul 2022 MBA 13" M2 making it 15 months old
- Jan 2023 Mac mini M2 & M2 Pro making it 9 months old
- Aug 2023 was the 25th anniversary of the 1st iMac making it 2 months ago
From M1 chip to M2 chip was 19.5 months apart.
Assuming refresh from M2 chip to M3 chip will also take 19.5 months then it will come out Q1 2024 before April 2024.
With report of Mac sales slowing down, they probably have huge inventory of M2 chips that needs to move before transitioning to M3, and releasing it on iMac would make sense.
I'm sure anyone who bothered to read this story is wishing for iMac updates with better processors and bigger displays, but the cold hard truth is right here in this chart. Services pulls in triple the revenue of all Macs put together. The iPhone pulls in six times the revenue of all Macs. Let's all remember this when we start throwing around speculation about how much an updated iMac would or wouldn't impact Apple's bottom line. As much as I love my iMac, it's a footnote.
OK, perhaps, but that display will be nowhere near the quality and pixel density of the iMac display.
HobeSoundDarryl
macrumors G5
Facts are always good. However, anyone wanting to sling some counters to projecting logic will reference "covid" and "supply chain" effects. Those were heavily used in abundance as excuses all throughout the period for why things seemed to be coming slower than the annual Intel updates that were supposed to be overcome by Silicon.
Conceptually, now supply chain is in much better shape, so it should no longer carry the same blame potential as it was last year+. Thus, any projections based on M1 to M2 are easily undermined in whatever someone wants to cast as what should be "normal."
More simply: going forward, the speed limit on upgrades is mostly likely tied to how fast chip designers can meaningfully upgrade chips... which seems to revolve around approx. iPhones annual pace. Macs getting derivatives of iPhone advances seems it has to get on the same approx. 1-year pace to simply keep up.
I am the Mac tech at a local university and we are looking to upgrade our 2017 27in iMac labs. 24in m1 are not powerfull enough so we are waiting for a at least a imac with M2 Pro preferably with 27+ inch screen. If we dont get a new powerful imac by Janurary we are going with Mac studio's and some lg or samsung monitors.
Mac Pro is foot note. The thing ships less than 100k annually or about 0.6% of all Macs annually.
30" 5.5K or 32" 6K iMac will come out once the display parts price drops below $1,000.
That is the only reason why Apple would not release it as they have historical sales data of how well the iMac 27" sold at these price points below.
| 2020 iMac 27" 5K Intel 14nm | Price | 2024 iMac M3/M3 Pro/M3 Max 3nm |
| iMac "Core i5" 3.1 27" | $1,799 | M3 |
| iMac "Core i5" 3.3 27" | $1,999 | M3 |
| iMac "Core i7" 3.8 27" | $2,299 | M3 Pro |
| iMac "Core i9" 3.6 27" | $2,499 | M3 Max |
| iMac "Core i7" 3.8 27"; 5700/XT | $2,599 | M3 Pro |
| iMac "Core i9" 3.6 27" | $2,699 | M3 Max |
| iMac "Core i7" 3.8 27"; 5700/XT | $2,799 | M3 Pro |
| iMac "Core i9" 3.6 27"; 5700/XT | $2,999 | M3 Max |
| iMac "Core i9" 3.6 27"; 5700/XT | $3,199 | M3 Max |
| 2017 iMac Pro 27" 5K Xeon 14nm | Price | 2024 iMac M3 Ultra 3nm |
| iMac Pro "8-Core" 3.2 27" | $4,999 | M3 Ultra |
| iMac Pro "10-Core" 3.0 27" | $5,799 | M3 Ultra |
| iMac Pro "14-Core" 2.5 27" | $6,999 | M3 Ultra |
| iMac Pro "18-Core" 2.3 27" | $7,399 | M3 Ultra |
I would like to emphasize for 2nd time that largest display iMac will come out once parts go below $1k.
I say this because the iMac 24" 4.5K that replaces the iMac 21.5" 4K share same price points.
| 2019 iMac 21.5" 4K Intel 14nm | Price | 2021 iMac 24" 4.5K M1 5nm |
| iMac "Core i3" 3.6 21.5" | $1,299 | iMac "M1" 8 CPU/7 GPU/2 Ports 24" |
| iMac "Core i5" 3.0 21.5" | $1,499 | iMac "M1" 8 CPU/8 GPU/4 Ports 24" |
| iMac "Core i7" 3.2 21.5" | $1,599 | N/A |
| iMac "Core i7" 3.2 21.5" | $1,699 | iMac "M1" 8 CPU/8 GPU/4 Ports 24" |
Even when the 2021 iMac screen size increased and parts improved in performance per watt, raw performance and power consumption.
| Smaller iMac | 2019 Intel | 2021 M1 |
| Chip die shrink | 14nm | 5nm |
| Dimensions | 45.0 cm, 52.8 cm, 17.5 cm | 46.1 cm, 54.7 cm, 14.7 cm |
| Avg Weight | 5.66 kg | 4.46 kg |
| Display | 21.5" 4K | 24" 4.5K |
| RAM type & speed | 2666 MHz PC4-21300 DDR4 | LPDDR4X-4266MHz |
| Power Consumption | 166W | 80-84W |
The price points above are likely the targets Apple has for the late 2024 iMac.
Android released its first AMOLED smartphone in 2010. It was delayed on the 2017 iPhone X due to color accuracy and burn-in issues. 6 years later no headlines or outrage of iPhone X with color inaccuracy or burn-in.
Back in 2018 OLED iPad Pro was all the rage. And yet 5 years later there is no OLED iPad Pro.
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Or sells extremely well to certain demographics and is fast enough for these consumers in the current config.
Why would Apple bother re-design the interiors for the marginal speed-bump that M2 would offer users in a desktop machine when the majority of customers wont need it.
M3 looks like it will kick ass, and be a worthwhile upgrade to the iMac......when its ready.
The current M1 still kicks the butt of pretty much every other AIO competitor.
If it sells well, how come it does NOT get annual updates just like MBA and MBP? It clearly proves that iMac does NOT sell well.
I expect Apple is waiting for the next generation of 3nm (N3E, N3P, N3X, and N3S) to fab the M3 on, as opposed to using the N3B that the A17 Pro is on since N3B is said to not be compatible with the later N3 series. So from that angle it makes some sense for the iMac refresh to launch with M2 and adding M2 Pro to help handle more demanding workloads since the N3E-N3S are expected to roll out across 2024 and early N3E production will likely be allocated to the iPhone 15 and the iPad Pro refresh.
Some 80% of Mac sales are the MBA and MBP so even if the iMac is the most popular desktop Mac, it is selling in the low millions per year compared to the tens of millions the MBA and MBP sell each year. So it's no wonder those two families get the annual upgrades and the desktops are on an 18-36 month cycle.
@picpicmac & I would disagree. We're using our iMacs beyond the final Security Update.
No way, I love my iMacs! 💕 🖥️ 💕
For a general use computer, it makes perfect sense. The demographic for these aren’t upgrading their PCs every 2-3 years, each one has lasted me 5-7 and by then I’d be ready for a monitor upgrade anyway. I’ll admit the iMac Pro, while being very cool, isn’t a great idea as that type of user will probably want to upgrade the rest of the computer sooner. But an iMac is no different than a laptop in terms of upgradeability, and no one complains about having the monitor stuck to the internals there, we just accept that it’s part of the form factor
Nothing looks as clean as an AIO, with one power cable and nothing else. A mac mini requires at least 3 cables and just looks like a PC setup, unless you spring for the Studio Display that costs more than a whole iMac
edit: also, Moore’s Law is dying, and as year-over-year speed increases slow down, AIO’s will make even more sense
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It is guaranteed to get a refresh to USB-C within 12 months with these other devices.
- 2015 Magic Mouse 2
- 2015 Magic Keyboard 2
- 2015 Magic Trackpad 2
- 2015 Powerbeats Pro
- 2020 AirPods Max
- 2022 iPhone SE (3rd generation)
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There’s lots of talk about the chips. But what about other aspects of the hardware?
My dad is looking to upgrade his 2012 21.5 inch iMac (with Fusion Drive) (Catalina is the last OS that it can run, I believe). For his purposes, the M1 should still be plenty of improvement, and last him a long time. But at two and a half years since the previous iteration, paying full price for it now, seems a bit silly.
My dad is looking to upgrade his 2012 21.5 inch iMac (with Fusion Drive) (Catalina is the last OS that it can run, I believe). For his purposes, the M1 should still be plenty of improvement, and last him a long time. But at two and a half years since the previous iteration, paying full price for it now, seems a bit silly.
K-2 is iPads here, because little ones use their fingers.
3-5 is Chromebooks they use on school premises
6-12 is Chromebooks and they're expected to take them home to do their assignments/homework
It's all about the keyboard and Google docs. The iPad, once you add a suitable keyboard -- becomes a lot more expensive per student than a $168 (district negotiated price) Chromebook.
I expect it is more likely that Apple is balancing availability of newer 3nm processes (starting with N3E) arriving across 2024 with expected demand between iPhone, iPad and Mac. The A17 Pro is going to soak up the vast majority of that initial N3E capacity and with the MacBook Air and iPad Pro being the most popular Mac and iPad families, the M3 refresh of those will soak up eight-figures worth of SoCs, as well.
So it may be that availability will be severely constrained for an M3 iMac and if the M2 Pro Mac mini has proven popular, that would incentivize Apple to offer it on the iMac now rather than late 2024 (when it will have to also compete with M3 Pro availability with the MacBook Pro refresh).
It's not that it doesn't sell well, I'd bet it sells better than virtually every other AIO on the planet. But laptops sell better.
The iMac currently is a reasonably priced AIO machine for edu and non-multimedia related businesses. That demographic might change when M3 is released and maybe a bigger screened version, but not right now and it would cannibalize sales of both the Mini & Studio.
M2 (standard version) benefits low power devices more than a desktop. It would be a marginal speedbump, hardly worth re-engineering components, considering the primary market is Edu, non-media businesses and home users who would not notice the difference.
Power users and professionals have already had their say about the 24" being too small a display and aren't buying iMacs in favour of modular Mac Mini or Studio.
I have no problem with iMacs skipping a CPU speedbump. The next version is ready when it's ready.
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