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M1 vs. M3 iMac Buyer's Guide: 15+ Differences Compared

The haters are out in force.

There was nothing broken about the 24 iMac except in the minds of the haters. And now it’s 20% faster with added attributes and it hasn’t gone up in price. How dare they!

Looks like a win to me. I still want to see some real world reviews, but it looks very likely I’ll be ordering one to replace my 2011 21.5 Hakintosh. I’m thinking blue, 24GB RAM and 512GB-1TB SSD. My 3D modelling should run pretty good on that.
 
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johnnytravels said:
Watching the Scary Fast video comparing the M3 to the M1 to make it seem more powerful than it is, I almost believe that Apple didn't upgrade the iMac to the M2 so that they’d have some plausibility making that comparison.
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With how little time the M2 existed for, I'm not surprised they skipped it.

Commenting on the table, its a bit funny to me how we keep seeing CPU NM stated as a feature. While a processor may be faster, I don't think the NM of it matters for end users.
 
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Really wanted an iMac but 24" 60Hz screen is a huge NOPE for me. I take it the iMac Pro will have ~32" screen and 120Hz but the entry iMac is already stupid expensive so I dread to think what an iMac Pro would be.
 
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Put the ethernet port back on the device versus the abysmal location on the power supply. Put on at least one USB-A port and an SD-card slot. The lack of connectivity on the current iMac and the odd form over function design choices make the current iMac unpalatable. At least with previous iMacs, they were both nice to look at AND functional. I think the current model is borderline checking the nice to look at box and completely missing the functional box. It is like a crippled MacBook Air at present; in the fact that is has basically the same ports and expandability but not mobile.
 
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It is disingenuous to not mention the SSD size in either the chart, or body of the article.




www.merriam-webster.com

Definition of DISINGENUOUS

lacking in candor; also : giving a false appearance of simple frankness : calculating… See the full definition
www.merriam-webster.com www.merriam-webster.com
 
2pacjeeman said:
I have a late 2012 27-inch iMac. Been waiting for this upgrade for a long time. Very disappointed! The design is OK, I don't need a PRO-version, however i want black bezels and the same 27-inch screen! I just use it for internet browsing. The screen on this model is too small for my needs.
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I have the same model as well and was hoping to finally replace this beast. Looks like I’ll still be waiting.
 
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Berti10 said:
Had the 5K iMac from 2014. Beautiful device, brilliant screen, but when the tech inside became outdated, needed to buy a whole new computer. Since there is no target display mode, I‘m going separate on computing device and display.
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They could have designed in a special port, modular system to allow upgrades, or target display mode like you mention…

But I doubt we’d ever see these in iMac. They will always want you to buy a new one.

They are probably looking into the next CPU architecture change as we speak… they are getting good at it. Plus they know it encourages a huge pickup in sales. It has its pros and cons.
 
Souponastick270 said:
Still only two thunderbolt ports on the base model means you’ll have to spend more for a dock to make them useable.
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…for you. I have used both my USB ports on my MBA at the same time exactly once, since I bought it. And one was for charging.
 
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Something else for the 24 iMac haters to consider: Apple also put the M3 chip from the iMac in their new base model MacBook Pro. That means Apple considers it a Pro level processor for a lot of people given the base model 14 Pro could well outsell the M3 Pro and M3 Max Models.

And if tech bench and real world tests affirm M3 outperforms M1 Pro and is about the same as M2 Pro that makes the M3 iMac a very respectable machine.

It now makes sense Apple skipped M2 for the iMac and went straight to M3. Just as M1 was a game changer for Apple’s computers in moving away from Intel the M3 takes it to another level where M2 really was a stopgap move.

Big picture: in two years Apple has gained 20-50 percent performance improvement over their 2019-2920 computers and with each upgrade using successively less power to achieve it.

This is truly quite something.


So if you take performance considerations away the haters’ real criticisms boil down to: colours beyond black and grey, white bezels and not being a 27in. display.
 
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Velli said:
…for you. I have used both my USB ports on my MBA at the same time exactly once, since I bought it. And one was for charging.
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Fair point but for a desktop it's weak. Im using a late 2012 iMac at the moment. I've got my printer connected and I'm running macOS from an external SSD. That's two out of four USB A ports used and I still have two 1st gen Thunderbolt ports I could use...

If I want to use an SD card I have a slot for that. You don't on the new iMac so that needs an adaptor. Oh you want to charge your keyboard well that'll use one of your USB slots as well. How about adding external storage since 256GB is pathetic.

Suddenly two ports looks piss poor when you have to choose what functionality you want to use.
 
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Well, didn't get the 27' replacement many of us wanted, but this was what I expected for the 24 M1 update - they essentially replaced the SOC and its a good bit faster and somewhat more capable for the same price. Can still choose colors, nice (was quite afraid we'd go to a single color).

Guessing the thin-ness of the design is why we don't see the upgraded M3 processors offered (as their thermal needs wouldn't fit into that super thin form factor) - leaving money on the table Apple. Have an old 27 inch in the kitchen and will be getting one of these as a replacement next year when the time comes, the size will be fine.
 
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Souponastick270 said:
Fair point but for a desktop it's weak. Im using a late 2012 iMac at the moment. I've got my printer connected and I'm running macOS from an external SSD. That's two out of four USB A ports used and I still have two 1st gen Thunderbolt ports I could use...

If I want to use an SD card I have a slot for that. You don't on the new iMac so that needs an adaptor. Oh you want to charge your keyboard well that'll use one of your USB slots as well. How about adding external storage since 256GB is pathetic.

Suddenly two ports looks piss poor when you have to choose what functionality you want to use.
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It's not news that Apple is forward focused, as it was in 2012, when you didn't have a disc drive for instance (which Lenovo's AIO apparently still does...). They expect you to use modern peripherals with a modern computer, meaning you wouldn't connect the printer via USB. Booting from an external SSD certainly counts as special case, which I wouldn't expect Apple to account for. I do agree with you on the missing SD card slot though, although I personally haven't used one for years. Casual photo editing seems to be a pretty common use case for an iMac.

I like not paying for features I'm not using.
 
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Velli said:
Yes, and the one after that. Welcome to computing.This is normal, however my comment was in relation to how well Apple does this.
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Yes, this is normal. But my comment was in relation to how well Apple does this.
 
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