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"new" iMacs

toddzrx said:
That's not the whole story obviously: it's thinner at the edge, but is pretty much the same thickness at the center, which isn't buying you anything for a footprint savings if desktop space is at a premium (which for most, it probably isn't).

I'd of rather seen Apple just reduce the thickness of the machine across its entire length, and retain the SD slot on the side (or maybe consider putting the slot on the bottom, along with the USB connections). Kind of like how they thinned down from the cMBP to the rMBP: no optical illusions going on; just thinner across the board.
Click to expand...

Someone said that doing it this way let the metal "back" of the thing act like a better heat-sink. I don't know if it's true, but it's one of those things I could probably "buy"

I guess if the overall unit is lighter that helps them with shipping and all of that. Shipping thousands and thousands of units, even a few ounces adds up.

Beyond that though it's just for "aesthetics" so long as you're not looking at it from too sharp of an angle.
 
calaverasgrande said:
The headphone jack on the back must annoying for those folks that use headphones. I use powered speaks with mine so it''s not an issue, but again, another reason to use an extender/adapter.
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Not really since I use the headphones for everything and they just stay plugged in all the time.
 
MisterKeeks said:
It would be cumbersome, power consuming, and not well suited to any of the tasks that would be performed on an iMac.
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It is not that bad. I have one in a pc I built and can reach 4.7 Ghz on stock cooling.
It is too unstable to use, how ever at 4.7 it can be used for a few hours without KP, but 4.0 Ghz is totally stable.

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rabidz7 said:
It is not that bad. I have one in a pc I built and can reach 4.7 Ghz on stock cooling.
It is too unstable to use, how ever at 4.7 it can be used for a few hours without KP, but 4.0 Ghz is totally stable.
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I am talking about the 8150. No Power 7s yet.
 
toddzrx said:
I'll agree with the OP: I bought a used 2010 iMac because the new design was a turn-off between the SD card slot relocation, no SSD-only options on the 21.5", and loss of optical drive (although I can understand Apple's desire to get rid of it). Yes, they offer the Fusion drive, but when it first came out it was not offered on the base model; you had to buy the more expensive model to get Fusion, which increased your purchase a significant amount.
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Well, well, well:

https://www.macrumors.com/2013/05/02/apple-adds-new-256-gb-and-512-gb-flash-storage-options-to-imac/

So Apple could have offered the Fusion Drive, and these SSD-only options from the beginning. Why wait until now?
 
rabidz7 said:
It is not that bad. I have one in a pc I built and can reach 4.7 Ghz on stock cooling.
It is too unstable to use, how ever at 4.7 it can be used for a few hours without KP, but 4.0 Ghz is totally stable.

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I am talking about the 8150. No Power 7s yet.
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OK. Since I asked you about why you would want a Power7 despite the obvious downfalls presented by it, could you please answer the question of:

Why would you want an iMac with a Power7 despite it being cumbersome, power consuming, and not well suited to any of the tasks that would be performed on an iMac.
 
MisterKeeks said:
OK. Since I asked you about why you would want a Power7 despite the obvious downfalls presented by it, could you please answer the question of:

Why would you want an iMac with a Power7 despite it being cumbersome, power consuming, and not well suited to any of the tasks that would be performed on an iMac.
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You can get a 6GHz on a Power7 with lots of cores and full pipelining. Plus IBM could make one custom like they used to for apple.
 
The fact that several people here think that a larger volume case gives you better cooling is shocking.

A larger case means that you may be able to use more efficient (read, quieter and or higher airflow) fan. THAT is why it may help cooling.

If your fan flows at some set airflow, let's call it 10CFM (I'm not quoting real numbers here), and you have, say, 1 cubic foot of volume in the case, then you "turn" the air over 10 times per minute. If you HALVE the volume of the internals of the case, you will get 20 turns per minute.

So, all other things being held constant, less air volume inside the case will result in MORE airflow, and BETTER cooling.

The issue is that it's hard to hold all things constant. Get too little air volume inside the case, and you may have resistance to airflow. Or dead spots that don't get any airflow (this is true even in big servers that have lots of screaming fast and loud fans, by the way).

So anyone saying "smaller cases are harder to cool" is oversimplifying and just grasping at straws. In fact, if there was more dead space inside, Apple engineers would need to use baffles or foam to keep airflow out of the dead space and flowing over the parts that need cooling!

Just because your laptops run hot and your old POS Dell tower runs cool doesn't mean that bigger cases mean cooler parts. It just means that bad engineers can do simple things (like bigger or faster fans, or put in big air flow shrouds) to fix their design limitations.
 
calaverasgrande said:
yes, but the optical drive was not on the back.
When the bondi blue iMac came out CDR were the dominant medium. It had a front loading optical. (unlike a certain Sun workstation!)
The SD card is pretty close to a dominant medium today, except not for retail software.

You guys that adamantly have no problem with the slot in the back have some great dexterity. Or maybe you sit at a table and dont have a wall behind your mac? I dunno. It's kind of weird how some people have to get personal over opinions about computer hardware.
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That's not my point.

My point was that criticising the new design for having the ports on the back, and referencing redesign from the previous generation to this one as the point where Apple "went wrong" is a bit silly because the ports have always been on the back. The optical drive used to be on the side, but now there is no OD. The only other thing to move is the SD card slot. I would have preferred to be the closest slot to the edge, since it would make it easy to plug in by reaching around, but other than that relocation, the other ports are in the same place.

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thejadedmonkey said:
Now imagine how much cooler this new mac could be if Apple had decided to keep the same case size and used 40% fewer components. I'm not sure how much more surface area the old iMac design had, but that's that much more surface area to dissipate heat. You can get more ports in better locations, better cooling, and the only thing you are giving up is an appearance of thinness when viewed from the side.
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Haha, are you serious? You really are just looking for things to criticise now.

Why does it need to be even cooler? It already runs cool and quiet in the current design (much cooler than the old one). Even under heavy, extended load the fan barely runs up. All the hardware is well inside the thermal tolerance and the machine itself doesn't audibly disturb or act as a giant IR radiator.

Your argument is essentially a solution in search of a problem.

A: "Sir, our factory is all set up to make the 5 widgets per hour at peach efficiency"
B: "But think of how much better we would be with more widget machines!"
A: "But we only produce 5 widgets per hour. Those extra machines would just be idle all the time taking up space"
B: "I don't care! Someone on the internet knows more about our design than us! He must do! He's on the internet! Buy those apparently necessary extra machines!"
 
toddzrx said:
Well, well, well:

So Apple could have offered the Fusion Drive, and these SSD-only options from the beginning. Why wait until now?
Click to expand...

Easy answer, people (at least here) tend to get turned off from buying mid-cycle products from Apple in fear something new will come out and trump it, rending theirs "outdated". This is a great move from Apple. The early adopters got what they wanted otherwise they wouldn't have bought it. To keep people buying throughout the cycle they offer more BTO options not offered from the beginning. It's that simple.
 
rnb2 said:
Honestly, the SD card slot on the back is easier to find and plug into than the slot on the side of my 2009 27".

As others have mentioned, it was way too easy to pop the SD card into the SuperDrive slot on the pre-2012 machines because, from the front, you had no easy way of telling exactly where the SD card slot was, front to back or top to bottom. On the 2012, it's exactly in line with the other ports, so you just reach around the right side, feel your fingers bump the first USB plug, and pop the SD card into the slot next to it. You wouldn't think that it would be easier, but in actual practice, it's no contest - the new SD slot is much easier to find and use than the old.
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Exactly. Try to think of it like you're taking off a bra, if you can't get it off without turning it around (or in, in this case) maybe you should practice putting it in some more.
 
Can't believe this thread is still going. The new iMac has the most brilliant design I've ever seen for a desktop computer. Give it a rest already... :rolleyes: I'm very happy all the connections are in the back. If you want semi-practical solutions that look cheap and ugly, buy a Windows PC. At the same time, why not put some stickers on your iMac.
 
HenryDJP said:
Easy answer, people (at least here) tend to get turned off from buying mid-cycle products from Apple in fear something new will come out and trump it, rending theirs "outdated". This is a great move from Apple. The early adopters got what they wanted otherwise they wouldn't have bought it. To keep people buying throughout the cycle they offer more BTO options not offered from the beginning. It's that simple.
Click to expand...

Adding BTO options, such as these, mid-cycle is pretty weak, if Apple wants to keep customers interested. How about a processor bump, like was done on the MBP in late 2011? THAT keeps possible customers interested.

That said, I understand your point, but not including SSD's from the start of the release can cut both ways: it did in my case. I was expecting Apple to include an SSD-only BTO option on all the iMac models since one was in place for the 2011 models, but it wasn't there when the redesign was released. I opted to buy a used 2010 21.5" and do the SSD surgery myself (and am quite happy with the results). I know: I'm more the exception than the norm.
 
toddzrx said:
Adding BTO options, such as these, mid-cycle is pretty weak, if Apple wants to keep customers interested. How about a processor bump, like was done on the MBP in late 2011? THAT keeps possible customers interested.

That said, I understand your point, but not including SSD's from the start of the release can cut both ways: it did in my case. I was expecting Apple to include an SSD-only BTO option on all the iMac models since one was in place for the 2011 models, but it wasn't there when the redesign was released. I opted to buy a used 2010 21.5" and do the SSD surgery myself (and am quite happy with the results). I know: I'm more the exception than the norm.
Click to expand...

Oh my, well while you're idea of a speed bump is certainly a more awesome option than just giving more BTO options I can only imagine the upset that Apple could cause early adopters and the outrage of posts here would just be too painful to read. Just the SSD options right now that they added are annoying people that they weren't offering in the beginning.
 
I would be annoyed over the location of the headphone jack, dvd drive and sd card reader but for 3 things....

I've got a headphone jack on my bose companion 5's so that knocks that out.
I wanted a bluray writer anyway, so solved that issue.
I've an SD card reader on my wireless printer under the desk, that solves that one too. :D

My only annoyance with the iMac is that there are not enough usb 3 slots. I have a hub, but still need another 2 USB slots. But it's something I can live without. ;)
 
I think removal of FireWire and the line in port are the most annoying for me. Way too early to remove FireWire I think.
 
At first I was annoyed at the absence of a FW port but once I used USB 3....that concern dissipated rather quickly. USB 3 is great! I simply bought a G-Drive external HD that had both FW and USB 3 ports in it, hooked it up to the older machine which has FW in order to retrieve the data I wanted to put into the new iMac, then hooked it up to the iMac into one of the USB 3 ports and I was good to go.

As for the SD slot, I will probably never use that as I have a new USB 3 dual card reader for my CF and SD cards. Much easier to tuck that under the computer and then when I need it, pull it forward to insert the card.

Headphone jack doesn't annoy me, either, as I've got my headphones more or less permanently plugged in there, too, for ease of use. I live in a condo building and realize that the neighbors might not appreciate listening to my music, especially late at night -- hence, headphones.

I don't really miss the optical drive -- very easy to quickly plug in my external Superdrive when I want to watch a movie or burn a CD or listen to an opera that is only on CD and not in my iTunes library yet. Works a treat and the rest of the time the external Superdrive is safely stored and out of the way.
 
ImpKali said:
The new iMacs are quite pretty in my opinion. I was of the same opinion as a lot of people when I saw that Apple removed the optical drive, and I was just screaming "What we're you THINKING?!"

Eh, I have most of my old software converted to ISO images though, and an external optical drive is cheap. The only thing that bugs me is the removal of the RAM slot door in the 21 inch models. If anything, I say that there should be doors for it and at least the hard drive. I would suggest doors to replace the video card and processor, but in such a form factor, I'd be worried about putting in a latest and greatest processor due to thermal issues. Not to mention that I'm not even sure how you would replace the mobile GPU.
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Im confused. If it runs so much cooler why are some suggesting they should have kept the existing thickness?

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Nuke61 said:
Apple led the industry in dropping built-in support for floppy drives by about 4 years. Back then, if you still needed FDD support, you bought an external drive. I don't see this as being any different in that if you want a front mounted SD card slot or an ODD, you need an accessory; the only difference i see from my perspective is that back then I used Windows on a PC.

Out of all the software on my Mac, only 1 was a CD only installation, and that was MS-Office. They are going the way of the FDD.


This isn't some new phenomenon... look at this headline, "The new iMac: thin is in" - must be describing the late 2012 iMac, right? That would certainly be a good guess, but it was from October of 2005.
http://www.zdnet.com/blog/apple/the-new-imac-thin-is-in/12
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Seems to me thinness was a consequence of them dropping the ODD, not the other way around. Or course they're going show off the thin edge because it is jaw dropping and an engineering marvel (go back and watch the keynote, the iMac by far got the loudest applause from the audience).

Perhaps Apple had data that showed most of the customer repairs were due to problems with the ODD, or data that ODDs are being used less and less. But the idea that the #1 design goal was a 5mm edge is ludicrous.

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calaverasgrande said:
The headphone jack on the back must annoying for those folks that use headphones. I use powered speaks with mine so it''s not an issue, but again, another reason to use an extender/adapter.
Click to expand...

Wasn't the headphone on the back on the previous model too?
 
calaverasgrande said:
The headphone jack on the back must annoying for those folks that use headphones. I use powered speaks with mine so it''s not an issue, but again, another reason to use an extender/adapter.
Click to expand...

No, I have external speakers and the controller sitting on my desk to plug in my headphones when needed.
 
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