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New Low-Cost iMac Nearly 50% Slower in Multi-Core, 10% Slower in Single-Core Benchmarks

For everyone saying this is the "same as a MacBook Air"
the reason why it works for the Air is because of the SSD. This does not have that.

I thought the latest Mac Mini would be "fine" for home-use but that thing chugs, even for my 74 year old dad.
 
"We don't ship junk" Steve Jobs

What the **** happened to we don't ship junk. This is junk!!! This is not what apple is...this is not what apple should become! This is not the apple I love. This is ********... Slower! They released a computer slower then the last! I can't believe it. How could they even think of doing this?

 
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IGregory said:
For some, yes, but there are customers out there who just want to web browse, email, message with family, and maybe, just maybe some light photo work.:cool:
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These people should save themselves $600 and get an iPad.
 
The only way this makes sense to me is if Intel asked Apple to help them get past Haswell.

This really is quite the step backward for a company that touts that they only make the best products. Strangely disappointing from Apple.
 
littyboy said:
I think the point here is that it is a DESKTOP, where power/performance should be at the top. Sure it is supposed to be "low-cost" but everyone did not expect performance to tank that low.
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Performance relative to what?

A Honda Civic is still a car but nobody thinks it is going to compare to an Acura let a long a Porsche.

Sometimes people just need a car and a Civic works fine of their needs.
 
The performance of this will not be bad it will not do for professionals, but I have a first gen MacBook Air (11") on mavericks and have NO issues running anything I want. In fact it performs better than my Windows desktop (probably due to OS efficiency)

ALSO, multi-core performance is only a issue if you have multiple open AND active apps running; most consumer apps don't do a lot of background processing (meaning having Word, keynote, Email and Safari at the same time really wouldn't benefit from Multi-core as you can only interact with one at a time and they don't do much when they are just sitting there)

BUT, I DO think this is missing some nice synergies:

This is essentially a fixed MacBook air. In my mind it should be $999 (that's a nice mental price point, or perhaps $899 to match the MacBook air)

it should come with the "Fusion Drive" for that SSD performance (Goes a LONG way toward the impression of performance) P.s. ALL IMacs should come with the fusion drive

the chassis should probably be about the same cost as the MacBook Air, they save on the battery and charging components, They spend more on the display.


If they really wanted to differentiate this product, they could go SSD right out of the MacBook Air (use the exact same board setup) and have a new, even thinner chassis(like the thickness of the Air), perhaps even with lightning connectors in the "foot" to attach external HD/Keyboard/Mouse call it the IMac Mini
 
I'm laughing at all the education comments!

Chromebooks are becoming the favorite choice in education. They are beating iPads because of the keyboard and price. With so much coursework web dependent they are the go to and google has everything else covered with google apps and google classroom releasing in the next couple of months.

iMacs are used for multimedia courses and this new iMac is **** for that.
 
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The Doctor11 said:
"We don't ship junk" Steve Jobs

What the fu** happened to we don't ship junk. This is junk!!! This is not what apple is...this is not what apple should become! This is not the apple I love. This is bullsh**... Slower! They released a computer slower then the last! I can't believe it. How could they even think of doing this?

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Come on, have you used the computer? This is not junk, it is a lower spec'd all in one, and it will probably become the most popular iMac model.
 
So right now Best Buy sells 11" Macbook Air at $650, and a 21.5" monitor you can buy for < $150.

11" Macbook Air and this new iMac perform more or less the same (Macbook Air probably outperforms in actual use because of the SSD).

Even without the Best Buy deal, this just seems like a horrible price for what it is.
 
patohi said:
I'm laugh at all the education comments!

Chromebooks are become the favorite choice in education. They are beating iPads because of the keyboard and price. With so much coursework web dependent they are the go to and google has everything else covered with google apps and google classroom releasing in the next couple of months.

iMacs are used for multimedia courses and this new iMac is **** for that.
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Do you think a school cares how ****** it is for that. No they go we need a Mac this **** is cheap buy that.

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JoEw said:
Come on, have you used the computer? This is not junk, it is a lower spec'd all in one, and it will probably become the most popular iMac model.
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Doesn't matter how good it is. Fact is it's 40% slower! That's not how apple should do things
 
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Hey everyone...

First, before everyone on earth blows a gasket over this underwhelming product, please realize that right now is when educational institutions in the northern hemisphere buy product. This is most certainly an institutional product designed to compete in a place where performance is not the critical factor but power savings, warranty and support and a modern operating system probably are.

With an education discount, this price goes sub-$1,000 which is perfect for schools.
 
patohi said:
I'm laughing at all the education comments!

Chromebooks are become the favorite choice in education. They are beating iPads because of the keyboard and price. With so much coursework web dependent they are the go to and google has everything else covered with google apps and google classroom releasing in the next couple of months.

iMacs are used for multimedia courses and this new iMac is **** for that.
Click to expand...

I work in IT for a school, and Chromebooks are a much better option than iPads in almost every way. Cheaper, a real keyboard, easier to manage Chrome OS, and we use Google Docs, Slides, and Sheets a lot. It's a perfect fit.
 
Should've come with a 500 GB fusion drive in the stock 21.5" model. That would've addressed the main bottleneck in this new base model -- the spinning hard disk. Also, it would've justified the $1,099 price tag as opposed to $999.
 
Honest question: How much multi-core processing is accomplished from a casual user (web browsing, email, some occasional Pages use)?

Because I'm thinking something like this might be a perfect machine for my parents. Especially in a year or two when this can be picked up in the refurb store for $899. They do only light computing, never owned a Mac, have been using my iPad 2 for over a year. I figure whenever their computer konks out they'll have to learn something new (either Win8 or Mac OSX), so it'd be the perfect time to try to get them to switch.
 
Cougarcat said:
Yuck. If you need to save $200, better idea to get a refurb.
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This new iMac is fast enough for many uses, like running a work processor or web browser, playing videos. Not great for editing video but for occasional editing it would woe.

But I agree for $200 savings is trivial. It is not a different enough price. This iMac should have sold for $800. I think they need to address the expensive parts. Perhaps loose the aluminum case and go back to white plastic. Loose the Thunderbolt ports too. The person who is looking for low price is never going to buy a TB disk drive so just having USB3 is good enough. They could $300 more in cuts.
 
"Do you think a school cares how ****** it is for that. No they go we need a Mac this **** is cheap buy that."

Districts are on a tight budget. They think long and hard on prices. Apple does not backdown from the basic edu pricing. You would have to buy 1000s of macs to maybe get a sub 1000 price. And most districts are not big enough to make those type of purchases.
 
Actually, when I looked, this has about the same performance as the current dual core Retina MacBook Pro and that seems like a screamer for personal use.

I still think this should be $999
 
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