The FireWire 400 port was removed to add another USB port. There's only one FireWire 800 port now.
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Unboxing of the Early 2009 NVIDIA iMac, Early Benchmarks
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Wait... when they do release truly new models (as opposed to this internal refresh), they aren't attempting to stimulate new sales?
Actually I believe is to have a video card attached to the mother board to save room to make it a bit better.
In my case this is an incredible upgrade. I work with Digital Signage screens, specially with the Philips WOWvx 3D displays. They need 1080i resolution for all their footage and only PCs were available for that.
The older Mac Mini didn't support 1080i resolution at 30fps. This new mac mini does it.
That mean I can get the new mac mini and runs windos and osx, not to mention the size of the mini is 1/3rd of the smaller PC I can find at $800.
And small PC mini ATX cost $800 and over. The mac mini is way perfect for all those applications.
The other computer that can compete with the Mac Mini is the Dell (what ever it name is) but it does not have the house power of the new Mac Mini regarding video.
Thanks (I just realized I could look that up on apple's imac page
). Lose the only FW 400 and gain a 4th USB? That's not a good trade, IMO.
Nope, they replaced the FW400 with another usb to make:-
4 USBs
1 FW800
Audio in/out
Mini Display port
Ethernet
4 USBs
1 FW800
Audio in/out
Mini Display port
Ethernet
This is the Mac version of Microsoft Downgrade
This is the Mac version of Microsoft Downgrade, it should be printed in the box: "Welcome to the new Apple, Downgrade! The Down Starts Now!"
This is the Mac version of Microsoft Downgrade, it should be printed in the box: "Welcome to the new Apple, Downgrade! The Down Starts Now!"
Thanks (I just realized I could look that up on apple's imac page
I totally agree with you, I think it sucks. If I were in the market for a new Imac right now I would be looking at the refurb store. Loosing that firewire port hurts for video production. USB is cool and all but firewire is preferable for me, USB 2.0 is so PC to me. I guess the fact that I have 8 Firewire Drives keeps me thinking this way.
I have a 24" 2.4 and I'm very happy with it and not jealous of the updates at all.
I wish Apple had figured out that 3 USB ports wasn't enough when the released the 24" LED ACD. Oh well, I guess the future is promising.
Fantastic Keyboard
Imagine the picture above of the iMac keyboard sitting in its box to the left of the documentation. What if the entire box was the keyboard and the flat area where the documentation is packed was a multi-finger, gesturing mouse pad. Apple would sell a gazillion of them! Especially if it was wireless and the pad could be attached on left or right. - - Or just make a bluetooth mouse pad.
Imagine the picture above of the iMac keyboard sitting in its box to the left of the documentation. What if the entire box was the keyboard and the flat area where the documentation is packed was a multi-finger, gesturing mouse pad. Apple would sell a gazillion of them! Especially if it was wireless and the pad could be attached on left or right. - - Or just make a bluetooth mouse pad.
I don't know how to break it for you, but in normal world old hardware get's cheaper with time ;-D
For Apple it doesn't. They charge exactly the same for the whole life-cycle (well, they do drop prices a bit sometimes), but it can't compare. So when they do update, what they're really doing is adjusting the prices to reality...
pretty good price point for the 24" model, it looks like they have the same base as the new 24" LED, the slimmer base really nice.
The GT130 is a rebranded 9600GSO which is a rebranded 8800GS. So the GT130 will perform about the same as the old 8800GS.
As an observation, it only costs $50 to upgrade to the HD4850 which should completely dominate the GT130/8800GS. It's a very worthwhile upgrade. I don't know why Apple even bothers offering the GT130, since the small price difference means the GT130 has little value. If they are selling it to consumers for $50, the actual cost difference to them would be even smaller, so they could have just absorbed the cost, deleted the GT130, and offset it with a simplified supply and production chain.
Personally, I'm interested in seeing how the 9400M performs against the HD2600Pro. I'm willing to bet there are cases where the dedicated nature of the HD2600Pro keeps it ahead, so the 9400M may well be a downgrade for the low-end 24" iMac.
Actually I don't think that this is a problem. Unlike the MacBooks which lost firewire completely (no 400 or 800), FW800 is backwards compatible with FW400. So you can still use your drives by just adding an adapter. It may be annoying, but you don;t lose your investment.
For the future, FW800 will be it, as most new drives are adopting the new standard (that along with e-Sata).
That is if Apple is using desktop cards in the iMac. We all know how that turned out...
Also the desktop GT130 is the desktop 9600GT.
Without a core i7, ddr3 has slower latency than ddr2= slower/same performance
and as others have stated, new tech gets cheaper. I think most of the cost of the iMac comes from the aluminum case and the price of aluminum has not been going down. I wish they still offered plastic models like the MB. I want a computer, not hunks of metal.
I'm honestly surprised Apple hasn't adopted eSATA. PCs have had it for a while. I'm just bummed it's nothing really new. I might scour the refurb store for a 24" with better video. 8GB of RAM? There isn't much out there that can take advantage of that.
Besides the ability to have 8 gigs of DDR3 ram over 4 gigs of DDR2 ram, is there any other benefit, or just the drawback of no longer having a dedicated graphics card in the low end and midrange models?
providing a keypadless-kb by defauly is a mistake. people aren't ready for that. the numberless one should be an option, not the other way around. Even though I use the current BT (numberpad-less) kb, I think people should still get the bigger kb by default. You might think this is crazy, but this might scare buyers away. If these are sold at big box stores, and the only one in stock is one with a "small" keyboard, some customers actually wouldn't buy it for that very reason (i've seen it happen!)
The top end model is essentially the same as the model it replaces ??
The CPU... no advancement
The GPU... its a rebadged 9600 version of the 8800 GS... no advancement
It does have more memory and a larger HD.... erm.. wow
Oh... and it now costs a whopping £449 more than the old version for practically the same machine spec.
People must be absolutely off their rocker to be buying the new iMac in the UK... totally insane. If my wife came home with one of these machines, I would have her committed to the loony bin.
The CPU... no advancement
The GPU... its a rebadged 9600 version of the 8800 GS... no advancement
It does have more memory and a larger HD.... erm.. wow
Oh... and it now costs a whopping £449 more than the old version for practically the same machine spec.
People must be absolutely off their rocker to be buying the new iMac in the UK... totally insane. If my wife came home with one of these machines, I would have her committed to the loony bin.