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Apple Introduces New G5 iMac
peatbakke writes "Well, here it is. Looks like the rumors of computer+monitor combined into a sleek little case were true." It's mostly what you'd expect both design-wise and specwise. And I want it.
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Here is a larger view of the inside of the machine. It's one hell of a lot more accessible than the last imac (or any of the imacs to date, for that matter).
:)
Reminds me of the layout of my favourite pizzabox machines - just standing up
Not trolling... just giving something for discussion. If anybody buys me one, I promise I'll add an apple section to tech-recipes. :)
$1,299.00
17-inch widescreen LCD
1.6GHz PowerPC G5
512K L2 cache
533MHz frontside bus
256MB DDR400 SDRAM
NVIDIA GeForce FX 5200 Ultra
64MB DDR video memory
80GB Serial ATA hard drive
Slot-load Combo Drive
$1,499.00
17-inch widescreen LCD
1.8GHz PowerPC G5
512K L2 cache
600MHz frontside bus
256MB DDR400 SDRAM
NVIDIA GeForce FX 5200 Ultra
64MB DDR video memory
80GB Serial ATA hard drive
Slot-load SuperDrive
$1,899.00
20-inch widescreen LCD
1.8GHz PowerPC G5
512K L2 cache
600MHz frontside bus
256MB DDR400 SDRAM
NVIDIA GeForce FX 5200 Ultra
64MB DDR video memory
160GB Serial ATA hard drive
Slot-load SuperDrive
Dell Dimension 4600C Intel® Pentium® 4 Processor (2.80GHz, 533 FSB)
Operating System Microsoft® Windows® XP Home Edition WHXP
Memory 256MB Dual Channel shared DDR SDRAM at 333MHz
Monitors Dell Multifunction LCD TV/Monitor Selected Below TV [320-2913] 5
Video Cards Integrated Intel® Extreme Graphics 2 IV
Hard Drive 40GB Ultra ATA/100 Hard Drive 40 [341-0836] 8
Floppy Drive and Additional Storage Devices No Floppy Drive Included NFD
Mouse Dell® 2-button scroll mouse SM
Network Interface Integrated 10/100 Ethernet IN
Modem 56K PCI Data/Fax Modem DFAX
CD or DVD Drive FREE UPGRADE! 24X CD-RW/ DVD Combo Drive
Dell W1700 LCD TV w/1 Yr Svc Qty 1
FREE Dell 720 Color Printer with 1 Yr Advanced Exchange Service Qty 1
TOTAL: $1,373.00
As posted here: http://live.macobserver.com/article/2004/07/paris2 004_keynote.shtml
:-) - posted by Bryan
Paris 2004 - Live Coverage of Steve Jobs Keynote
3:00AM CDT, August 31st, 2004
[4:44 AM] We aren't sure that the unit shown on stage was an actual working unit. It may have been a body with a paper display covering it. We aren't sure, of course, but we wanted to make note of that. - posted by Bryan
[4:41 AM] We are seeing a video for the new iMac now. Apple is comparing it to the iPod, the way the music player sits in the Dock. Also, the video says "From the creator of the iPod," showing that Apple is trying to leverage the success of the music player. Jonathan Ive says it is "quiet and utterly serene" in the video. - posted by Bryan
[4:38 AM] US$1299 - 17" 256 MB RAM, Combo Drive, 80 GB drive, 64 MB video card. This compares to US$1799 for the old starting iMac.
US$1499 - 17", with 1.8 GHz.
US$1899 - 20" display (1680 x 1050), 2.2" thick, 1.8 GHz G5, 256 MB RAM, 160 GB drive, SuperDrive, and same 64 MB video card.
They will begin shipping in mid-September! - posted by Bryan
[4:37 AM] You can unscrew three screws, and the entire back comes off. The crowd loves it!
The G5 module, when looking at the back, is on the right side. There are three fans in the unit, and it is "quiet as a whisper." - posted by Bryan
[4:35 AM] SuperDrive. 1.8 GHz G5. 600 MHz frontside bus. 400 MHz DDR RAM, up to 2 GB. Serial ATA hard drives, AGP 8X graphic slots. The speakers are mounted on the bottom, so they reflect off the desk, up to the user. The keyboard will slide underneath the display when you are not using it.
There are three 5 USB (3 2.0, 2 1.1), two FireWire, a modem slot, Ethernet (10/100 Base-T), audio-in, audio-out, both headphone and optical), power button on the bottom. - posted by Bryan
[4:34 AM] "Everyone is ging to be asking "where does the computer go?"
All of the connectors are on the left side, all in a row. Again, the crowd is going wild. - posted by Bryan
[4:33 AM] It's white in color, and the crowd is going wild. It has a grey Apple logo on front. Everyhting fits together right behind the display. - posted by Bryan
[4:32 AM] It looks like just a Cinema Display with a DVD slot loader on right side towards the top. Aluminum foot. It's the world's thinest desktop computer, at less than 2" thick. - posted by Bryan
[4:31 AM] The iMac G5 demonstration has begun. - posted by Bryan
[4:31 AM] Apple has sold 7.5 million iMacs, which works out to2.38 per minute over six years. - posted by Bryan
[4:29 AM] The iChat demo ended with Bertrand Serlet video conferencing in. The crowd loved his brief conversation in French. - posted by Bryan
[4:20 AM] We're on to iChat now. The last time we saw such a demo, it included lots of people from around the world in Apple's very cool iChat AV update in Tiger. That does, of course, bring to mind the idea that perhaps will see a certain iCEO who is in northern California, and if we do, we might even see some new hardware... - posted by Bryan
[4:19 AM] Mr. Schiller has moved on to demonstrating the iLife suite. This is the same demo that we have seen before... - posted by Bryan
[4:09 AM] We've moved on to Dashboard, Apple's implementation of a Widget engine. - posted by Bryan
[4:05 AM] For those keeping score at home, the US Apple Store is now, and finally, offline. - posted by Bryan
[4:02 AM] Well, Mr. Schiller went on to a H.264 demo instead of the iMac. Go figure. Interestingly, he specifically did not mention any release dates for this new digital video technology.
From H.264, we are moving on to a demonstration of Safari RSS. - posted by Bryan
[3:54 AM] During Mr. Schiller's Spotlight demonstration, he "found" a document on his demo Mac called "New Products Demo." This will, undoubtedly, be the new iMac everyone is waiting to see.
[3:43 AM]
I will work to elevate you, just enough to bring you down
Original source for the images. Apple's bandwidth and servers are probably a little more /. proof
i call bs. OS X runs perfect here on two different machines, one with 256 and the other with 384 megs of ram. Things may run a little bit slow if you try to run a zillion programs all at once, but for the average user, 256 is fine.
Jisho - A Japanese English German Russian French Dictionary for the rest of us.
You can grab the images from Apple's iMac G5 PR images page.
I won't comment on the rest of your points but point #1 is factually wrong. If you look on the design page you'll see that the wires will hang out in the back, not on the side. Apple thought about that for you. They most likely thought about other things as well for you! :)
I see they kept the PowerMac/iMac performance differential in part by using a 3x multiplier instead of the 2x that the PowerMacs use.
;-)
That was an engineering choice more than a marketing choice, though of course it was dictated by both. The largest single source of heat in a Power Mac G5 is the system controller ASIC. Low-temperature G5-based systems must necessarily eliminate that source of BTU's.
Most importantly, can this model finally take an aftermarket internal Bluetooth module?
The internal Bluetooth module is available as a BTO option only.
Will more VRAM be available as a BTO option?
No. You'll get more VRAM in 6-8 months when the Rev. B machines are announced, just like always.
If the iMac is going to sell at all in the gaming market
The "gaming market?" Surely you jest.
With this out there, will the eMac see a minor speedbump anytime soon?
Odds are slim. That's a Motorola issue, not an Apple issue.
Most importantly, will normal human beings actually be able to buy these in stores anytime this year
Depends on where you live. If you live near an Apple Store, you'll be able to buy one this week. But you'd better get there fast.
I write in my journal
I guess style is one reason why I buy macs, but the main reason I buy macs is for OS X. So, as long as they keep improving and innovating the OS, they'll keep me and many others as customers.
If you think about what a capacitor is, I don't think it is all that thermally sensitive. After all, the biggest, crappiest and hottest capacitors are going to be inside the PSU.
In my experience, electrolytic capacitors, which have a liquid dialetric, tend to fail as this liquid migrates from one end of the capacitor to another. Inside they're built like a jelly roll, and all the jelly leaks to one end, changing the capacitance value and sometimes creating shorts.
I can see how heat might make this problem worse, but the biggest problem is gravity and the orientation of the capacitors. I don't know how many pieces of old equipment like video terminals I've "fixed" by having their users "put them to bed" by turning them upside down at the end of the day. These capacitors look like they're laid out horizontally, which I think will tend to make them last longer.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
Just to nitpick, the original Mac had 128k. Six months later or so, they introduced the "Fat Mac" with 512k.
Comparing Apples to Oranges....Dells
Ok iMac is low-end so compare to cheapest Dell with almost the same functionality.
Dell w 17 inch lcd = $1377 yet it is not an all-in-one
Dell with 20" lcd = $1887
Specs for the Dells otherwise:
Pentium 4 at 2.8 Ghz (533 FSB)
Windows XP Pro (Can't compare Home to OS X because OS X has all the features of Pro and more)
256 Megs RAM
80 gig hd/160 with 20 inch screen
Single Drive: 16X CD/DVD burner (DVD+RW/+R) w/double layer write capability
Fireiwre PCI adapter
128MB DDR NVIDIA GeForce FX 5200 Graphics Card with TV-Out and DVI
What your not getting with the Dells:
Gigabit Ethernet
Widescreen LCD
All in One enclosure
64 bit capability->Especially for linux users
A design that begs to be seen, not shoved under a desk.
What your not getting with the iMac:
64 extra megs in the viedo card.
Crap trial software you have to remove
The lower end Dell (17") was made to compare with the mid range iMac. $122 isn't all that much considering what benefits you will gain. (IMO).
At the higher end, there is no question in my mind that the iMac is by far the better deal for merely 12 dollars extra.
Feel free to try doing the spec work on your own elsewhere. Just make sure you don't compare OS X to Windows XP Home. OS X's capabilities far outstrip those of XP Home. And if your selling to businesses that need to join a domain, you would need Pro anyway.
A conservative is a man with two perfectly good legs who, however, has never learned to walk forward. -- FDR
I have a feeling the photos don't do the new machine justice, but I really loved the fully adjustable screen on the previous generation iMac. I thought it was wonderfully practical and ergonomic to be able to bend it up, down and sideways. Frankly, I wished the standalone displays were designed as nicely.
Unfortunately, I think they've pretty much sold out the previous generation iMacs, so I doubt that getting one of them is much of an option. And of course the G5 processor's going to be great.
Interesting that they went to 17" only. I wish they'd kept a 15" model at $999. This lack of low end is Apple's greatest problem with consumers. With HP and others packaging a computer, monitor and printer for $999, I think a $999 iMac with a nice LCD would make a very nice package for many, considering that you can buy printers for next to free nowadays.
D
Macs have longer active lives than PCs since there is much less built-in obsolescence. I can run MacOS X well on my five-year old iMac or PowerMac.
........... $ 1,299 ......... 1xlifetime = 100 ..... 5 years ......... $1,399
............. $ 600 ........3 year life x100 = 300 per lifetime of machine ......... $ 1,000
If you have a lousy monitor left in a corner the PC is much cheaper than the Mac. But if you want your employees to survive without eyestrain you probably want to fix its lifespan at three years. This means replacing the monitor at the same time as the PC.
The cost of spyware and virus protection/removal solutions is about $50 per machine, plus $1,000-odd on the server level, plus about $100 per year per machine for roughly one technician hour a year of support.
Mac
Visits
Lifetime
Total
Cost/year... $279
PC
Visits
Spyware+AV Software... $100
Total
Cost per year: $333
If we add a cheap monitor for $100 it goes up to $366. But then you should really compare it to the $799 eMac, not the $1,299 iMac, which would actually increase Apple's advantage.
if we add a 17" LCD for $500 it goes up to $458.
Visits may be a gross underestimate. I've seen PCs messed up so badly that it's been cheaper to buy a new PC than to figure out what's wrong.
This doesn't even include the server-based AV software you should also buy.
See? The Mac isn't half bad when it comes to a reasonable cost perspective with all costs included. Not to mention that Apple Mail + iCal costs nothing, while Outlook + Exchange are obscenely expensive.
D
-25 to 70 is commercial spec.
-40 to 125 is industrial spec.
-50 to 150 is military spec.
Some companies/products differ from these (i.e. a lot of power ICs are designed for the 150 max in their industrial version), but those are the general guidelines.
---
Mod me down, you fucking twits. Go ahead. I dare you.
(I read with sigs off.)
I think it has a VESA mount on the back which you can use to add your own swivel arm. I miss the swivel arm of the iMac G4, too, but I'm sure that someone sells, or will sell shortly, a VESA mount that will allow tilt and swivel just like the old system. It is nice to be able to push the screen with a fingertip to turn it to show someone something, or adjust it to a nice viewing angle easily, then walk away and have the next person to use the machine move it to wherever they want it. Sometimes, when I'm working on something on one for a while, I move the screen around a bit to vary how I look at it to avoid fatigue.
i am a soviet space shuttle
I agree with you with this point. Apple historically has always been behind on the supply side. They never seem to be able to estimate demand or scale up when well when it rises, resulting in delayed orders. Its a shame.
No, you just need to lock down the config tight enough so that can't happen
We have an entire team of guys at our college that specialize in one and only thing. Windows PCs. Yet, they have trouble locking down the computer because Windows and Windows programmers have picked up alot of bad habits over the years. Allowing Limited Userby default to even write to the root of the C:\ drive, the root of Program Files, last but not least the root of the Windows directory. Even after locking down most things. Our computers where hit by NetSky.
Here is a short example C:\Program Files\Common Files\McNeel Shared\Teen Porn 16.jpg.pif has been deleted. C:\Program Files\Common Files\McNeel Shared\Virii Sourcecode.scr Found the W32/Netsky.c@MM virus !!! C:\Program Files\Common Files\McNeel Shared\Virii Sourcecode.scr has been deleted. C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\Best Matrix Screensaver.scr Found the W32/Netsky.c@MM virus !!! C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\Best Matrix Screensaver.scr has been deleted. C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\CDO\Best Matrix Screensaver.scr Found the W32/Netsky.c@MM virus !!! C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\CDO\Best Matrix Screensaver.scr has been deleted. C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\CDO\Dark Angels.pif
It just goes to show that the Windows OS is inherited from a single user system, and doesn't think about where and how a user can install malware and virii ..etc throughout the system, infecting other users. We've been using Unix and now Linux for the last 20 years and I've never as many problems on Windows on other
platforms like Solaris, HP-UX, AIX, Linux and Mac OSX.