Apple Announces Major Consumer PC Upgrades | Hacker News Reader

Apple Announces Major Consumer PC Upgrades

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90 pointssant0sk1113 comments

New twist: In the imac 27", the Mini DisplayPort is both an input and an output. You can plug your laptop into an iMac and use it as a display.

This probably adds $0 to the assembly cost, same connector, and depending on how the bits get to the LCD, it could be near $0 in silicon costs. This feature that will provide more life for the display after the poor computer inside becomes obsolete.

That's a pretty fantastic feature. I wonder if it does HDCP?

It does: http://gizmodo.com/5385841/apple-imac-hands-on?skyline=true&...

I really love the screen. And consider that it is 2560x1440 at 16:9 and only 160 pixel "shorter" than the 30" Cinema HD (2560x1600 at 16:10), and the $100 CHEAPER with LED backlight --- guess what a pleasure it would be to code on it! :)

Ditto. I just wish the hard drive were user replaceable: from what I can gather, the HD is the big bottleneck on most of my day-to-day activities and would very much benefit from an SSD.

I'd like the option to use SSD too. Aside from the performance improvement, it would make the machine completely quite (fan not running and no CD spinning, though) at night :)

The new iMac looks nice, the Macbook looks like less of a wussy addition to the lineup, the Mac mini still looks like a Mac mini. What I'm excited about is that mouse. Multitouch scrolling is the feature that I love most about my Macbook Pro; I feel somewhat crippled when I don't have it on the iMacs and Mac Pros at my school. This mouse looks like what I've been waiting for from Apple. Sexier and sturdier than the Mighty Mouse, and much more in line with the rest of their technology.

EDIT: Yes! This was a launch that came with Jonathan Ive talking about things. Score one for Ive fanboys. http://www.apple.com/imac/the-new-imac/#large

EDIT EDIT: Two smaller announcements: New remote, new Time Capsule. http://www.engadget.com/2009/10/20/apple-updates-19-remote-p... and http://www.engadget.com/2009/10/20/apple-quietly-updates-air...

"the Macbook looks like less of a wussy addition to the lineup"

The specs match the low end MacBook Pro in most regards, and beat it in others (bigger default disk, for example).

Huh, I didn't realize that. I was actually referring to it in terms of visuals: the old plastic Macbooks look very dated.

It didn't help that Apple attempted to replace them with the aluminum 13" MacBook (and then later backed out and re-emphasized the plastic one).

The Macbook has never been a wussy part of the lineup. Until the unibody MB/MBP was announced, the sanest Apple purchasing advice was always, "buy the cheapest Intel Apple laptop, whatever that might be". Even now, the difference between the MBP and the MB is largely build quality, and the build quality of the plastic Macbook is still so much better than that of the Powerbook that the MBP wins mostly on pure excellence and not utility.

I said looks like less of a wussy lineup. The Macbook has always had a much cheaper feel to it compared to the Pro. It doesn't look incredible now—I don't like how non-contrasted it is—but it looks better.

I've found that my upgrades these days our dictated by the ram caps. For this reason, I go with the mbp, which has an 8GB cap whereas the mb has a 4GB cap.

I used to recommend the white MacBook, but since it became clear that the top case nearly always cracked I stopped recommending them. Now I would say the 13 inch MBP is the most sensible recommendation.

I have already had the cracking thing repaired under warranty once. It has since done it again. Now that my version of the MacBook is no more, I'm going to haul it in on Nov. 28, 2010 (the last day of my AppleCare warranty) and kindly request they fix it again :-) Who knows, maybe I'll get comped an upgrade.

They'll replace it for you without complaint, but as an Apple Service Provider tech I can tell you, don't get your hopes up about the upgrade. Apple supplies its providers with parts for machines well after their warranties are all up; for a part like that, that's had problems all across the board, doubly so.

The screen quality on the Macbook has always been terrible. Maybe the new model is better, but the previous versions have had awful off-angle viewing. The screen alone justified the move up to a MBP for me.

At first I was just waiting for the store to reopen to get the mouse, but I don't think I can live without the middle click

I've never really used middle click, so that doesn't inconvenience me at all.

I was freaked out for a second when I saw the oddball screen sizes on the iMacs and the "16:9!" blurb -- usually that means that you just get a shittier lower-res panel in a larger size.

Instead, they switched back to S-IPS panels, and increased the resolutions substantially -- 21.5 is 1920:1080, the 27 is 2560:1440.

The Apple page only refers to “IPS technology”. Is it really S-IPS or just E-IPS (or something else entirely)? Do you know? What’s your source?

Is there a big difference between S-IPS and E-IPS?

I really don’t know. E-IPS panels seem to be much cheaper which would suggest that they are worse. Not as bad as TN, but worse.

They've said it's the best iMac display yet, and I doubt they could claim that the LED backlighting more than makes up for any deficiencies of E-IPS compared to the S-IPS they used to use.

Rather disappointing Apple is going along with this trend, HD-ing resolutions of screens. I mean it's great for watching movies, but most people will be word processing, e-mailing or surfing the web on iMacs, and that's when you'll miss those 120 vertical pixels. (HD, 16:9 has 1080 vertical pixels, and 16:10 has 1200 vertical pixels.)

Neither model has lost any pixels. These displays are higher resolution in both dimensions for both models. The smaller model has gone from 1680x1050 to 1920x1080 (+30 vertical pixels) and the larger from 1920x1200 to 2560x1440 (+240 vertical pixels).

If Apple came out with an iMac with a 4:3 screen of the same width, I would not mind.

I'm rabidly anticipating some reviews of the Magic Mouse. The Mighty Mouse has been pretty disappointing but this new one has real potential.

One of the biggest failings of the Mighty Mouse is gone, the stupid scrollball on top that was unclean-able. I was actually hoping from a external trackpad, but I will have to look at this. I use a trackball now and find a mouse hard on the wrist. Now if logitech would combine their trackball with a trackpad, I would be overjoyed.

You might want to try out the Wacom Bamboo multitouch trackpad. Seems to do everything the Apple notebook trackpads do, plus you have the option of using a pen.

I'm curious if the shape of the Magic Mouse is better at preventing RSI/carpel tunnel. The old Mighty Mouse didn't do it for me in that regard, the shape and feel in my hand was awful.

Doesn't seem to be able to do a middle-click. Sad.

What do you need a middle-click for? I used to only use it for scrollballs, but multitouch killed my need for that.

I use it for closing tabs in Firefox when I don't have two hands on the keyboard (W is on the right hand's side of the keyboard for us Dvorak folks).

A middle click anywhere on the entire tab is easier that hitting the lil' x button. Plus, you can turn off the 'close tab' button it the options and make your Firefox look a little bit cleaner.

If you don't have a middle-click, how do you open a link in a new tab? (honest question, I buy mice for this.)

If you use OS X, cmd+click.

Cmd+click even works on some things that middle click doesn't, for example middle clicking on the home, back/forward, or top sites buttons in Safari will do nothing at all, but cmd+clicking will properly open your home page, previous page, or top sites page in a new tab.

Smalltalk and GNUStep :)

Highlight and paste in terminal for me...

I use it to open links in new tabs in Safari. The current Mighty Mouse does this -- you just set a scrollball press to "Button 3" in prefs.

I am miffed that the new mouse doesn't have it, as it means opening links in a new tab is now a two-handed operation (you have to use cmd+click on the laptops as well, but you can do that with one hand).

Still, hopefully they'll be able to add new gestures to it via the Preferences pane, so it might make a comeback.

Alt+Middle-click allows one to resize a window in most X11 window managers without moving the cursor to a window border.

Middle-click also pastes the clipboard in most X11 apps.

Finally, I used to bind middle-click to next weapon in Quake 3 (since I bound the mouse wheel directions to the rocket launcher and rail gun), and zoom in other games.

It doesn't even support the reverse-reach-around-click. Very sad.

Why not? The whole surface is multi-touch, so it would seem like one could program the logic to detect 3 fingers on the mouse and the middle one pressing down.

I think the cool part about this mouse is the bluetooth. Those of us with aging laptops can still enjoy multi touch gestures without buying a whole new laptop.

But I think most people "middle click" with the index finger. I know I do.

Just ordered one. My current mouse has been erratically double clicking and I've been waiting for the new Apple mouse.

Only thing missing in the iMac is an option for an SSD boot drive. I wonder how much of a bad idea it would be to boot off an external firewire SSD?

It would be slower and need more power - you need esataII

It doesn't have that port, though. Nor do I really feel like opening up an iMac to replace the HD.

That said, it's more the seek time which is appealing about the SSD rather than the raw data transfer speed, which is why using the Firewire interface may not be too much of an issue. Obviously I wouldn't want to use USB.

I wish the 2 drive mac mini had an option for SSD boot drive as well. That'd make a great desktop replacement.

why not make the SSD internal? the bus speeds would still be faster internally...

You don't really have that option with Apple hardware. You take what they give you. Unless you like opening the cases of computers which are designed to discourage you from doing so.

But again, the seek times are the important thing, not transfer bandwidth.

Swapping the drive on my aluminium MacBook requires removing one screw. I wonder why Apple's new designs don't include this?

I think iMacs used to be easier to upgrade, but now it looks like a nightmare:

http://forums.macrumors.com/showthread.php?t=350120

I'm not doing that!

It's probably so they can get everything inside the case. Making it user accessible would really reduce their options in placing parts.

Interesting that the nicer iMacs have the ATI Radeon HD 4670 and 4850 instead of a NVidia chip.

I would guess that Apple is getting ATI and NVIDIA to outbid each other for inclusion. Best way to get good prices.

I was wondering if it was more an issue with NVIDIA's problems of late.

You're quite correct. http://www.hardwareinsight.com/apple-to-replace-nvidia-gpus-...

Great for consumers IMHO. It will force nvidia to make their stuff better.

A few interesting details: the iMac displays are now 16:9 (formerly 16:10) and both models are specifically stated to use IPS displays (formerly only the 24" did, but it was not advertised), which are higher resolution than the previous models. Both now have SD card slots. Both now come with wireless keyboard and new "Magic Mouse" standard. The 27" model's Mini-DisplayPort connector functions as both an input and an output.

"27-inch models also support input from external DisplayPort sources (adapters sold separately)."(apple)

Does that mean that the incoming signal can be displayed on the monitor, or does it actually treat the port as an incoming data stream (i.e. recordable with iMovie/Quicktime)?

The features page only specifies that it can be used as a monitor.

I would love to see some of these IPS panels in the Macbook Pro's.

Currently the only things differentiating between the stock Macbook and the 13" MBP is build quality (unibody polycarbonate vs unibody aluminum), Memory Cap (4gb max vs 8gb max), default HDD size (the MBP is actually smaller), and the Pro has Firewire and a SD slot.

Granted the price difference between the MB and the 13" MBP is only $200, but I think the perfect way to distinguish between the two is IPS. Seeing this manifest itself in the iMacs is really unexpected to me given the industry trend as a whole to keep displays as cheap as possible (I was previously just hoping for a simple bump to 1680x1050 on the 15" MBP, which is what I own and will likely buy again in the future), but this gives me hope that better panel technology in the laptops is actually a potential option.

I'd bet that the quality of the display is already much worse on the MB.

You'll be waiting a long time. IPS on laptops is basically dead at this point. The market has spoken and no one really wants an IPS laptop (5 years ago this was different story). The problem with IPS is it's expensive to make. You'll rarely find an IPS monitor (any size) for less than $500, except when Dell does a fire sale.

Because laptop makers have stopped asking for them, LCD makers stopped making them. Until something else comes along we'll be stuck with TN panels. And they have slowly taken over each market. I've checked some online sites 20" is all TN, 22" has a few old IPS displays, 24" was split 50/50 before the summer, now it's down to 9 IPS out of 100. IPS is left at the high end. And that will eventually go TN, I believe.

As an owner of a LG IPS display I'm miffed that my next display purchase will probably be worse than the one I already have.

Personally I'm very glad I got my Aluminum MacBook when I did. I don't want a polycarbonate case...

My guess is that machining the aluminum cases was just too expensive, it would clearly be much cheaper to simply mold a polycarbonate case. But personally I don't think they will match up from a durability perspective...

Huh? When did Apple ever sell an aluminum MacBook? Only the MacBook Pros are aluminum AFAIK.

EDIT: I was wrong. Apple did have an aluminum 13" MacBook before the MBP version. See replies below.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MacBook#Aluminium_unibody_model

There was briefly an aluminum MacBook before they introduced the 13" MacBook Pro.

There was an aluminum MacBook before there was a 13" MacBook Pro. Essentially the aluminum MacBook became the 13" MacBook Pro when they upgraded the specs.

Hm? The aluminum Macbook still exists. It's just classified under the Macbook Pro line. 13", right?

Think of the polycarbonate case as Apple's attempt to make a product that's affordable as possible. I was expecting them to phase out the plastics entirely; the fact that they're keeping it and improving on it suggests that they'll be gradually lowering the price on it too.

Ah! Well pointed out!

I never realized that the 13" aluminum MacBook was actually classified as a 'Pro'... When I bought mine the cheaper MacBook was not available...

Cheers!

What's with all the downmodding for being misinformed?(myself and a reply below the reply to my original)

Don't downmod. Educate.

It's easy enough to write a short comment explaining what someone got wrong, with any luck they'll actually learn something from it! (like I did!)

27" Screen would so much more useful if only OS X had system-wide font size settings^. Parsing 10px fonts from a distance of even a couple feet is far from accessible.

^ Resolution independence anyone?

Yeah, I still run the first Apple flat 22" display which is decidedly low-res these days, but works great for my old eyes!

Look at the new 27" iMac, that 16GB of RAM make it a very interesting machine. I do wish the price on the new MacBook would have been $799.

Absolutely, I think the addition of a quad core chip in the iMac is a good move too. I know quite a few people that hovered in that area between iMac and Mac Pro, this seems like a great push in the right direction to close that gap.

That iMac is basically a work station with the Nehalem processor and that much ram. Still ridiculous that they charge $1400 for 16GB RAM though.

It's DDR3 memory and 16GB of it. Crucial has similiar prices for that.

Yea, I can understand it's expensive but the thought of spending more than what a baseline iMac costs just for RAM is a tough pill to swallow.

Do you need 16GB of RAM? Seems like overkill unless you have a specific reason for needing it in which case the price probably isn't a huge concern anyway. I had 16GB in my Mac Pro until recently I downgraded to 8GB. I never came anywhere close to using 16GB and FB-DIMMS on the MP are power hogs. -30W of power yanking the extra memory.

I don't know if the iMac is as upgradable, but when I bought my Mac Pro I just got the default amount and upgraded it with third-party RAM at a sane price.

upgradable with 4 slots - I generally buy my ram from crucial or ramjet

Their markup over wholesale prices is only around %30 -- 4gb SO-DIMMs of DDR3 cost at least $270, where 2gb sticks cost ~$40.

It's fairly disappointing that they decided to not include the core i7 in anything as a default processor. Considering they're the "high performance" brand. They only have it on their top model mac pro. And as an upgrade. Core i7s really up the snappiness of a system.

They have an i5 system which is the similar to the i7 but without hyper-threading support and less cache.

Since when are they the "high performance" brand? High build quality, very much yes.

I guess, but considering their high price, well built os, high build quality, you'd think they would add an extra $100 a put a proper processor to fit the image.

http://www.apple.com/imac/specs.html -- Core i7 is an upgrade option for the 27" iMac. (Or am I misunderstanding you?)

Its only available as an upgrade for their top of the line imac.

Apple has never been the high performance brand. They've traditionally either been a generation behind in processors and memory configuration or at least not at the bleeding edge.

That being said, they tend to run more consistently across a wider breadth of configurations. People were using their classic macs (the 680x0 series) for nearly a decade after they were turned off as a product line.

Apple was one of the first ones to market w/ Nehalem based systems. Looks like the same will be repeated w/ the Gulftowns.

Does the new MacBook sport the Mini-DisplayPort? Can't tell from the images

Yep, it has one. http://www.apple.com/macbook/specs.html

Yes. It's listed on the specs page. No FireWire or SD, however.

I wonder how many people are thinking of ordering the Mac mini with Snow Leopard Server? I have used a normal Mac mini with server as a secondary server and it seems to do ok.

Dual HDD seems a handy addition.

wow i still think $599 for the mac mini with a core duo and 160gb hdd is way too much.

and it costs 25% more than it did a couple of years ago, at least in the U.K.

But Mac mini with Snow Leopard server is kind of intriguing. (Maybe not worth $999. But it does come with 2 500GB drives.)

Right, and 10.6 Server is basically coming for free. (Normal $500 value.) Pretty good marketing move if you want to get more people to use the Server version of Mac OS X for their small businesses, education back room machines, etc.

For that form factor, it's quite good. Compare to the Dell Studio Hybrid.

They are also still selling the $899 20" to educational institutions.

Is that a new remote? It looks round.

You mean the mouse?

no, I actually mean the remote - I was pricing up one of the new iMacs and got to the remote picture and it sure doesn't look like the old one.

Ah, sorry - was just looking at the article pics.

The remote is aluminum. That is newer than any of the plastic ones I have, but I don't know if it is new for this product.

Looks like it: http://store.apple.com/us/product/MC377LL/A

The scroll wheel is moved up to the front of the remote, and the play/pause button is now separate.

Engadget's short write-up on the new remote (from unalone's comment): http://www.engadget.com/2009/10/20/apple-updates-19-remote-p...

No matte screen is disappointing.

Still no HMDI, that sucks...

http://www.monoprice.com/products/product.asp?c_id=104&c...

And probably never will be, Apple have moved on to DisplayPort.

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