“Apple is expected to begin production of two new iMac all-in-one (AIO) PCs in May 2017 for an official launch in the second half of the year, according to sources from Taiwan-based supply chain makers adding that Apple is also testing a new server-grade iMac for the high-end sector,” Aaron Lee and Joseph Tsai report for DigiTimes.
“Apple currently has a 21.5-inch and a 27-inch iMac available in the market,” Lee and Tsai report. “The new products are expected to be the upgrades of the two models and are expected to hit the market in the third quarter to catch up with the year-end holiday season.
“The new server-grade iMac is expected to feature Intel’s Xeon E3-1285 v6 processor, 16-64GB ECC RAM, up to 2TB NVMe SSD and a latest discrete graphics card,” Lee and Tsai report. “The product is unlikely to become available in the market until the end of 2017.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: As with much of Apple outside of the iPhone: Better late, than never.
SEE ALSO:
What I’d like to see in Apple’s next-gen iMac – April 11, 2017
Ars Technica imagines a new Mac Pro, the ‘iMac Pro,’ and the future of Apple’s desktops – April 11, 2017
Apple might be going ‘Pro’ with next-gen iMac – April 7, 2017
New iMacs with up to Xeon E3 processors, 64GB RAM, AMD graphics, and Thunderbolt 3 rumored for late October – April 6, 2017
Apple patent application reveals Touch Bar keyboard for a future Mac desktops – April 4, 2017
Apple to unveil ‘iMac Pro’ later this year; rethought, modular Mac Pro and Apple pro displays in the pipeline – April 4, 2017
thats good I suppose.
Hopefully they’ve vastly improved the thermal envelope.
they already run too hot and thats without ECC ram and a xeon.
“Server Grade”??? That makes no sense.
If we’re talking an iMac used as a server, well that’s been done. Mac mini as a server? Been done. Mac Pro used as a server? Again, done.
But a (all in one) “server grade iMac” makes absolutely zero sense. Servers are set off to the side or in a data center. They rarely have a screen hooked up to them (they run “headless”), and even when they do they only need a reasonable screen and not “retina” and not “wide color gamut”. Why pay an extra $500 to $1,000 for a fancy screen when it will almost never get used and never to its full specifications?
Further, no iMac shipped ever, can manage the heat load of Xeon processors, card based GPUs, and multiple high speed NICs (think 10G for true “server class”).
If you’re going to modify an iMac enough to handle all that, why doesn’t Apple just get a new, proper Mac Pro out the door ASAP?
New iMac = Fake Mac Pro.
In a competitive marketplace, sometimes late is as bad as never.
If you are bought into the Mac eco-system in regards to hardware and software it isn’t a competitive marketplace, it’s single source.
Maybe that’s the issue…
Which translates into: at least late is better than never.
Not in the computer industry. If Apple had real leadership, it could own the pc profit share while Microsoft stepped into it with vista and win8. Apple instead coasted with no significant improvements to the Mac since 2009.
Tim Cook has allowed the Mac to fall so far behind that major industries have left. All the Facebook loving Mac netbook users aren’t going to keep the Mac viable when competitive computer makers are going full speed ahead into powerful graphics and impressive performance on the best software out there, which sadly is now almost all Windows based. Nobody except Apple itself writes industry leading software for the Mac first, it’s now all ported and dumbed down from the windows version. That will not change until Apple demonstrates consistent Mac product refreshment year after year and claws itself to a significant double digit market share.
How about a server-grade Mac Mini?
H-P already has one and it costs less than the Mac mini. Quad Core i7s, Xeon and NVIDIA GPUs of 2 or 4 GB. Up to 32GB of user expandable memory. Case opens without tools and you can drop in upgraded HDs or SSDs.
But Apple wants to sell you a fucking Phone. Oh, yeah, we have Macs too. Somewhere behind the DJI Drone and the iPad cases.
By the way, could I interest you in a new Watchband?
Do not want an iMac, sealed shut and unrepairable by third parties. I will buy my own display, thank you.
How much you want to bet Jony’s skinny iMacs cook themselves like early XBox 360s?
I have an all in one called a MacBook Pro that I rarely use.
Tim, make the call to H-P and let them ship workstation grade Macs. It is well past obvious Apple cares not about the Mac or the Workstation market. Meanwhile, endless resources are available for putting binkies, balloons and fireworks on iMessage. I cannot wait to see what earth-shattering waste of resources Apple unveils at WWDC, like Facebook integration on the Weather app.
Those binkies, balloons and fireworks (and new campus trees) took a lot of Apple’s time and resources.
Can’t wait for the new “ribbon” on the new iMac Server Pro.
“Tim, make the call to H-P and let them ship workstation grade Macs.”
Why? And for what market? Apple currently sells 4-5 million Macs per quarter with all of them lumped in. What tiny sliver of that is to Pros? (Not well heeled consumers that want the best machine available, but actual Pros that need an actual workstation?)
I would actually like to see the business case where HP decides to go after a hard sell (granted, whatever HP would do, a large number of folks would hate it anyway) of roughly 700,000 to 1m units a year. And that’s being generous.
I will admit there are a LOT of users out there that could use workstation power AND macOS all in one box. I just don’t think there’s enough to make an appreciable profit on.
That’s the argument against all Mac “pro level” machines.
EFI is all that separates a Hackintosh from a Macintosh.
I’ve been waiting a long time to replace my iMac. I’m praying what Apple delivers isn’t an overpriced, under-spec’d turd. Fingers crossed.
And what the hell is a “server grade” iMac for the “high end sector”? At least give everyone the spec’s on whats coming down the pipe so they can make informed, well planned decisions. DO NOT release 2 iMac’s mid year and then make us guess if we should wait till end of year for the “good one” smh.
Server grade iMac????
Now it’s just getting silly.
Mac mini
Well, what do you expect from a company that only has a measly $850B….results?
forward all complaints to:
Pipeline Timmy, CEO
One Infinite Circle Jerk
Cupertino CA
No, they
I don’t care how far behind Apple’s hardware falls behind, I’m not ever going to compromise and use Windows ever again. Hardware companies leapfrog one another all the time. It’s about the software. Apple stumbled with Mac Pro development, but it has promised to fix it. I’ll wait.
MacOS needs a lot of work. Its getting long in the tooth.
Who the hell tnought a late 2017 date is in anyway acceptable when many were hoping for new versions pre last Christmas and we all expected them (if late) a certainty by this Spring? Probably the same genius who launched ATV 4 with no 4K and then went over a year and still waiting without putting it right and for good measure failed after years of snail like iPad development failed to deliver new Pro versions either new or worth the label or price in the holiday season and and then just no doubt to keep it consistent, again failed to deliver in Spring. Just think how much money they could save if they simply just cancelled all new development, that would seem to appeal to Cook.
… and will they fix the bugs in mail and add some features? And will they restore the remaining missing features from Pages 9?
Wake me up when Apple decide they really care about the Mac.
the specs (if true) look good.
Pro grade chips like Xeon even at same benchmark speeds as ‘consumer’ chips like the ‘i ‘series are better as they are more ‘sturdy’ (designed to work for long hours continuously and for years).
Titan workstations :
“For all intents and purposes an i7 and Xeon when matched core-for-core and clock-for-clock have essentially the same computational power…
This is the key difference between the i7 and Xeon CPU lines. Xeons have a much more stringent set of parameters to adhere to in order to be binned as such. While i7 CPUs are binned for their performance characteristics, Xeon CPUs are binned for low-voltage and high-stability characteristics. Xeons are chosen for their ability to run 24/7 in enclosed server rackmount environments.”
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the main issue I have for iMacs is that the monitors are stuck.
You can’t change monitors. If something is wrong with the CPU or monitor you have to send the entire thing to a shop. With my cheese Grater Mac Pros (besides the fact that I can sometimes change internal components) I can switch CPUs and Monitors around if there are issues. Also if Cheese Graters you can easily pull out drives as they are on slide trays if the issue is not drive related and drop the drives into another enclosure — so your data is not stuck at the shop . (the Cheese Grater being a 10+ yr old design is a wonder!)
If the new iMacs GPU is powerful enough though the issue of attaching a second big monitor like a 27 inch Cintiq would be less of an issue (not to mention TB 3 eGPU possibility ).
The simple fix: offer official Apple macOS motherboards (good, better, best) and let users build a computer of their liking.
There has never been a server grade iMac and there never will be.
Whoever it is that can’t understand the difference between a popular consumer grade fashion-first consumer desktop computer and a durable server that prioritizes data transfer above other functions clearly needs to get out of the analyst/blogger business.