(upbeat music)
- New design matters, new design inspires,
new design drives purchases. And now there's finally a new design
in the flesh for the iMac. It's been a long time since we've seen something this new,
fresh and exciting for the desk. Apple, a company famed for its industrial design,
really did let its iMac languish. The very computer that blaze the trail
from the company's brush with death. So let's really take a look at this new one
and find out if it's been worth the wait and if it's worth the $1,500.
(upbeat music)
I didn't think this is would happen. I didn't want it to happen, but I'm smitten.
I've fallen in love with a computer. And what we have here is a personal computer
that you can truly make personal right when you order it.
Channeling the original colored iMac G3, it's available in a whole seven colors.
And I think for the average person, it's the most interesting question worth asking.
What color would you take? - Probably the purple.
- Yellow. - Probably silver. - Purple or blue. - This is a big commitment.
Purple. - The green. - You know what? I'm loving this green.
- Blue. - It's amazing how you give people an option to express their personalities
and they'll show you just how vibrant they are. Me, it was between the warm tones, orange and yellow.
They really jumped out at me quite simply because they're not what you'd find on any PC these days.
And after going with the yellow, I don't regret it at all,
but I'm sure I'd feel the same way with orange too. The pictures online and perhaps even this video
don't quite capture how the iMac reflects the lighting conditions.
This yellow one is just so cheerful yet golden.
It literally and figuratively brightens my mood when I look at it.
It's like the warm, rising sun. A lot of people have been also harping on
about these white bezels and I don't get it.
This is supposed to be a bright, friendly computer. The screen is supposed to be obvious.
And if you think about how white the interfaces of big Sur are, it doesn't really strike me as odd
that the bezels are white too. Other computers look like black mirrors,
but this actually looks like a computer that's being designed.
(soft music) (upbeat music)
As this is Apple's first ARM-based all-in-one, I think it's important to analyze just how much
that dictated the design of this computer. It's impossibly thin, too thin
for a headphone Jack to go through. Too thin even for an old USB A port.
It's so thin that it doesn't really have a side profile.
It's a case of now you see it, now you don't.
And that thinness is really the story of the computer.
It's why this chin remains for one.
The logic board and most the things we think of as a computer are contained in this controversial section.
I support the move as it maintains the look of previous iMacs
while avoiding making the whole computer thicker, wasting space.
And they clearly wanted to depart from the curved back of the outgoing iMac in favor of a symmetrical flat design.
It also means that the power supply is external
and under the desk, along with the Ethernet port. And since that means there's only one color match cable
visible at the top of the desk, I don't mind that as much as I thought I would.
The performance of the M1 chip contained in this iMac has been talked about for months
since their debut in the fall. Benchmark wise, this mid-range model performs
about the same as other fan cooled M1 models. Though, recent reports show that the best here
is slightly less performance due to there being only one fan for cooling compared
to the two in this model. That with the pricing leads to a strange choice.
The mid range iMac is the one that gets you all the latest iMac innovations,
touch ID on the keyboard, which is wonderful.
All the color options and all four USB-C ports at $1,500.
That doesn't sound so bad. Right.
But a Mac book pro with the same M1 performance,
a touch ID sensor, eight gigabytes of RAM, 256 gigabytes of SSD storage
and 20 hours of battery life costs $1,300, $200 less.
Now, I don't know about you, but I know a lot of people like laptops.
So why would they buy that? If you're a laptop person,
I'm gonna have difficulty explaining why, but there are a few things this IMAX still does better.
One, the screen is just bigger and nicer.
It's a 23.5 inch retina, sporting 4.5 K pixels
across a 16 by 9 aspect ratio. At default scaling, your going to just fit so much more
on the screen while maintaining big, easy to read interface elements.
And that also means making things bigger for aging eyes is less of a compromise.
Two, while the speakers on the MacBook Pro are good,
these are better. They're downward firing and support spatial audio,
but that's not what's impressive about them. Good speakers need air to move about
and Apple has created these incredibly thin chambers, but then made them take up most
of the area behind the screen. So it really punches above its weight.
Three, this webcam is 1080P with some image signal processing added to the mix.
It's much, much better than any Mac book webcam
which is about as potatoes Apple dare let them get. It's perfect for what's left of this pandemic.
And four, well, just look at it.
(upbeat music)
So if you're planning to put this on desk or the desk of a family member, which one should you get?
The base, $1,300 model will probably find itself in schools and with seniors,
though, I mean, if you're like user and a lot of people are,
you're probably not gonna notice the performance differences between it and this double fanned model.
So you can safely go for that. Just remember, it doesn't have touch ID, that's $50,
Ethernet or all the colors available. Plus there's only two Thunderbolt ports.
So if you wanna save money and get that, I recommend at least paying $30 for the Ethernet option.
The next big upgrade worth considering is 16 gigabytes of RAM for $200,
especially since you can upgrade memory later. This'll probably help your computer feel fast
for a few extra years. And RAM is certainly more worthwhile than upgrading storage
because it's $800 to have two terabytes inside the iMac.
It's less than $100 for two terabytes
in this yellow enclosure. Yes, a spinning drive is slower,
but most people are storing documents, photos, videos and music for playback
and a drive like this is fast enough. And since this computer isn't going anywhere,
it's easy to just leave it plugged in so you have access to that data whenever you need it.
Knowing how I use my desktop computer these days,
I think I'd be fine just getting a $1,500 mid tier model
in orange and then calling it a decade. (upbeat music)
I really like this computer. It hearkens back to a very brief time
when computers were fun and flavorful pieces of design.
I really hope inspires colorful peripheral designs that will match the iMac you've put on your desk.
Remember the impact the original one had? This new iMac really does make a case for itself
as a computer made for families and individuals in the home.
If it were to be placed on that four quadrant model lineup of 1998,
it would sit firmly in the consumer desktop space,
a space I'm happy to see clearly defined again.
Thanks for checking in on this Mac Address. If you thought this was a good video, give it a like
and if you wanna see more when they come out, feel free to subscribe.
Now that we're done with this video, I am so excited to put this on my desk
and replace that awful monitor that Riley ruined last week.
It's gonna be good to have a splash of color up there.