I fail to understand why someone would buy this over a Mac Mini and an external display: cheaper, more powerful, ability to change displays, only two more cables (power and data for the display).
Anyone care to enlighten me?
Compare that to an iMac. Go to the Apple store, drop $1k, take it home, plug in the power cable, and she's on Facebook in minutes.
That's the friction that iMac removes. If the customer has to leave the electronics store with multiple boxes from several different companies, and has the ability to buy the "wrong thing" (DVI instead of HDMI, etc.), it's probably a sign that the process can be simplified.
I strongly dislike when people use the "my grandma" argument. So what you're saying is either you're also as technically challenged or you're just an ass for not helping her and letting her go with the less optimal purchase because it's easier to set up.
Dropping $1k to browse Facebook does not make sense, and it never will, I'm sorry.
Disclaimer: I own a late 2013 rMBP.
It's once place where I'm generally disappointed in Apple's competitors (I loathe Apple but I freely admit they win because they're the best). Non-Apple all-in-one devices either ugly and anemic or fail to compete with Apple on price (if Apple beats you on price, you lose). The big thing I think competitors need to learn from Apple is to stop being such size-queens. Save some money on monitor size and focus on getting the other details right.
Same goes for laptops - the average Windows laptop the same size as the the largest Macbook. Apple is one of the only companies even building in the 11" form-factor.
I'd love it if my current monitor came with the iMac's speakers. I don't know if it was the speakers or the enclosure necessarily, but the iMac at my last office job sounded great.
On the functional side, thanks to the L shaped foot with the huge cable guiding hole, iMacs "hover" over the desk and thus have almost zero footprint. It's extremely practical to be able to push documents around or move your legs and not have dangling cables or boxes occupying above- or below-desk space.
The audience are the same people buying 8GB iPhones and 16GB iPad Minis -- they need the platform, but don't care much about the speeds and feeds.
Also, I think buying your own external display that is the same quality as the iMac one would be more expensive than people think... but then , most people don't need that good a display.
There's more to it than that of course, just as with $200 pants - they're often nicer to wear rather than good enough. So long as they fit. But they aren't usually cut for all body shapes. It's ok to say 'Not for me' and move on by which I mean that assuming this is an alternative to a Mini has already ruled out all those people who don't consider Mini's in the first place.
There is no real competition in this space (unfortunately), so people pay a premium. If you care about how your room feels, let me tell you: it feels a lot better with an iMac instead of some ugly 3rd party monitor. I didn't care about that as much, but now for me it is absolutely worth it.
Also, its a computer for people that don't like to invest huge amounts of time finding the "right" pc - I've started to appreciate that as well.
Agreed. You'll see a lot of iMacs at design-conscious shops like art galleries and boutiques, and in architects' homes. These applications/people have different objective functions than many HN readers.
2) self-contained. Only a power cable is required. Makes a neat desk.
3) it's completely silent (but then again so is a mac mini)
4) the higher-end models have an actual graphics card (mac mini has very bad graphics)
The gap is the closest I've seen yet—the mini used to be very underpowered and this is the lowest clock speed I've seen on an iMac in a long time. But the iMac is still the better value, especially if you want a top-quality machine. That said, I don't see how many people would want the $1100 model instead of the $1300 model now that there's such a gap between the two.
Simply put, because it's designed by Apple. Evidently, that alone is enough to drive a much higher demand than similarly priced competing products.
In fact, I can get an all in one with much better specs for less. http://www.costco.com/.product.100115209.html?cm_sp=RichRele...
Other than the crap specs, it's really hard to buy into the idea that this is "entry level" when it's selling at a mid-level price.
This should be a $799 price point max.
Are we back to the Apple tax again?
Design, noise, materials, software (try getting that inspiron with apps like garageband, imove, pages and numbers for less than $1099), support (walk into the apple store and someone's there to help) and general ecosystem (time machine, app store, UNIX foundation (no real viruses)).
Even though I copied a "gold build" from "TonyMacx86" (the "hackintosh authority"), the machine freezes randomly every hour, sometimes a week. But it will freeze and I'll have to do a hard reset.
Also, many of Apples services won't work with a hackintosh. iMessage and FaceTime, for example. To fix it, you'll need to call Apple and convince them to whitelist your fake generated system ID, risking getting your apple ID banned.
Something also happened during the installation so I have to have a Mavericks USB drive attached at all times to boot the damn thing.
Oh, and don't forget you have to reconfigure the whole thing when you apply an update.
Had I known these things I'd just have saved up a little more and bought the real thing.
I built one last year, and it's far from being a nightmare. I also followed the builds from the site you mentioned, as best as I could in my country (local dealers are cheaper, or on-par to amazon around here) - the few deviations I had to make just require me to replace the NIC and Graphic kexts after an update (but I can do this on the same system, it's not unusable without them). The only other problem I did not bother to fix yet is that I can't watch hardware-accelerated movies in the browser (really not required with the work I do this machine).
But still, it was for fun. I'd never use them as a substitute to the real thing, the price difference is too small IMHO – I do factor in the time I "waste" on a system.
So I don't quite get where people got the Idea that a Hackintosh is worth the hassle to be used as a substitute. C'mon, it's even in the name.
The first time I built one I had lots of problems like you described but that was pretty much due to me not really knowing what the hell I was doing.
I disagree with this comment due to the level of colloquial discussion. Illegal is (colloquially) whatever you can't do because of the law. (Just about the only exception is a contract, which you might be forced to follow because of the law, but we don't view as part of the law in a colloquial sense.)
Regarding "nothing will happen, you don't even have to feel bad." That is a very narrow view and I disagree that this is the correct way to view all civil torts.
Indeed, the whole idea of a tort is that you have wronged someone. You are literally saying that you don't ever have to feel bad for wronging someone, because they would have to sue you and prove their case, even though an entire field of law has been enacted to give them the possibility of making them whole again.
On a very literal level, you are saying "you don't have to feel bad for wronging your neighbor." (Which is the definition of a tort.)
Look, I even argue for a new form of a tort (civil liability) here - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7910112
precisely because of how damaging it is to someone. The terms I use is that it shoudl "be illegal", and I compare it with libel and slander, which are both torts.
Basically, your view is no different from saying that you are innocent until you are proven guilty of a crime. Well, yes and no.
As far as hackintosh's go, I think it's accepted that piece of hardware is one of the best supported ever. All the hardware worked flawlessly, all the time. It even slept and work up.
Even still, there were a hundred little things that it did (or didn't do) compared to Apple hardware running OS X. After all those years, the choice was very simple. I bought a MacBook Air, and I've never regretted it.
I've never done a Hackintosh (very happy with other unixes), but is this true? Certainly more complexity with setting it up, but afterwards? If you follow http://www.tonymacx86.com/home.php and get hardware they recommend and follow their guides isn't it pretty close to Apple's own computers?
1.4ghz seems awfully slow, but... I suspect for a lot of what many people do - email, youtube, Facebook, a bit of iTunes music, this will be more than fine. But maybe not. I'd rather people not have a horribly bad experience on something too underpowered for the software. That said, they pushed out the retina mbp a couple years ago(?) and that experience was not all that great (imo) - laggy window drag, etc.
There's no SSD or 'Fusion Drive' in this one, which will make it bog down a lot. It's a shame that Apple won't go for a $999 model with a 64GB SSD or something. Should be enough for classrooms and anyone who wants a basic computer.
My bigger complaint is that the RAM is non-upgradable even as BTO. I really couldn't imagine if I had to bring my computer back down to 8GB RAM from 16.
Speaking as someone with a MacBook Air who does software development (compiling large projects like the Zend engine).
But honestly, a system targeting that demographic and use-case (and built minimally to serve them) should be several hundred dollars less.
The small keyboard of the CF-18 is perfect for little hands, the rugged construction means he probably won't break it whatever he tries, and Linux Mint just works, as usual.
He uses it mostly for watching movies, playing educational games (GCompris and such), looking at small things with a USB microscope I got from DealExtreme, taking to Grandma on Skype, and recently, he has started making little Scratch programs. He's really proud to own a real computer.
Preschool children are not the target market of Panasonic Toughbooks, but they actually are a great fit.
This says both a lot about touch-screens and about how little I know about iMacs.
Edit: Core speed is actually 0.3ghz lower than I thought...
Eh.. I got similar specs in laptop form for about half the price on black Friday last year.
I'd like to get something like this for a desktop but I'm afraid my Ubuntu might have some issues on the hardware. I'll wait until I find it slightly used for half the cost.
On a side note: Is absolutely everything Apple does "HN worthy"?
Can someone explain to me how this product is new or innovative or really interesting?
I'm also not an Apple user but I still read the stories about what they are up to as I find them an interesting company to watch.
so it's interesting because people think it's interesting?
You might want to look at something like https://system76.com/desktops/model/sabc2
It's similar in the idea, it will support Ubuntu (or Linux in general) 100%, no drivers problems. Obviously it's not branded Apple so some people might not like it.
That sounded cynical but leaving out possibly the most expensive component on the iMac to compare it to a generic laptop with a smaller screen on a Black friday sale doesn't make sense.
Probably not! :(
If it's the same as last year's model[2], it isn't that hard if you are used to working on laptops or mini-itx cases. Just have to be careful about dust, have a few torx bit screwdrivers, and some adhesive strips which you can find for $15-20.
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fusion_Drive#Design [2] https://www.ifixit.com/Teardown/iMac+Intel+21.5-Inch+EMC+263...
Regardless of that, that process is HELL compared to another machine. The thing I'm typing this on now (Lenovo T400) requires any old screwdriver you have lying around and 2 mins.
1960s point to point wired televisions are easier to repair.
I also bought a 13" Sony Vaio S for around £1200 in 2011 and had to sell it 6 months later, because it was a total piece of shit. I got £650 for it.
So I'd argue that buying cheap plastic crap is in fact the non-budget option.
http://store.apple.com/us/product/FE086LL/A/refurbished-215-...
However, people that walk into an Apple store to buy a computer don't want to buy a "used" computer. (Or people placing bulk orders for enterprises or educational institutions, either.)
