Speedier iMacs? Apple may roll out upgrade next week
Specs listed by French site MacGeneration point to a minor speed bump, but there's no sign of the long-awaited Retina Display iMac.
Apple could soon rev up the iMac with a boost in processor speed.
The iMac has retained the same look since its last redesign in late 2012, and it has largely benefited from minor upgrades in its processing power. While it's unclear when Apple will change up the design of the already thin-looking all-in-one computer, customers are hoping to at least get other enhancements, notably a higher resolution Retina Display.
But a report out Tuesday from French blog site MacGeneration suggests that Apple will refresh the iMac lineup as soon as next week with speed upgrades. Listing all four flavors of Apple's ultrathin all-in-one, the site laid out the following potential upgrades:
The $1,499 21.5-inch 2.9 GHz version would see its CPU speed inch up to a full 3 GHz, while its Turbo Boost feature, which automatically manages individual cores of the processor for better performance and power efficiency, would rise from 3.6 GHz to 3.7 GHz. The $1,299 21.5-inch 2.7 GHz would undergo no changes, according to MacGeneration.
The $1,799 27-inch 3.2 GHz variant would increase its processor speed to 3.3 GHz accompanied by a Turbo Speed bump from 3.6 GHz to 3.7 GHz. And the $1,999 27-inch 3.4GHz model would rise in CPU speed to 3.5 GHz, while the Turbo Speed's performance would grow from 3.8 GHz to 3.9 GHz.
Those speeds are all for the basic models. For a small fee, buyers can always upgrade the speed of both the processor and the Turbo Boost when configuring the unit.
Assuming the details of this report are true, it appears this latest upgrade to the iMac still won't offer a Retina Display option, at least not yet.
Hints have floated about for awhile that Apple would bring the higher-resolution Retina Display to the iMac. A 5,120x2,880-pixel wallpaper image released by Apple last year hinted that a Retina Display would be destined for the iMac as well as external monitors. Apple's MacBook Pro lineup has long supported a Retina Display, as has the iPhone and iPad. But Apple has yet to expand the technology to the iMac or the MacBook Air, creating frustration among potential buyers.
One recent clue, however, suggests that this might finally be the year for the Retina Display iMac. Code discovered in the beta of Apple's newly-announced OS X 10.10 Yosemite OS points to higher-resolution settings for an unknown computer that could be the iMac, AppleInsider said last week.
(Via AppleInsider, 9to5Mac)