If you’ve managed to make it this far through fall 2014 without yearning for new hardware, you’ve done very well. But Apple wants to finish you off. Not only are the new iMacs, announced Thursday, thinner and more powerful than previous generations, but the 27” Retina model has a 5K screen. That’s obscene.
To give you some perspective, the 5120 X 2880 display on the new Retina iMac has seven times more pixels than your 1080p high definition TV, and 67% more than even a 4K screen — in total, 14.7m pixels. There are also numerous less spectacular upgrades to the new models such as 5mm thinness at each edge, and an impressive 30% saving on power consumption. The Retina iMac is priced at $2499, which is pretty steep, but as Apple rightly points out, you’re not going to get a display like that anywhere else for any less. Also worth noting is a range of upgraded lower-resolution iMacs, starting at a far more affordable price of $1099.
The New Mac Mini — Mighty Small, Mighty Small Price
While most eyes will understandably be drawn to those beautiful displays, Apple did actually release the first new Mac Mini in two years, and it’s a beaut. The new desktop is now only 7.7 inches square, but has an improved Intel processor and graphics card, plus two Thunderbolt ports. And it starts from $499…which when you think about it, means you could hook a 4K display up to it, and it would still only cost you half of the new iMac…
Finally, It’s Yosemite
The other Mac announcement made was to mark the release of OS X Yosemite which, apart from being somewhat prettier, provides closer integration with iOS 8 — you can call and message from your Mac — plus better Messages, Mail, Safari and Spotlight experiences. iWork has been updated, too, and iCloud Drive finally brings Dropbox-like storage to Apple’s online presence.
Yosemite is free to download via the App Store now, although based on the troubles some folks had with the first release of iOS 8, you might want to hold off a couple of days.
The Mac to the Future Bundle – $29.99 (96% off)
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