[shmerek]

<quote>
iMac, iBook, 1GHz mystery all Expo highlights

As Jobs & Company take pot shots as so-called rumor sites, ThinkSecret has been hard at work separating fact from fiction as we quickly approach Monday��s keynote address at Expo in San Francisco. One thing we can say for sure is that there is there will be something for everyone.

While we know many of the details down to specifications on some of these new products, we are more interested in reporting what we know is coming across the board and leaving the details to Steve. Here is what we know about Monday��s announcements and we are very confident of the following:

Flat-panel iMac � It is time to let one of the most awaited new products out of the bag. The flat-panel iMac with 15-inch LCD screen is here. The question is can you afford it. At right around $1800 retail, there will be many questions if this iMac is just another over-priced Cube. Its success will be based on specific features and if it grabs attention for other than it is fantastic looks (and fantastic looking it is, we are told). There will be more than one configuration of this model and based upon what IBM has been announcing lately, we are pretty sure the 750fx G3 processor will be at its core. Do not expect multiple colors.

Speed-bumped iMacs � the current iMac in its original design will not die that quickly. We will see speed bumped iMacs at new price points to make the flat-panel iMac more attractive. Look for new colors.

iBook � Surprise! Look for speed-bumped iBooks and new colors. This is one product announcement we have few details about, but we are sure of its factuality.

iPhoto � The long awaited consumer photo manipulation product is ready for the public. It will be free and will take a more consumer approach to editing and posting photos than Adobe Photoshop Elements.

These are the product announcements we know for sure. You should not be surprised to see announcements of USB 2.0 and FireWire jumping to version 2.0 at 800Mbps.

1GHz G4 mystery � If Apple announced everything else and no 1GHz Power Mac, many would look at Monday��s keynote as a failure. We're hearing various reports on this front even this close to Expo and we simply do not have enough confidence to confirm there will be a 1GHz G4 announcement. We are confident Power Macs with a G5 processor will not be announced, despite ridiculous reports from other places.

What we find most interesting in our checking, double-checking and triple checking is how Apple is taking unprecedented steps to stop leaks before the keynote. Apple has cut out a number of third-party companies that previously have been involved in planning for the keynote simply to squelch rumors. And despite what we know for sure, we continue to hear people tell us there is still more that will be announced.

We continue to be very curious as to why the keynote address was moved from Tuesday to Monday and have yet to really find out why. Could it have something to do with the fact Steve wants to one-up Bill Gates and his Monday evening keynote at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas? Or could it be an even bigger announcement of a merger, partnership, or acquisition with another company? What we do not know just might be the biggest announcement of all.
</quote>

1800???? I sure hope not

[ 01-03-2002: Message edited by: shmerek ]

[Nebrie]

1800 was right around my price estimate for that iMac-with-iTablet. creepy... maybe it really is a tablet. There's not much that can make an iMac worth 1800.....

[lee vieira]

$1800 for an LCD iMac? Hoo boy

Assuming ThinkSecret is correct about that (and that's a huge if...the rumor sites have had LOUSY track records of late), that would definitely suck. Sure, its a better deal than the Cube was at launch (because the price includes a display) but still, it's too high and would tend to limit the LCD iMac's appeal. It would still sell, but not as strongly as it could.

Realistically, they'd best have one for $1499, if they know what's good for them. $1799 flies only if its got a SuperDrive on it

Steve does know that we're in a recession, right?

In any case, I'm getting tired of Apple home runs being turned into singles by overshooting the correct price point by 20-33%. First the Cube launch, then the iPod(which would be a killer if it were $299), now the LCD iMac?

Hope ThinkSecret is wrong. Hope I'm wrong.

--lee

[NeilCharter]

I have to agree with Lee on this one. Apple always overprice their debut products. Remember the original iMac was pretty expensive (can't remember how much ~ $1400??).

This seems to be their ploy, since they want to maintain their profit margin. To some extent this makes sense cos Apple hav a limited market and if they released a product with huge appeal (such as the iMac had) with competitive prices they may sell a lot but not make much money.

I for one, think that if Apple seriously wants to break out of the niche market then they need to drop the price down so that the average punter would go for it. $1200-1500 is want I would pay for such an item. Similarly, I would have got a Cube if it was around $1200.

Saying all this Apple made a huge bundle on the iMac and now on the iBook. The Cube was a failure, lets hope they get it right this time.

Neil

[DigitalEl]

At $1,800 .. count me out.

Sure, you get what you pay for and I'm sure this rumored LCD iMac will be spectacular .. but that's still a lot of scratch. As Lee just said, one hopes our friends in Cupertino realize the rest of us are still in a recession.

I feel like a little kid jumping up & down like I have to pee, whining "I want..." Let's just hope whatever Monday's announcements, they're affordable for the masses. For a lot of us, price matters.

[Colonel Panic]

Well, home runs may be being turned into singles by Apple missing the price point by 20-33%, but since that's also roughly their profit margin on products, we can't realistically ask them to sell things at cost.....

costs money to develop all the nifty goodies Apple does.

Apple must have learned their lesson from the cube. All this speculation is making me dizzy. I can't wait til monday.

[applenut1]

Originally posted by NeilCharter:
<STRONG>I have to agree with Lee on this one. Apple always overprice their debut products. Remember the original iMac was pretty expensive (can't remember how much ~ $1400??).

Neil</STRONG>

the iMac was cheap when it debuted. 1299. far less than any mac had been in several years and it was basically a lowend PowerMac as far as specs go.

It was the perfect balance of performance and price.

too bad apple doesn't understand that anymore

[scottiB]

When the 266 debuted, it was $1199. A great deal--at least I thought so.

I'm not in the market for a new Mac, but if I were, a $1799 iMac would be tough to rationalize.

[lee vieira]

Originally posted by Colonel Panic:
<STRONG>Well, home runs may be being turned into singles by Apple missing the price point by 20-33%, but since that's also roughly their profit margin on products, we can't realistically ask them to sell things at cost.....

costs money to develop all the nifty goodies Apple does.</STRONG>

Apple's profit margins on hardware tend to be in the 25 to 30 point range, but that's *overall*. I don't have any hard proof but I'm pretty darn sure that when Apple releases a 'hot new product', they profit-take on it, i.e. profits more like in the 30-50 point range.

The high-end Cube at launch is a good example. Probably high-end towers also, though perhaps less so than it used to be, due to dual G4 cpus and SuperDrives being costly.

iMac is a lower end, consumer product. They shouldn't milk it, they need marketshare badly

--lee

[Cipher13]

Apple will hit the "Cube" audience with the LCD machine.

They must keep inexpensive (read: CRT) models, with an updated shell, for the "rest of us".

We're planning on buying an iMac, but are gonna wait for a few days, of course; if they don't have a model the same price or cheaper than the current low-end... well they're losing at least one sale.

[mbperk]

Come on guys. At least wait and see what it has to offer.

[SpeedRacer]

Those are some seriously depressing announcements that TS is claiming. It's ironically unfortunate that they've hit the mark on several just-before-announced announcements in the past.

Let's hope Nick's mistaken on the pricing issue, b/c he's definitely correct that there's a surprise announcement coming that nobody has yet nailed down.

Speed

[NeoMac]

Ya'll jumping the gun.

First, $1800 is a rumor from Think Secret. It could be totally wrong.

Second, $1800 could be an LCD iMac with a SuperDrive, which would be a great deal!

So, don't jump go jumping off any bridges just yet.

[BrunoBruin]

Why does a new 15-inch LCD machine have to be a new iMac?

I asked this question last summer when a new model was supposed to be introduced (if you believed the rumor sites). If the component prices are still not low enough for Apple to make a profitable entry-level LCD machine, why not keep the current iMac form factor and introduce a new, third desktop -- which would essentially be a lower-priced replacement for the Cube. And call it Macintosh -- so the lineup is iMac (consumer and education), Macintosh (prosumer) and Power Mac (pro).

This machine may have been designed to replace the iMac, but perhaps the combination of high component prices and the weak economy convinced Apple they could not drop the low-priced, CRT model just yet.

For that matter, $1,800 seems awfully high to me, unless the guts are considerably more advanced than the current iMac. I wonder if that figure is the high end. I mean, the iBook with combo is only $1,699 and one assumes that a desktop would be cheaper to manufacture, even with a somewhat larger screen...

We're planning on buying an iMac, but are gonna wait for a few days, of course; if they don't have a model the same price or cheaper than the current low-end... well they're losing at least one sale.

There's a market for a sub-$900 machine even if it is a CRT. There are a lot of people who just aren't willing to shell out what might amount to 50 percent more just for the cool factor of an LCD. I know several people who were happy to buy iMacs for about $1,000, but would not have bought them at $1,500 -- or $1,800.

[tullamore]

Everything that Bruno says is true. Why would they take the cost of their low end product up $6-700. They can find a better way to fill that gap

HOWEVER, We are all kinda missing something here. Yes maybe a new flat panel iMac is coming, BUT maybe they are also going to keep the CRT screen in the lowend models too. Then the iMac could fill that gap all the way to the G4 desktop.

[shmerek]

I am also concerned about the speed if they don't have at least one consumer machine at the ghz mark that will turn off a lot possible first time buyers. To win customers Apple has to keep up with low end PC clock speeds.

[BrunoBruin]

I am also concerned about the speed if they don't have at least one consumer machine at the ghz mark that will turn off a lot possible first time buyers. To win customers Apple has to keep up with low end PC clock speeds.

I agree, but you can't speed-bump the old iMacs too much and have them running at the same speed (or close) to the LCD model.

I don't think we'll see much beyond 700MHz in the old form factor, tho maybe that processor could be available across the line. Apple will want to keep a clear feature difference between the two models, if indeed it keeps the old iMac. I'm hoping for a Sahara G3 at 1GHz in the new machine -- even tho this will make it very hard to keep my resolution of buying fewer computers this year!!

$1800 for an iMac! My heart sank when I first saw the news of that over at macminute.com earlier today and again when I saw it at thinksecret.com tonight. What in the world is Apple thinking? (If $1800 is correct, which I fully realize it may not at all be. But I have to say it wouldn't surprise me given Apple's pricing history. The fact that both of these sites, especially macminute.com, are posting this info makes me think it's probable.) The iMac is supposed to be a consumer machine. I know, I know, it could have a SuperDrive, you say, and it has a flat panel display. But how many folks looking to buy a new computer want to pay such a premium to burn DVDs? I don't. I don't even have a digital video cam, so for me it would just be a nice thing that I might expand into in the future.
It will indeed be hard for Apple to expand market share with that kind of pricing. Surely they realize that Gateway has been running ads for a flat panel WinXP system (running at what? 1Ghz?) for $999. I could just imagine trying to sway a friend shopping for a new flat-panel computer away from that sort of deal to buying an $1800 iMac. Forget about it. Apple will be selling $1800 iMacs almost exclusively to people who already own Macs.
I myself own a 2 yr. old PC w/ WinXP and over the last year I've really grown interested in Mac OS X. I started reading all the Mac news and rumor sites daily and I've been anticipating buying a redesigned iMac for some time now. I was prepared to spend up to $1500 (the price of the current top-of-the-line iMac) for the new machine if it comes with a 1Ghz or faster processor but I just can't really imagine spending $1800 for a Mac with a G3, even if it does run at 1 Ghz. I've read all the stories about OS X being slow and it seems obvious that it's really meant to be run with Altivec-enhanced processors (G4 or higher).
Well, maybe the consolation prize is that they'll freshen up the form factor of the CRT iMac, put in a flat screen display (not flat panel, but flat screen, like the old 17" clear plastic studio CRT), and juice up the clock speed a little. If they did that and dropped the price substantially, THAT might just pick up a number of Windows converts. Perhaps including me.

[Capt Shane]

Originally posted by NeoMac:
<STRONG>
So, don't jump go jumping off any bridges just yet. </STRONG>

yeah we will have monday night for that... i guess it could be worse flordia did beat the terps right...

It's me again. OK, maybe I could pay $1800 for a flat panel G3 iMac--if it were 1 Ghz or faster, could play Nintendo GameCube games, had a TV tuner card, and...drumroll...had a detachable tablet-PC style screen with InkWell handwriting recognition technology and built-in Airport. Having the benefits of a desktop with the portability of a laptop plus the coolness of stylus-input instead of keyboard and mouse-input...that would be awesome. It would change the way I use a computer. (I threw in the GameCube thing because, for one, I think it's probably feasible, and two, Apple needs more quality games for its machines. If I'm gonna pay close to $2000 bucks for a computer, it better serve just about all my home entertainment needs!

[lee vieira]

Originally posted by &lt;Worried&gt;:
<STRONG>
It will indeed be hard for Apple to expand market share with that kind of pricing. Surely they realize that Gateway has been running ads for a flat panel WinXP system (running at what? 1Ghz?) for $999.</STRONG>

Just to clarify...the Gateway you refer to is NOT an LCD all-in-one. It's a 'poverty' (Celeron w/crap vid card) minitower with a seperate LCD display included.

Nothing revolutionary about that...just buy an eMachines and a 15" LCD display.

Gateway's real LCD all-in-ones are the Profile series, which debuted in the $1799-$1999 range, or thereabouts (though they recently added a poverty model w/CD-ROM, crap vid card, and Celeron for $1299).

<STRONG> Apple will be selling $1800 iMacs almost exclusively to people who already own Macs.</STRONG>

Hate to say it, but yeah, I agree. Especially in this economy.

<STRONG> I've read all the stories about OS X being slow and it seems obvious that it's really meant to be run with Altivec-enhanced processors (G4 or higher). </STRONG>

Mmm...not exactly. OS X when first released was a bit pokey, but the 10.1 and later version seem to be reasonably speedy on G3 hardware.

<STRONG> Well, maybe the consolation prize is that they'll freshen up the form factor of the CRT iMac, put in a flat screen display (not flat panel, but flat screen, like the old 17" clear plastic studio CRT), and juice up the clock speed a little. If they did that and dropped the price substantially, THAT might just pick up a number of Windows converts. Perhaps including me.</STRONG>

I'm sure the cheap CRT iMacs will be around for a long time, existing side-by-side with the LCD ones. The very price-sensitive education and low-end consumer markets will make sure of that.

--lee

[lee vieira]

Originally posted by BrunoBruin:
<STRONG>Why does a new 15-inch LCD machine have to be a new iMac?</STRONG>

For the same reason you see things like Pentium II, Pentium 3, Pentium 4, Windows 98, Windows 2000, etc. etc. It isn't just that Gates et al lack creativity...it's that once you've sunk a lot of effort and marketing money into a brand or model name, and it becomes successful and above all, KNOWN, it's a heckuva lot easier and more cost-effecitve just to keep on using it or to just slap on a new number after it then trying to create a whole new brand/image/name.

The iMac, and iMac name along with it, has been highly successful. Therefore, I'd be really suprised if the LCD all-in-one isn't called 'iMac' or 'iMac2'.

Sounds a lot better than 'Cube2', I'd say

<STRONG> There's a market for a sub-$900 machine even if it is a CRT. There are a lot of people who just aren't willing to shell out what might amount to 50 percent more just for the cool factor of an LCD. I know several people who were happy to buy iMacs for about $1,000, but would not have bought them at $1,500 -- or $1,800.</STRONG>

Very true. I'm sure CRT iMacs will remain for some time, especially considering that LCDs will not be as cheap as CRTs for a long time, perhaps never.

--lee

[ 01-04-2002: Message edited by: lee vieira ]

[Metzen]

Originally posted by lee vieira:
<STRONG>

I'm sure the cheap CRT iMacs will be around for a long time, existing side-by-side with the LCD ones. The very price-sensitive education and low-end consumer markets will make sure of that.

--lee</STRONG>

Personally, if this is true, then this is what the Cube should have been.

People bought the Cube at it's price point, I'm sure more would be more than willing to purchase an Cube + LCD at twice the speed for the same price.

[Westfoto]

Take a look at this for the new iMac
http://www.macminute.com/

Very Cool!!!

Quite something!!!