Just took a look at the new iMac desktop with the M1 chips. Just a word of caution for anyone, like myself, who are looking to upgrade into a new Mac. Other than the M1 chips, even with Rosetta, not fully integrated yet with many major DAWs/VSTs/Kontakt to begin with, we might need to steer clear of the base model.
While RAM and SSD storage are upgradeable, it comes with only TWO Thunderbolt ports–that’s it. Not even an ethernet port; you’ll need to pay extra for more ports. So, if you’re like me and have all your VSTs on external SSDs and need a port for an audio interface, your MIDI controller CD drive, etc. this isn’t going to work, unless there is a USB hub that can integrate with the Thunderbolt ports.
It looks like they are aiming this first round of new imacs at home / college users, same chip as all the other M1 macs. I expect a ‘pro’ version or a larger screen version will be out later.
Also as they all use the same chip, for audio use you’d be better off getting a mac mini and adding your own screen. Although I’d steer clear of any M1 mac for a while until the software compatibility improves.
It’s actually just the base model. all the other models come with 2 Thunderbolt ports and 3 USB 3 ports plus an ethernet port. Just seems to me Apple is always trying to screw people into getting a higher priced model every time they redesign, they always leave something that seems so basic out. My current iMac is about 7 years old now, it’s the base model and it comes with 2 thunderbolt ports, 4 USB and ethernet. Of course at that time Apple decided to build these things without a CD-ROM drive
This is just on the 21.5in version. All the 27in. come with all the ports, but of course…$$$$$
I was looking at this to resolve the problem for me.
2 Thunderbolt and 2 USB on my Mini. I figured they’d have more than that on the iMac, but they do like to pretend to be minimalist. It’s CRAZY to think of any computer not having an ethernet port. The Mini even has ethernet. With the shaky performance of the wifi on the Mini, I’m shocked to think that Apple would expect users to rely only on wifi for any of its desktop machines.
Wait, did they not in fact include an ethernet port on the power adapter? Or was that an upgrade? In any case I found that to be pretty neat, as I have millions of cables behind my computer in any case (with all USB hubs etc.)
