The list of upgrades also includes a brighter display, a quad-speaker array and the new 1080p webcam. The fact that it does all this while staying whisper quiet and cool without fans remains astounding. You also get a nice performance bump and it still delivered 14 hours and 6 minutes in our battery life test, placing it easily ahead of the Windows competition and ridiculously so when factoring in performance. The notch in the display isn't my favorite design choice, but the rest of the changes are great with the addition of MagSafe charging freeing up those two Thunderbolt 4 ports for other purposes. The new iMac might be an attractive machine, but when you consider the alternative of Mac mini and dedicated screen, it doesn’t look that attractive at all.While most will be happy with the MacBook Air M1, there's no denying the appeal of the new design and of course chip inside the MacBook Air M2. Separates allow you to replace each component when it needs replacing. And, of course, if something goes wrong with the iMac, you lose both screen and computer.

Most people don’t hang on to computers for that long. Either the Dell or LG monitors mentioned above will likely last you a good five or more years. Your screen will far outlast the computing power too. It can sit purring away quietly in a corner, unlike the iMac. What’s more, your old M1 can be pressed into secondary duties, such as acting as a Time Machine backup. You can replace the computer bit and stick with your screen. If Apple releases an M2 or M3 Mac mini in the next couple of years that completely blows the performance of the M1 out of the water, then it’s a relatively cheap upgrade. The real benefit of separate Mac mini and screen, however, is that all your eggs aren’t in one basket. But then how much time do you spend gazing at the back of a monitor, especially if it’s flush against a wall? With a cheap attachment, you could even mount the Mac Mini to the back of the screen and effectively create an all-in-one, albeit an ungainly looking one. The footprint of pairing a Mac mini with a separate screen - even a bigger screen - really isn’t all that different from that of the new iMac.Īs Apple’s own marketing shots (above) show, it’s perfectly possible to have a neat desktop with the Mac mini. There’s no doubting the thinness and neatness of the new iMac, but when you’re talking about a desktop computer it’s really the overall footprint that matters. The Mac mini with separate screen is still a neat package Apple

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