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Sometimes size really does matter. We lauded the latest version of Apple's 21.5-inch iMac for its improved performance and excellent screen. But after setting up its 27-inch sibling in our labs and spending some quality time mousing around, it's clear that this larger-screen model of Apple's ubiquitous all-in-one desktop has a lot more to offer serious computer users.
With this latest line of iMacs, Apple has left well enough alone with the stark-but-stunning exterior design. On the inside, however, there's been a pretty extensive overhaul. The top-of-the-line $1,999 27-inch iMac we're looking at here comes packed with some seriously powerful components that are for the most part a pretty big step up from the last generation of the iMac. In our testing, we found that the souped-up CPU and graphics in this latest generation lead to the kind of performance that we usually only expect to see from the more expensive Mac Pro tower, if you're comparing Apples to Apples, so to speak.
Of course, we would have loved it if Apple had included more entertainment-friendly features, such as a Blu-ray drive or HDMI port. But even without those amenities, when you consider the iMac's powerful performance, gorgeous design, and best-in-class LCD, it still adds up to one big, bad AIO that looks great on any desk.
The body of the 27-inch iMac is about 1.5 inches thick.
With the 2011 version of the iMac, each member of the line gets an awesome boost in processor and graphics power. Our top-of-the-line 27-inch review unit is built around a 3.1GHz Quad-Core Intel Core i5 CPU, 1TB hard drive, and AMD Radeon HD 6970M graphics with 1GB of discrete memory. For those looking to save some money and who don't need as much gaming and processor muscle, a $1,699 27-inch model is available with a 2.7GHz Quad-Core Intel Core i5 processor, 1TB hard drive, and AMD Radeon HD 6770M graphics with 512MB of discrete memory.
The 21.5-inch models start at $1,199. That entry-level iMac, which we also reviewed, includes a 2.5GHz Quad-Core Intel Core i5 processor, 500GB hard drive, and AMD Radeon HD 6750M graphics with 512MB of dedicated memory. You can also opt to upgrade various components at the time of purchase to best suit your needs...for a price, of course.
While the insides of the iMac have gotten a compete overhaul, the outside is almost exactly the same as the 2010 version. But we certainly don't count that as a bad thing. Like all of Apple’s products, the iMac’s design is sleek and minimalist. It's encased in a single-piece aluminum enclosure, much like Apple's other laptops and desktops now sport, giving the whole Mac family a unified look.
On the right side of the screen is an SD-card reader (which also supports the SDXC format) and a slot-loading optical drive. Other than the power button (which sits almost invisibly on the lower-back-left side of the body) and a little patch of ports, you won't find any other features to interrupt the iMac's mostly bare rear panel.
On the rear of the iMac, you'll find a strip of ports, the power connection, a power cord, an Apple logo...and that's about it.
The minimalist design helps draw your eyes to the gorgeous 27-inch LCD, which is glossy and LED-backlit. Its wide-screen aspect ratio (16-to-9) and 2,560x1,440 native resolution make for an impressive HD viewing experience. Unfortunately, the iMac doesn't come with a Blu-ray player option, which would have been great to pair with such a stunning screen. Like all glossy screens, this one picks up a bit of glare off of ambient lighting, but colors represent nicely, and, unsurprisingly, we noted no motion blur when viewing video. However, considering this beautiful screen, notably absent from the iMac (apart from the Blu-ray player) is an HDMI port for connecting a gaming console. That said, we've yet to come across another AIO with a 2,560x1,440 native resolution screen. And while this system's asking price may sound pricey, you'd have to pay at least close to $1,000 to get a comparable 30-inch monitor, or $999 for Apple's 27-inch LED Cinema Display. For those considering such a large screen anyway, that makes the price tag of this $1,999 iMac a lot easier to swallow.
The Magic Mouse features laptop-touchpad-like features such as finger swiping.
The iMac’s body sits nicely on an aluminum base that provides a sturdy rest for the screen and components. The display is tiltable, and the adjustment motion is refined and smooth. There's no left/right swivel adjustment, but Apple claims that its iMacs have a 178-degree off-center viewing angle, and that minimizes the need for fine swivel adjustments. (Based on our testing, we believe it; we noted no appreciable deterioration of color or viewability when we looked at both video and still images far off center.)
One new feature that comes to the iMac with this generation is a built-in ambient-light sensor. (You'll find it on the top strip of the screen bezel, next to the Webcam lens, but it's almost invisible to the eye.) This sensor adjusts the brightness of the screen depending on the brightness of the room you are in. (You can turn it off if you're not a fan of this option.) We applaud Apple for bringing this feature, which has been on its MacBooks for a few generations, to its desktops. (You'll know the value of this feature if you've ever tried looking at a bright screen in a dark room. Talk about an instant headache.)
The iMac ships with either Apple's Magic Mouse or the company's Magic Trackpad. You previously had to pay an extra $69 to get the Magic Trackpad separately; now, you can get it bundled with your iMac instead of the Magic Mouse, for no additional charge. The Magic Mouse works almost like the touch pad of a laptop. Looking like a tiny spaceship, the Magic Mouse has no buttons—or rather, like its MacBook touch-pad counterpart, it’s one big button. (Click here for our full review of the Apple Magic Mouse.) The Magic Trackpad, on the other hand, is actually the is the touch pad of a laptop, lifted off and made a free-standing peripheral. If you've used the touch pad on a MacBook Pro, you'll be very familiar with how this unique pointer works. (Click here for our full review of the Magic Trackpad.)
You can now choose to have your iMac ship with a Magic Trackpad instead of a Magic Mouse.
Along with your choice of pointing peripheral, the iMac also ships with a wireless Bluetooth keyboard that adheres nicely to the Apple minimalist aesthetic. About three-quarters the size of a traditional keyboard (partly thanks to the lack of a numeric keypad), it’s almost totally flat except for a rounded area in the back that holds the batteries and props up the keyboard slightly.
Despite its tiny body, we didn’t find the keyboard hard to type on. Like the mouse, it bears a striking resemblance to Apple’s laptops, with the Chiclet-style keys rising only slightly from the body of the keyboard. It's tiny and may take some getting used to, but if you're an Apple fan, it will definitely fit your style.
The super-thin keyboard comes with built-in Bluetooth and requires two AA batteries.
Apple's new 720p FaceTime HD camera lives in the middle of the top of the screen bezel, along with a camera-indicator light, which lights up to warn you when the camera is on. The FaceTime camera features three times the resolution of the iSight camera that came on previous iMacs. We first used the FaceTime camera when it made its debut on the latest line of MacBook Pro laptops, and we immediately noticed the huge improvement in video quality. As far as using the camera, we noticed no lag, and it performed well even in a dimly lit office. You can make FaceTime calls to other Mac devices that have a camera and the FaceTime app installed. (You can download the app from the Mac App Store for 99 cents; it also comes loaded for free on new iMacs and MacBooks.)
The built-in speakers are located on the underbelly of the bezel. They deliver a loud, bass-filled sound that could easily fill a small room. You'll want to consider hooking up some external speakers, though, if you plan on pumping music from the iMac to entertain at a party, as it doesn't quite have the sound to fill a large room.
On the back-left side of the body is a single-file row of ports. From left, they are audio-in and -out jacks, four USB 2.0 ports, a FireWire port, two Thunderbolt connectors (don't worry, we'll get to that probably unfamiliar one in a minute), and an Ethernet jack. In the middle, behind the base, is the power connection. The power cord snakes out through an opening in the base.
The iMac's ports include, from left: headphone and microphone jacks, four USB 2.0 ports, a FireWire 800 port, two Thunderbolt ports, and an Ethernet jack.
These iMacs are the first desktops to feature the Thunderbolt port, which replaces the mini-DisplayPort connector from previous iMacs. Thunderbolt is based on Intel's Light Peak technology, which supports both high-performance peripherals and high-resolution displays. You get two Thunderbolt ports on the 27-inch iMac, and one on the 21.5-inch model, to support additional peripherals. (This means, for example, you can hook up two additional displays to the 27-inch iMac.) Apple claims the technology can provide data transfer at 20 times the speed of a USB 2.0 port, and, from what we saw during an Apple-administered demonstration the morning of this computer's release, we believe it. (We'd have tested it ourselves, but no cable or device was available for us to lug back to our labs. Estimates are, though, that Thunderbolt cables and compatible devices will be available by the summer of 2011.)
The Thunderbolt port doesn't just work with Thunderbolt-equipped peripherals; it's also compatible with USB 2.0 and 3.0, FireWire, Gigabit Ethernet, VGA, DVI, and HDMI connectors via an adapter. (Adapters are expected to be available for each connection type soon. Keep in mind, though, that with the adapters, you’ll still be running at the speed of your original connection.) Lastly, the Thunderbolt port also allows you to daisy-chain up to six devices together on a single port, much like old-school SCSI devices.
The iMac's power cord runs through this gap in the stand.
While the outside of Apple's latest iMacs may not have changed much from the previous generation, the inside has been overhauled substantially, with more powerful graphics and CPUs. So not only is the 27-inch iMac beautiful on the outside, but it's brawny on the inside as well. As we mentioned previously, our test unit was the top-of-the-line iMac, built around a 3.1GHz Intel Core i5 CPU and an AMD Radeon HD 6970M graphics card with 1GB of memory. The Intel second-generation "Sandy Bridge" processors have already wowed us on the Windows side, setting all kinds of speed records at low system price points. With this kind of power now backing the iMac, this machine topped its predecessor—and most of the competition—in our testing.
The first test we ran, Cinebench 10, stresses all the cores of a given processor to gauge raw CPU performance. The iMac's score of 16,694 handily beat the previous version of the 27-inch model by more than 30 percent. It did not, however, surpass another recent strong-performing AIO: The $1789.99 HP TouchSmart 610 scored slightly better 18,317 on this test. Our test unit of that AIO was backed by a higher-end Intel Core i7 processor.
Our next CPU-centric test was our iTunes Conversion Test, in which we encode 11 standard audio tracks from MP3 to AAC format. The 27-inch iMac took 2 minutes and 10 seconds to complete this task, blowing both the previous iteration of this AIO (2:50) and the TouchSmart 610 (2:27) right off of the test bench.
Even thought those scores were impressive, it wasn't until will started testing the iMac's graphics power that we were really wowed. Backed by an AMD Radeon HD 6970M card, we knew we would see some powerful gaming brawn here. But when the numbers rolled in, we saw exactly how well-suited this high-end iMac is for gaming. For the sake of comparability with the performance of Windows-based systems, we fired up BootCamp, installed Windows 7, and ran the iMac through our Far Cry 2 test. We achieved a frame rate of 52.26 frames per second (fps) at the system's native 2,560x1,440 resolution under DirectX 10 with most of the game's settings set to high. And when we knocked the resolution down to 1,920x1,080 (the resolution you'll see on most other AIOs), the iMac offered up a phenomenal 74.12fps. For comparison, the TouchSmart 610 managed just 22.2 frames per second at 1,920x1,080 in the same test. As a matter of fact, the 27-inch iMac ever-so-slightly beat even the powerhouse Apple Mac Pro's 51.6fps. While Far Cry 2, now pushing three years old, is far from the most-demanding game out there, the iMac's performance here is high enough that all modern games should be playable, provided you're willing to occasionally drop down the resolution a bit and switch off a few graphical settings.
Overall video-playback performance was solid as expected. DVDs displayed crisp and clear, with no motion blur to be seen. (We would have loved to have watched a Blu-ray disc, but as we noted, alas, there's no support for that.) MOV video files that we shot on our inexpensive Canon point-and-shoot camera also played back without glitches.
Previously, if you wanted to get this kind of performance from a Mac, you had to spend much more for one of Apple's Mac Pro towers. Now, for hundreds of dollars less than you would pay for a Mac Pro (not to mention the display you would need to get with it), you can get a machine that packs in plenty of productivity power as well as the ability to game at high settings. For graphics professionals (who make up most of the target audience for the 27-inch iMac) we see this machine handling high-end image and HD video editing with ease.
The iMac comes bundled with the 10.6 version of the Mac OS X Snow Leopard operating system, as well as iLife ’11 (comprising the superb iPhoto, iMovie, iDVD, iWeb, and GarageBand applications). The latter is as good a starter set of media-centric programs as you'll find with any modern desktop computer. The iMac also comes with a one-year limited warranty and 90 days of toll-free phone support. (An extended AppleCare warranty will cover your system for two more years; it costs $169 extra, and that upcharge was not factored into the cost of our test unit.)
With the latest version of its all-in-one desktop, Apple left everything that was great about the 27-inch iMac alone (namely its best-in-class screen and beautiful design), while making some serious improvements to it internal components. In almost every way, this top-of-the line model beats every other AIO on the market. With strong productivity performance and excellent entertainment capabilities (even with the lack of a Blu-ray player and HDMI port), this is an AIO that could appeal to a style-conscious but serious home gamer as well as a graphics professional.
Price (at time of review): $1,999 (mfr. est., as tested)www.apple.com
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See all of our Apple IMac (27-Inch, 2011 Version) coverage
See all of our Apple coverage
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