Apple Silicon iMac Pro coming early 2022, says leaker

Apple's next iMac could be an iMac Pro arriving in the first half of 2022, a leaker claims, one that could sport an M1 Pro or M1 Max and has a chance of having Face ID in the display.

Apple officially discontinued its Intel-based iMac Pro on March 19, pulling the product from its website after the last of its stock was sold. According to a new rumor, its seems a replacement for it could be on the way within months.

According to leaker @Dylandkt on Twitter, Apple is preparing to create an "iMac (Pro)," with Saturday's tweet seemingly proposing the next iMac could be a "Pro" model due in the first half of 2022. The tweet continued that the model would be similar in design to the 24-inch iMac and Pro Display XDR, with a mini LED display and ProMotion support.

The screen would also have dark bezels, though no word on a notch. According to the leaker, Face ID was apparently tested, though admits it's "not confirmed" for the model.

For other specifications, it is claimed to run on an M1 Pro or M1 Max with 16GB of memory in the base model, along with 512GB of storage. The port selection includes HDMI, USB-C, an SD card, and an Ethernet port on the power brick.

iMac (Pro)
Promotion and Mini Led
Base model 16gb Ram 512gb Storage
M1 Pro and Max
Dark bezels
HDMI, SD Card, Usb C
Similar design to iMac 24 and Pro Display XDR
Starting price at or over 2000 dollars
Ethernet on brick standard
Face ID was tested (Not confirmed)
1H 2022
— Dylan (@dylandkt) October 30, 2021

Dylan claims the internal name candidate for the model is "iMac Pro," but warns the marketing team "can change gears very quickly." The rationale for the name would be to "better distinguish" it from the 24-inch iMac, as it's a "Pro device with a Pro chip."

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The leaker adds that the model will most likely have a 27-inch display, and replace the existing 27-inch iMac. Rumors ahead of the launch of the 24-inch iMac launch claimed that a larger iMac model was planned, though it didn't pay off during the launch event itself.

25 Comments

waveparticle 4 Years · 1497 comments

About 3 years ago

27-inch is only three inches larger than

24-inch. 30-inch will be better suited for a "Pro" model.

10 Likes · 0 Dislikes

OutdoorAppDeveloper 16 Years · 1292 comments

About 3 years ago

A bit disappointing if true. Early 2022 would be a good time to release a consumer 30" iMac with the new design and a M1 Pro/Max chip with similar performance specs to the MacBook Pro. Fall 2022 is when we should see a genuine iMac Pro with a M2 (something) chip. The iMac Pro is supposed to be for professionals. It should have a desktop processor not a laptop chip. It should also cost a lot more than the consumer iMac.

5 Likes · 0 Dislikes

Marvin 19 Years · 15379 comments

About 3 years ago

OutdoorAppDeveloper said:

A bit disappointing if true. Early 2022 would be a good time to release a consumer 30" iMac with the new design and a M1 Pro/Max chip with similar performance specs to the MacBook Pro. Fall 2022 is when we should see a genuine iMac Pro with a M2 (something) chip. The iMac Pro is supposed to be for professionals. It should have a desktop processor not a laptop chip. It should also cost a lot more than the consumer iMac.

It would make a lot of sense renaming the 27" model iMac Pro as that matches the laptop line.

CPU-wise the M1 Pro and Max perform really well against Intel and AMD chips:

https://www.cpubenchmark.net/high_end_cpus.html

There's no need to have an artificial split between mobile and desktop chips like Intel does. Intel does it so they can remove or lower the integrated graphics under the assumption an external dedicated GPU will be used. Apple will be using the integrated graphics chip.

The highest i9 chips are faster than M1 Pro/Max but only by around 1.5x. Everything else higher are the bigger Threadripper/Epyc/Xeon chips. The highest is the Threadripper Pro 3995wx. This is around 3.5-4x faster than M1 Pro/Max. They'd have to quadruple the cores in some way to reach that level but every chip from the M1 Pro up can be used in an iMac Pro. Anything capable of 32GB of video memory, 7GB/s SSDs, 5TFLOPs+ GPU is pro-level hardware.

The highest Xeon in the Mac Pro is around 1.5-2x faster than M1 Pro/Max. This is regarded as a pro machine so just doubling the M1 Max cores will reach this level.

There's no reason for pro-level hardware to be more expensive for the sake of it. It should only cost as much as it costs Apple to build with healthy margins. Given that Apple charges $1100 to jump from lowest Pro to highest Max chip, they will likely charge a bit more than this doubling it up again e,g an extra $2200. If the base 27" iMac replacement is $1999 (16GB/512GB), the 2x chip would be around $5k, same as the old iMac Pro. Doubling again could reach $9k - this would be equivalent to the current $24k Mac Pro.

7 Likes · 0 Dislikes

9secondkox2 9 Years · 3260 comments

About 3 years ago

waveparticle said:

27-inch is only three inches larger than 24-inch. 30-inch will be better suited for a "Pro" model.

I don’t think it’s going to be 27 inches. That’s not a big monitor size anymore. It’s like he buying a 32 inch or 42 inch hdtv today. Sure it’s adequate. But not impressive at all and certainly not at the forefront of what a modern tv should be.

30” would be the minimum in 2022. I’m thinking Apple will go big and make it 32”. The challenge with getting some really big monitor size is the aspect ratio creates a giant block of screen. This can cause issues with neck ergonomics as well as figment in a work area. Easy solutions though. Lower where the screen sits on the stand or go ultrawide, which would be insanely cool. But do ultrawide in such a way as to stay 5k or more vertical and add the pixels as needed horizontally. Most ultrawide are a mess. But it’s s great concept. Apple could usher in sn era of high quality ultrawide glory as part of a high performance iMac with hopefully higher cpu and GPU core counts.

M1 Max with 64GB and a monster screen? Yes please. All day.

A replacement for 27 inch? Yes. But not equal in dimension.

Also, the iMac went 5k SIX years ago.

Time to move up.

5 Likes · 0 Dislikes

9secondkox2 9 Years · 3260 comments

About 3 years ago

Marvin said:

OutdoorAppDeveloper said:

A bit disappointing if true. Early 2022 would be a good time to release a consumer 30" iMac with the new design and a M1 Pro/Max chip with similar performance specs to the MacBook Pro. Fall 2022 is when we should see a genuine iMac Pro with a M2 (something) chip. The iMac Pro is supposed to be for professionals. It should have a desktop processor not a laptop chip. It should also cost a lot more than the consumer iMac.

It would make a lot of sense renaming the 27" model iMac Pro as that matches the laptop line.

CPU-wise the M1 Pro and Max perform really well against Intel and AMD chips:

https://www.cpubenchmark.net/high_end_cpus.html

There's no need to have an artificial split between mobile and desktop chips like Intel does. Intel does it so they can remove or lower the integrated graphics under the assumption an external dedicated GPU will be used. Apple will be using the integrated graphics chip.

The highest i9 chips are faster than M1 Pro/Max but only by around 1.5x. Everything else higher are the bigger Threadripper/Epyc/Xeon chips. The highest is the Threadripper Pro 3995wx. This is around 3.5-4x faster than M1 Pro/Max. They'd have to quadruple the cores in some way to reach that level but every chip from the M1 Pro up can be used in an iMac Pro. Anything capable of 32GB of video memory, 7GB/s SSDs, 5TFLOPs+ GPU is pro-level hardware.

The highest Xeon in the Mac Pro is around 1.5-2x faster than M1 Pro/Max. This is regarded as a pro machine so just doubling the M1 Max cores will reach this level.

There's no reason for pro-level hardware to be more expensive for the sake of it. It should only cost as much as it costs Apple to build with healthy margins. Given that Apple charges $1100 to jump from lowest Pro to highest Max chip, they will likely charge a bit more than this doubling it up again e,g an extra $2200. If the base 27" iMac replacement is $1999 (16GB/512GB), the 2x chip would be around $5k, same as the old iMac Pro. Doubling again could reach $9k - this would be equivalent to the current $24k Mac Pro.

Realistically the iMac 5k is and was a steal.

The iMac Pro is replacing that. Not the old iMac Pro which was only a stopgap as the Mac Pro was being developed.

The new iMac Pro should be comparable in pricing to the iMac 5k, but with price bumps similar to the MacBook Pros.