I’m not the first person to say this, but the M1 chip is astonishing. The version I’ve been testing is the model with 8-core GPU. Not surprising, given that it’s been performing brilliantly in the iMac mini and MacBook Pro for months now. Could it really make a 24in iMac run as effectively as a 13in MacBook Air? It turns out it can. This is the first-generation of a chip designed for laptop use. I approached this review with some trepidation. Apple may not have actually named this chip after the fastest road in the U.K., but the comparison is there.

AppleĪs anyone who’s ever lived in Britain will tell you, M1 is the name of the country’s first high-speed road. The M1 chip on the new iMac is remarkably fast. The new iMac looks like nothing so much as a super-sized iPad Pro on a stand, but that’s hardly a bad thing. Don’t worry, it’s actually solid and secure with just the right amount of give for you to angle it easily. The base is thicker than on the previous iMac and attaches to the computer itself with a clever hinge that looks like attaches in one tiny part of the circle. Still angled but no longer curved, it has a base with a backward pointing foot to keep it stable. The elegant aluminum stand is replaced by one that’s slightly different. Ethernet capability is built into the power brick. Speaker grilles are on the bottom edge, headphone socket on the left side, Thunderbolt ports on the back. MORE FROM FORBES Forget AirPods 3, Apple Accidentally Leaks Dazzlingly Different Earbuds By David Phelan Apple has put the power management in an external brick instead of the main unit, but everything else is there, just flat. A thin slab of aluminum and glass, so thin that it can’t be more than a monitor, surely? But it is. That was pretty innovative design at the time, of course.īut now, it’s completely flat. The whooping grew more subdued as it became clear that it was only the extreme edge that was thin, that there was a curved bulge in the middle of the computer’s back.

When Phil Schiller revealed the last big design update in 2012, the audience at the keynote cooed as they saw how thin it was. The shape of the new iMac is as eye-catching as its colors.

Magic desktop review