Apple has announced the new iMac with M6 chipset, which updates the 24-inch all-in-one with a faster CPU and GPU, more on-device AI capability and upgraded connectivity. The desktop keeps its thin design and comes in blue, green, pink, yellow, purple, orange and silver colors.
New M6 iMac
The Apple M6 chip offers up to a 12-core CPU, which is two more cores than before; Apple says it delivers the world’s fastest single-threaded CPU performance. The GPU also has up to 12 cores, with a Neural Accelerator in each core. Apple claims up to 2x faster graphics and ray tracing over M4 – though be aware that in the grand scheme of things, this is not going to let you play Cyberpunk 2077 and the likes in proper console-grade fidelity, since this is more comparable to integrated graphics in Windows laptops.
The Dual 16-core Neural Engine offers up to 2x faster AI compute than the previous generation. Apple states that the iMac runs up to 5x faster than M4 on on-device AI tasks, such as prompt processing for local large language models. Provided the spec of your choosing has enough memory to fit the relevant models, user data stays private since they run locally.
The iMac supports Wi-Fi 7 and Bluetooth 6. Models with the 12-core CPU and 12-core GPU add 2.5GbE LAN – an upgrade over the previous generation’s 1GbE LAN, plus up to four Thunderbolt 4 ports. The desktop can drive up to two 6K external displays, while the onboard 24-inch 4.5K Retina display reaches 500 nits of brightness and supports P3 wide color with 10-bit color support (nano-texture glass optional). Apple claims the iMac’s display offers 5x more resolution and nearly 70% more brightness than the best-selling 24-inch Windows all-in-one equivalent.
Other hardware includes a 12MP Center Stage camera with Desk View and a three-microphone array. The speaker system uses two pairs of force-cancelling woofers and two tweeters, with Spatial Audio and Dolby Atmos support. Color-matched accessories, including a keyboard and a mouse or trackpad, charge over USB-C. The 12-core models come with Magic Keyboard with Touch ID as standard, while 10-core models can be configured with it.
Customers can pre-order the new iMac with M6 from Thursday, 29 October at official website and in the Apple Store app. Pre-orders are now open Malaysia, with units begin arriving to customers, Apple Store locations and Apple Authorized Resellers on Friday, 6 November. The iMac with a 10-core CPU and 10-core GPU starts at RM6,499, or RM6,299 with education savings; the model with a 12-core CPU and 12-core GPU starts at RM7,499 and RM7,099 respectively.
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