Apple's New iMacs Have Ivy Bridge Desktop CPUs

[MacMan]

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This week's Apple announcement saw the release of new iMacs with Ivy Bridge CPUs. So what does this mean for us?

The good news is Apple is still using desktop CPUs in the iMac. This means that in a future Mountain Lion update we will see official native desktop 7-series chipset support. No more "Unknown AHCI Standard Controller" in System Profiler.

On the graphics front, all Apple Ivy Bridge based products now have either Intel HD 4000 or NVIDIA Kepler mobile graphics. Since Apple dropped the ATI/AMD mobility cards from the iMacs, I wouldn't hold out hope for AMD HD 7xxx support coming anytime soon.

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Looking for more information on the CPU models, I did a quick search on the CPUs based on the specs on the Apple website and have come up with the following detailed CPU specs:

iMac 21" 2.7GHz quad-core Intel Core i5 processor (Turbo Boost up to 3.2GHz) with 6MB L3 cache
is most likely the Intel Core i5-3330S

iMac 21" or 27" 2.9GHz quad-core Intel Core i5 processor (Turbo Boost up to 3.6GHz) with 6MB L3 cache
is most likely the Intel Core i5-3470S

iMac 21" 3.1GHz quad-core Intel Core i7 (Turbo Boost up to 3.9GHz) with 8MB L3 cache
is most likely the Intel Core i7-3770S

iMac 27" 3.2GHz quad-core Intel Core i5 processor (Turbo Boost up to 3.6GHz) with 6MB L3 cache
is most likely the Intel Core i5-3470

iMac 27" 3.4GHz quad-core Intel Core i7 (Turbo Boost up to 3.9GHz) with 8MB L3 cache
is most likely the Intel Core i7-3770

Each link above references the Intel spec sheet for each CPU model. When you look at these specs, don't get excited that some of these Ivy Bridge chips are have onboard Intel HD 2500 graphics. I'm almost certain that Apple will not enable them at all, and will only support the discrete NVIDIA Kepler GPUs.

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[NimhOfJoy]

Any word on getting USB 3 support?

 

[HellbentLLC]

Yes! According to the video of the event yesterday the new iMac's and the Mac Mini's both have USB 3

 

[stahl]

What about "Fusion Drive" in Hackintosh? Is it possible? And, how to activate it?

 

[imaj]

Looks like the end of the road for Firewire.

 

[mkteagle]

Well, doesn't the new mac mini still have firewire?

 

[Pechente]

Article: Apple's New iMacs Have Ivy Bridge Desktop CPUs

Wow the prices seem pretty nice, that's about what I paid for my hackintosh with a comparable display. I'm wondering how repairable they are, though.

What about "Fusion Drive" in Hackintosh? Is it possible? And, how to activate it?

I'm wondering about this too. I bet it's possible to set this up with 10.8.3.

 

[malone46844]

Was hoping thunderbolt display would get a USB3 spec bump at the same time.

 

[BillyBooBob]

Article: Apple's New iMacs Have Ivy Bridge Desktop CPUs

Well, doesn't the new mac mini still have firewire?

Looks like it has a single FW 800 port.

 

[tonymacx86]

Article: Apple's New iMacs Have Ivy Bridge Desktop CPUs

What about "Fusion Drive" in Hackintosh? Is it possible? And, how to activate it?

We're thinking, since it was specifically said to be a software thing, they will have a few new drivers in the next official build 10.8.3 that will enable this special hybrid stuff in the Apple way. Perhaps we'll be able to do something to artificially stack a SSD/HDD and take advantage of the software. Maybe using the built in mSATA on some of these newer 7-series boards + a HDD.