Apple appears to be warming up to the prospect of offering their much-coveted products at more budget-friendly prices just to keep up with competitors who have raked in enviable revenues from selling smartphones at more economical price points.
One clear evidence of that, aside from the rumored cheaper iPhone 6 models and the lower-priced MacBook Air released last April, is the fact that the California-based tech giant has unveiled a 21.5-inch iMac that sells at $200 less than the usual rates for the lowest-end models still available, Forbes reported. The latest "entry-level" unit now starts at $1,099.
"The new Apple (AAPL, Tech30) iMac features a 21.5-inch LED-backlit screen, a 1.4 GHz dual-core Intel Core i5 processor, 8 GB of memory and a 500 GB hard drive. That's far less powerful than Apple's previous 'low-end' iMac, which had a 2.7 GHz processor and a 1 TB (1,000 GB) hard drive," CNN noted. "Also built into the new Mac are next generation 802.11ac Wi-Fi and two Thunderbolt ports, which allow for unprecedented high-speed, massive data transfers from cameras or other media devices."
The new unit will also contain Apple's software suite, including "word processing, spreadsheet, photo and music editing programs." However, it won't come pre-installed with OS X Yosemite, although the new OS may be downloaded for free to iMac buyers come fall season this year.
Meanwhile, Forbes pointed out that this move is "a serious step backwards" for Apple.
"To get that lower price, Apple dramatically sacrificed both the performance and the storage capacity (half of the previous low-end iMac) of its new low-cost desktop computer," the business and finance news site said.
"The newly added entry-level iMac actually contains similar internal hardware usually found in ultra-thin notebook computers like Apple's Macbook Air - also starting at $1099 - with a low-power dual core i5 processor (instead of a standard quad-core desktop CPU) and a low-performance Intel INTC -0.07% graphics chip - a serious downgrade from the previous Iris Pro Graphics," the news source added.
"An architecture decision that makes this cheap iMac at least 40% slower than the slowest of Apple's all-in-one desktop computer line so far."
Aside from this, it would appear that this newly released model's price is actually the same as "a certified refurbished 21.5 inch iMac from the Apple online store now."
Did Apple pitch a loss with this new iMac?
This "unexpected" announcement somehow went against expectations of tech industry pundits as the unveiling of the Mac OS X Yosemite at WWDC 2014 invited predictions of a higher-end iMac that includes a Retina display. It appears this upgraded version remains a dream of avid iMac users - at least for now.