[Leica] iMac 27" 5K—first impressions

[Howard Ritter]

I had been hoping that Apple would introduce a 4K display that I could drive with my years-old Mac Pro desktop, though it didn’t seem likely that the old machine would have the horsepower or compatibility to be able to do so, but when I heard that the new iMac was expected to have a Retina screen, I had some reason to hope that they’d also bring out a standalone display with the same screen.

They didn’t, but they did something better. The new iMac has a *5K* screen, which is Retina resolution (217 ppi) across a 23.5 x 13.2-inch display area, 5120 x 2880 pixels, for a mind-boggling total of just under 15 Megapixels, comparable to the pixel count of serious digital cameras. Apple had been selling the Sharp 4K display through its stores for $3600, so the new iMac with 5K priced at $1000 less than that, with almost twice the pixel count and, oh yes, a top-line computer inside, was jaw-dropping. Given all the above, I decided to replace my Mac Pro with the new 5K iMac rather than hoping eventually for a (now, probably) 5K standalone display that I likely couldn’t use with the Mac Pro anyway. (Unfortunately, the data rate required to drive the screen exceeds the capabilities of current peripheral interconnect protocols and hardware, so there is not a “target mode” available that would allow even a new Mac Pro to use the 5K iMac as its display.)

And I must say that to see a brilliant display of a multi-megapixel image 18” from my face, presented at nearly pixel-for-pixel correspondence to the original file, is astounding. I am not only newly impressed by the phenomenal detail of the screen, which is unprecedented, but impressed all over again by the staggering detail captured by a sensor the size of a postage stamp—not news, but now, seen for the first time in its entirety and at this size and resolution, beyond impressive. My desktop image at the moment is from my Sony NEX7 with kit 18-45 zoom @ 24mm (APS-C sensor, 36mm equiv FL), and I fully believe that it is at least as sharp and detailed as the same scene captured on MF film would be. It was taken from the top observation deck of the Eiffel Tower looking straight down, and it clearly shows, for example, two separate legs in the shadows of people standing on the plaza almost 900 feet below. I have to take off my glasses and move in to 6” from the screen to see even a suggestion of a pixel structure in the screen. (Also, staring at it with no text window on the desktop gives me vertigo!) Working with images on this screen is going to be a GREAT pleasure!

—howard