In case you didn’t hear, Apple released new iMacs on Tuesday, which can only mean one thing: iFixIt Teardown! Or as the company puts it, they sharpened their suction cups (two of them, in fact) and dove in.
iFixIt has posted the requisite teardown photos from the latest 21.5-inch iMac that Apple released only yesterday. The new model, EMC 2428, scored a “very respectable” seven out of 10 on the company’s “Repairability Scale,” with the iMac getting cracked open (by way of two medium-sized suction cups) in the same manner as previous generations.
According to the teardown, RAM replacement is easy for the casual user, with the hard drive and optical drive being “moderately difficult.” If you’re looking to replace the CPU or GPU, you’ll have to first remove the logic board, a tricky process intended only for “adventurous users” -- not to mention those willing to void their warranty with Apple. (That may or many not include the iFixIt team, as you can see from the image above.)
Other highlights from the teardown include the discovery that the LED display is manufactured by LG, model number LM215WF3 -- the exact same display used in the previous generation iMac of the same size. The Thunderbolt port nearly matches the one found in the latest 15-inch MacBook Pro as well.
If you’re aiming to buy with the optional SSD, you may be interested to learn that the unit appears to be installed under the optical drive -- the only space where the iFixIt team found something was clearly missing, although they note that the SSD option is only available on the 2.7GHz model.
The remainder of the iFixIt teardown didn’t reveal anything too crazy or new, but you can get a glimpse of the gory details for yourself by heading over to their website.
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(Images courtesy of iFixIt)
