Over the years, Apple has expanded its product lineup with models with a range of price points like iPhone 12 mini, iPad mini, MacBook and MacBook Air, and others. Now, the company is rumored to offer an affordable alternative to its high-end external monitor, Pro Display XDR starting from $4,999.
In his weekly newsletter, Mark Gurman of Bloomberg shared that “he strongly believes” that Apple will launch a new external monitor for the latest Macs powered by Apple Silicon” at an affordable cost. An external monitor allows users with heavy workflows to keep several windows open at once or mirror their laptops’ screens on a larger display. Currently, affordable third-party external monitors are the only option for those MacBook users who are not willing to spend thousands of dollars for an extra screen.
Apple might tweak the size and features of the new external monitor to make it cheaper than Pro Display XDR
Gurman believes that the Cupertino tech giant is going to launch a new cheaper external monitor because the cost of manufacturing an external monitor has been reduced and a slightly smaller display than Pro Display XDR with inferior display quality will bring the price down considerably.
He also predicts that it will be a “hot seller”. He thinks that 2021 MacBook Pro users are likely going to purchase the alleged low-cost monitor for the extra viewing area.
I strongly believe [Apple will launch a new external monitor for its latest Macs.] A lower-cost monitor, I think, would be a hot seller for those looking to add a larger screen to their new MacBook Pro without spending the equivalent of a luxury car down payment on the Pro Display XDR.
At this point, the cost of building that monitor has likely come down, and with a few tweaks and perhaps a slight drop in brightness, Apple might be able to get to a similar quality monitor (at a slightly smaller size) at perhaps about half the price. By the way, it’s still hilarious that Apple tried to justify the current monitor’s price by comparing it to a $43,000 Hollywood-grade reference monitor.
Besides the price, Gurman did not share any other details of the alleged external display or its launch date. But his claim holds weight as it corroborates a previous report on a cheaper external monitor. Reportedly, the company is also testing the successor of Pro Display XDR with a built-in GPU powered by an A13 chip and a Neural Engine.
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