Apple’s first somewhat affordable display in years got off to a rocky start, with some reviewers complaining about the quality of the webcam and others complaining about the high price. But if there’s one question we all have, it’s this: why is it so thick?
Now we have an answer. iFixit did its usual teardown of the new screen and discovered some interesting engineering maneuvers. Most notably, the site’s experts discovered that the Studio Display has a split power board inside the screen that requires “massive fans” to stay cool.
That’s the main reason the Studio Display is so thick: 19mm compared to 11.5mm on the 24-inch iMac. Even though the power supply is incredibly thin and took “a huge amount of engineering effort”, since it’s inside the Studio Display (meaning there’s no ugly power supply attached to the cord), Apple needed the space extra to dissipate heat. iFixit believes that, had Apple gone with a standard external power supply, the Studio Display “could have had the exact same design as the iMac.”
Elsewhere, iFixit has confirmed that the Studio Display has an A13 Bionic chip with 64GB of storage and runs iOS. The speakers are “impressive” for a screen, but still not as thin as the iMac, although there are “exciting force-cancelling woofers” to minimize vibration.
Overall, iFixit calls the Studio Display an “alternate universe iMac” and “an impressive testament to Apple’s problem-solving ability.” Still, it’s hard not to wonder what might have been — or might still be a few years from now.
