Speculation has reached a fever pitch as it often does the day before an Apple product presentation. I've been relatively confident regarding one bit of speculation of my own ever since the WWDC reveal of the new Mac Pro: Apple has a 4K display ready, and the price will be the big surprise.
iPads and refreshed models of Macs and Mavericks, alongside a possible refresh to the iPod line? All of this is widely expected.
The long-awaited halo-end of the Mac line was pitched heavily on the back of its ultra-powered graphics horsepower, and consequently its ability to run up to three 4K monitors at once. The existing Thunderbolt Display also uses three inputs that are made obsolete by the new Mac Pro: Thunderbolt 1, USB 2, and the now ancient -looking FireWire 800.
Only in the last few days have people gotten more confident about predicting a new 4K Thunderbolt Display, and I'm surprised that everyone I've read or heard seem to predict the cost at $3000-$4000. These people include John Gruber and Marco Arment on the latest installment of The Talk Show, among others.
That price range sounds much more reasonable for the Mac Pro itself. Applied to a desktop display, the hefty price tag runs counter to the trend seen since the introduction of the 24" LED Cinema Display at $899, which replaced a 23" Cinema Display that originally cost $1999. For reference, the 30" Cinema Display from the same line dropped over time from $3300 to $1800.
It would be bizarrely out of character for the flagship Apple display to ratchet up in price at this point. One of the areas where Apple has shored up its component purchasing leverage in particular is in displays, including both iMacs on the large end and phones and tablets at the smaller end.
Aisin Seiki has been selling a $700 39" 4KTV (and a $1000 50" model) since April. I'm not saying that directly correlates to Apple's ability to price a 4K "Retina" display at the $999 point of the Thunderbolt Display, but if anyone in the computing industry has the component volume leverage to be first to move, it's Apple. If Apple can, they will, and it would be a hell of a precursor to a late 2014 TV set launch.
I wouldn't necessarily peg the same 27" size as the Thunderbolt for what I'm calling the Retina Pro Display, but it would make the most logical sense for it to be offered in the size of their largest iMac. That way, it would begin to drive down component pricing so that the iMac line could go 4K next year and not have an impact on margins. Refreshed MacBook Pros and even Mac mini models would have to support the new display resolution with beefed up graphics cards, but perhaps the theoretical new Air models wouldn't...or perhaps only at a reduced resolution.
It's not really Apple's style anymore to wow people with how much more than the old product their new thing costs. Whether it's Phil Schiller or Tim Cook who drops the news, an Apple 4K Display for $999 that works with their hot new Mac Pro would be a great way to sell multiples of three of them.
You know who really wins if this turns out? Whichever monitor arm mount manufacturer makes a three-headed model.
Post Script (11:30am CT 22 October 2013)
In 2012, Aisin Seiki (which generally does business as "Seiki" in the US) licensed Vizio's QAM patent portfolio. Those who dismiss them as a second-rate "Asian third party" are ignoring the fact that they are using the same core signal processing technology as one of the biggest LCD TV manufacturers in the United States. What I can't personally speak to is the signal processing and upconversion quality of their Ultra HD offerings. Could part of Apple's "fab-less" chip design strategy, with regard to graphics in particular, be geared toward reducing their overhead in display chipsets?
2nd Post Script (1:30pm CT 22 October 2013)
So my 4K/Retina desktop display prediction didn't pan out...yet. I stand by the pricing and positioning logic above, and expect some sort of movement during the coming months.