Apple‘s Studio Display is designed to work great with Mac computers and MacBooks, and it packs serious computing power of its own with its A13 chip and newly discovered 64 gigabytes of storage, but why? Could Apple have special plans for the Studio Display that will be revealed at a later date? If so, it won’t be the first time that Apple has shipped a product with hidden capabilities that might be unlocked later with a software update.

The iPhone 11 was the first Apple product to contain a U1 ultra-wideband chip. Apple mentioned the chip when the iPhone 11 was announced in 2019 but didn’t provide any convincing reason for why anyone should care. The mystery of the reason for ultra-wideband technology in Apple’s product lineup grew with the same U1 chip being placed in the Apple Watch Series 6 and iPhone 12. Finally, in April of 2021, Apple launched the AirTag, which could be found with incredible accuracy with any Apple product that contained a U1 chip, revealing the master plan that began at least two years earlier.

Related: An Apple Studio Display Pro May Be Right Around The Corner

Apple’s Studio Display is an odd monitor. Its premium pricing doesn’t match the display specifications. While a 5K monitor is very sharp, why not add HDR capability? Instead, Apple included unexpectedly powerful computer hardware. Those components include an A13 processor, Thunderbolt and USB-C ports, iOS 15.4 and 64 gigabytes of storage. IOS developer Khaos Tian discovered the storage, and he shared it in a recent Tweet. Stranger still, only two gigabytes are in use. This hardware would be the equivalent of a super-sized iPad 9 if it had a touch screen. MacRumors suggested that perhaps it was simply the economies of scale that led Apple to load this display up with overpowered computer components that might never be put to full use.

Thinking Different About Studio Display

If a brief detour is made into a bit of wilder imagination, trying to ‘think different,’ the famous Apple slogan, there are a variety of possibilities. For example, adding a mouse, keyboard and enabling this usage in software would allow Apple’s Studio Display to work as a low-power computer. A more likely scenario would be making it into an advanced Apple TV with a more powerful processor and integrated high-resolution screen or an all-in-one gaming console with a display if a user connected a game controller.

It would simply be a matter of a software update to make either of these ideas a reality. Unfortunately, Apple didn’t mention Bluetooth or any other wireless connectivity, which makes it unlikely Apple intends the Studio display to be used as an all-in-one computer or an Apple Arcade console. Perhaps some adventurous hacker will jailbreak a Studio Display and explore those possibilities. In the meantime, the mystery remains. It might be as simple as Apple running out of stock on older processors and smaller storage chips, making it more cost-effective to give the Studio Display an A13 and 64 gigabytes, even if it’s unneeded.