The iMac is a range of all-in-one Macintosh desktop computers designed and built by Apple Inc. It has been the primary part of Apple’s consumer desktop offerings since its introduction in 1998, and has evolved through four distinct forms. In its original form, the iMac G3, the iMac was gum drop- or egg-shaped with a CRT monitor, mainly enclosed by colored, translucent plastic. The second major revision, the iMac G4, moved to a design of a hemispherical base containing all the main components and an LCD monitor on a freely moving arm attached to the top of the base. The iMac G5 and the Intel iMac placed all the components immediately behind the display, creating a chunky unified design that tilts only up and down on a simple metal base. The current iMac shares the same form as the previous models, but is now thinner and uses anodized aluminum and black-bordered glass for its case.
History
The announcement of the iMac was a source of discussion and anticipation among commentators, Mac fans, and detractors. Opinions were divided over Apple’s drastic changes to the Macintosh hardware.[1] At the time, Apple was trying to improve its retail strategy. Apple declared that “the back of our computer looks better than the front of anyone else’s”.[2]
Apple declared the ‘i’ in iMac to stand for “Internet“; it also represented the product’s focus as a personal device (‘i’ for “individual”).[3] Attention was given to the out-of-box experience: the user needed to go through only two steps to set up and connect to the Internet. “There’s no step 3!” was the catch-phrase in a popular iMac commercial narrated by actor Jeff Goldblum.[4] Another commercial, dubbed ”Simplicity Shootout”, pitted seven-year-old Johann Thomas and his border collie Brodie, with an iMac, against Adam Taggart, a Stanford University MBA student, with an HP Pavilion 8250, in a race to set up their computers. Johann and Brodie finished in 8 minutes and 15 seconds,[5] whereas Adam was still working on it by the end of the commercial. Apple later adopted the ‘i’ prefix across its consumer hardware and software lines, such as the iPod, iBook, iPhone, iPad and various pieces of software such as the iLife suite and iWork.
On March 3, 2009, Apple updated its offerings for the iMac, featuring new Nvidia chipsets, the new Mini-DisplayPort and a new standard keyboard featuring no numeric pad that has become standard in all new Apple computers.[6]
On October 20, 2009, Apple updated the iMac, adding two new LED-backlit 16:9 widescreen screen sizes in 21.5″ and 27″ models, replacing the 20″ and 24″ 16:10 aspect ratio screens of the previous generation. In addition to memory and hard drive capacity increases, this release brought speed bumps to the Core 2 Duo technology and added Intel’s new Core i5 and Core i7 chips in the high end model, signifying the first quad-core iMac.
Design
Borrowing from the 1997 Twentieth Anniversary Macintosh, the various LCD-based iMac designs continued the all-in-one concept first envisioned in Apple’s original Macintosh computer. The successful iMac allowed Apple to continue targeting the Power Macintosh line at the high-end of the market. This foreshadowed a similar strategy in the notebook market when the iBook was released in 1999. Since then, the company has continued this strategy of differentiating the consumer versus professional product lines. Apple’s focus on design has allowed each of its subsequent products to create a distinctive identity. Apple derided the beige colors then pervading the PC industry. The company would later drift from the multicolored designs of the late 1990s and early 2000s. The later part of the first decade of the 21st century saw Apple using anodized aluminum and white, black, and clear polycarbonate plastics. Today many PCs are more design-conscious than before the iMac’s introduction, with multi-shaded design schemes being common, and some desktops and laptops available in colorful, decorative patterns.[7]
Apple’s use of translucent candy-colored plastics inspired similar designs in other consumer devices. For example, grilling machines, portable electronics, pencil sharpeners, video game consoles and peripherals (including the Nintendo 64, which was released in special edition ‘Funtastic’ colors) featured the translucent plastic. Apple’s introduction of the iPod, iBook G3 (Dual USB), and iMac G4, all featuring snowy white plastic, inspired similar designs in consumer electronic products. The color rollout also featured two distinctive ads: one called ‘Life Savers’ featured the Rolling Stones song “She’s a Rainbow” and an advertisement for the white version had the introduction of Cream’s “White Room” as its backing track.
Thanks for kind reference: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IMac
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