BC-CPT-IMAC:DE – business, xtop, world, itop (510 words)

Finally, a desktop with great guts

By Mike Wendland

Knight Ridder Newspapers

(KRT)

If a new desktop computer is the object of your holiday hopes this season, look no farther than the new G5 iMac from Apple.

I said it when I first tested it and I’ll say it again after two months of use: This is the finest personal computer I’ve ever used, hands down. Nothing comes close. If you have ever thought of switching from a Windows-based PC to a Mac, this is the deal-clincher. It is a stunning machine to look at and to use.

You won’t find anything more stylish in appearance. All the innards of the computer-including the power supply-are built into the monitor, which comes as either a 17-inch or 20-inch flat panel. That means the entire computer is about 2 inches thick, contained in an acrylic rectangular-shaped case with rounded corners.

The CD or DVD drive is recessed into the right side. USB and FireWire ports, external speaker and microphone jacks and the on-off switch are on the back, with the whole shebang adjustably mounted on a piece of anodized aluminum.

It seems as if it’s just hanging there, suspended in space.

The G5 iMac comes with Apple’s iLife suite of software for handling digital pictures, editing video, burning DVDs, playing music and managing and synchronizing an address book, a calendar and e-mail. The GarageBand music composition application is also included, as is the 2004 edition of the World Book encyclopedia and the popular Quicken 2004 money management software.

And all of those applications zip right along, thanks to a speedy 1.6 or 1.8 GHz PowerPC G5 processor.

But besides the sheer beauty of the thing, the most brilliant thing Apple has done is to make the G5 iMac affordable.

The 17-inch, 1.6 GHz model starts at $1,299. For that price you get an 80 GB hard drive and a DVD and CD player that can also record CDs.

The 20-inch version begins at $1,899. It has the faster 1.8 GHz processor, a 160 MB hard drive and Apple’s SuperDrive that plays and records DVDs and CDs.

My one complaint has to do with the standard 256 MB of memory. Apple is clearly cutting costs. That 256 MB really should be 512 MB at a minimum, especially if you plan to do a lot of heavy lifting like video editing with the Apple iMovie software. You can upgrade to 512 MB by forking over $75 more, but skimping on memory seems pretty classless for what otherwise is a very classy machine.

I like this machine a lot. And because Macs-for a variety of reasons-are as close to immune to viruses and worms as you can get, the new G5 is my top recommendation for anyone considering a new computer this year.