So here we were, expecting that the whole "Banana and Cherry" series of rumors would have crumbled to dust by now, but they just won't go away. In the past few weeks, several sources reported that Apple was revamping its color palette for the fruit-flavored iMacs to help equalize customer demand. Basically, while Blueberry was by far the most popular and Grape was right up there, too, the other three flavors weren't quite as grab-worthy. To compensate, it was rumored that Apple was ready to replace the pinkish Strawberry (the "Hello Kitty" iMac flavor) with a healthy red Cherry, and poor forlorn Tangerine ("But it brings out the orange highlights in your complexion! Hey, where are you going?") would be retired in favor of a yellow Banana. (Lime is lime-- there isn't much anyone can do about that. And besides, we like it.) To us, it sounded plausible-- heck, even likely-- but it also had that faint smell of hoax about it, perhaps because it was just a mite too plausible. Anyway, once the SKU numbers for the new 333 MHz iMacs were released and they clearly showed Tangerine and Strawberry on the list, we figured that Banana and Cherry were either destined for future iMac models, or just plain fiction.

But guess what? The Mac Observer reports that the flavor revolution is still go. They've gotten email from "several retailers" who swear that the new colors are real-- and not in some future iMac due this summer. According to these folks, Banana and Cherry are part of the 333 MHz iMac line-up, officially due in a week. According to one such anonymous source, just because the SKU's show Tangerine and Strawberry "doesn't mean [Apple] won't ship Banana and Cherry instead... because that's exactly what's going to happen." Now, we haven't heard from any resellers (some of whom are rumored to have already received some 333 MHz iMacs in stock) who can confirm this with an eyewitness account, so at this point, we still have to count the whole story squarely in the rumor category. Still, it's rare to see a rumor so widely reported that sticks around for so long.

In fact, the sheer "stickiness" of this rumor makes us think that if it turns out not to be true, it must have originated from a pretty trustworthy source to have been taken for granted by so many who have passed it on. So if the new, speedier iMacs are introduced next week and Tangerine and Strawberry are still firmly in the lineup, we have to wonder: could the Banana/Cherry rumor have been deliberate Apple misinformation intended to help isolate a leak? Oooooh, intrigue-y.