Things are awfully quiet in Macville these days. How quiet? Well, MacWEEK has trotted out that old chestnut about Apple needing a six-slot Mac, if that means anything to you. The "pro Macs need more slots" debate was slow-news-day fare even when the first beige G3s shipped two and a half years ago; since then, the subject has gone out of style at least twice, so when a major Mac news outlet trots it out for one more tired run, you just know those folks are scraping the bottom of the news barrel. (When we first read the headline we thought we had inadvertently slipped back in time, but when we hurriedly checked Apple's stock price, our hopes of an easy score crumbled to dust. So sad.)

And with so little going on down Cupertino way (at least of a public nature), what better time for rampant speculation and amateur armchair corporate steerage? After all, opinions are like AOL CD-ROMS-- everyone's got at least sixty, and they're anxious to push them off onto others. In that respect, we at AtAT are no different from anyone else, so we figured we'd weigh in on this whole iMac refresh issue. Sales numbers don't lie-- or, at least, for the moment we're going to pretend that they don't-- so when we hear that sales of Apple's flagship consumer product are flattening out, we get a little worried. Especially since it's not as if Apple isn't pushing the things for all they're worth; iMac commercials are maintaining a hearty primetime network presence, and faithful viewer Wil Nelson even notes that Apple is reportedly offering cash-incentive "spiffs" to CompUSA sales personnel on every iMac sold. So why the lousy sales?

Most everyone who's offered an opinion on the issue agrees that, in one way or another, what's hurting the iMac's sales is the lack of a revision B Kihei (or, if you choose to keep lettering from the beginning, a revision F iMac). The iMac in its current incarnation hasn't changed one iota in eight months, which is unheard of in that product's short history. Now, with iMac commercials back in heavy rotation and Apple paying CompUSA to move as many iMacs as possible, it's reasonably logical to assume that Apple's trying to clear the channel-- presumably for whatever new iMac is coming down the pike. More than likely that new model will first surface at next month's Macworld Expo, and what it'll be is anyone's guess. Luckily, John Martellero is one such anyone, and he goes out on a limb at MacOpinion to surmise that perhaps the Big Surprise™ in store for next month's Stevenote is a retooled iMac incorporating not a 15" monitor, not a 17" monitor, but an honest-to-goodness LCD flat-panel display instead of the standard CRT.

Now, John's not alone in considering this possibility; faithful viewer Nicole Yates wrote in a while back with the same suggestion, and we're sure they are aren't the only two who are expecting Apple to move away from CRTs (big, heavy, and hot) and towards LCDs (thin, light, and cool-- in more ways than one) in the iMac line. Our only question is, "when?" Personally, we'd love to see a flat-panel iMac debut next month, but given the cost of LCDs these days, we think it's probably a mite early. An iMac with a 15" LCD would probably have to cost upwards of $1799 right now, and that price point's just a little high for widespread consumer adoption. If an LCD iMac shows up as early as next month, you can bet it'll be the new "Special Edition" model; the base iMac and iMac DV models will most certainly be CRT-based. Whether those CRTs will be 15" or 17" in size is anyone's guess; we're doubting that Apple would make the iMac bigger and bulkier by integrating such a large tube, but stranger things have happened. Eventually, though, we're quite certain Apple will get out of the CRT business altogether, and every Apple display-- whether integrated into another product, or sold as a standalone unit-- will be a flat-screen LCD. It's just a matter of time, though we're not placing any bets on when.