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Monkey, Monkey-- Match (6/15/00)
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If anyone was concerned that the Mac rumors scene might dry up and blow away because of Adobe's lawsuit against AppleInsider, it appears you can put your mind at ease. Despite the fact that Adobe's suit alleges "tens of millions of dollars in irreparable damages" caused by AppleInsider's unauthorized sneak preview of future versions of Photoshop and ImageReady, the rumors over there keep flying fast and fierce. First there was what we consider to be an extremely ill-timed sneak peek at the next version of Office for the Mac-- which Microsoft ordered shut down posthaste. Then it was a piece on ATI's new RADEON graphics chipset and when it may be appearing for the Mac; that article remains available, indicating that ATI needs to hire some more tenacious lawyers if it expects to be taken seriously in this business. And most recently, AppleInsider's posted a doozy of a rumor about the future of the iMac.
Everyone knows that the iMac's sales have been slow recently-- and no wonder, since the current models haven't changed a translucent hair in a staggering eight months. So AppleInsider's dredged up last December's rumor about an iMac with a 17-inch display, spruced it up with some zippy new moves, and served it up as the Juice Du Jour. Here's the skinny: production of current iMacs will cease completely by the end of the month, at which point Apple's manufacturing partners will start cranking out new iMacs in preparation for an Expo unveiling. What's new? Glad you asked. The next mutation in the iMac's evolutionary history is said to include faster G3 processors and Apple's newly-designed USB keyboard and mouse, which is all pretty tame and safe to predict. But it's the iMac DV Special Edition that's getting a serious feature upgrade: in addition to the revamped input devices, the Graphite SE is said to be getting a G4 processor and that long-fabled 17-inch screen.
But wait, there's more! iBox, anyone? The iMac was originally just that-- the iMac. One configuration, one color; perfect for attracting newbies suffering from configuraphobia. Then Apple muddied the waters a bit by introducing the least-technical choice possible: color. Consumers had five flavors from which to choose, but the feature set of each choice was still identical. Fast-forward eight months, and suddenly the choices get a little tougher: there's a Blueberry-only base iMac, five flavors of the iMac DV, and the Graphite DV Special Edition; different colors, different features. And now, if there's any truth to this iBox rumor, Apple's taken the final step and tossed the whole "choice = complexity" equation out the window.
See, the iBox architecture turns the iMac into a build-it-yourself Lego set. Pick a base unit, which is pretty much just the iMac's guts. Then pick a display in a matching color-- there's the classic 15-inch CRT, that 17-inch CRT you've all been waiting for, and even a 15-inch LCD for the flat-screen fetishists out there. Once you've chosen a base and a display, you just snap them together, and voilà: there's the iMac of your dreams. It's kind of like Garanimals for computers. Neat idea, right? But don't count on iBox surfacing in time for the Expo, assuming it even exists at all. We have a hard time believing that something this major wouldn't have leaked before now if it's ready enough to debut next month. Then again, who saw the original iMac coming? You never know.
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SceneLink (2359)
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 | | The above scene was taken from the 6/15/00 episode: June 15, 2000: Apple prepares next month's iMac speed bump even as lab gnomes work on that system's next-generation Lego-like architecture. Meanwhile, the Microsoft-Bungie buyout rumors heat up and point to some kind of announcement this Monday, and Woz gets inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame...
Other scenes from that episode: 2360: D-Day Approaches (6/15/00) Funny how, in a world filled with mortgage payments, corporate downsizing, car repairs, and the ever-mounting environmental problem caused by mountains of AOL disks, it would be a rumor about a game company that finally gave us a bleeding ulcer... 2361: Father Of Invention (6/15/00) Hey, everybody-- make sure you head over to Woz.org and congratulate "The Other Steve" on his recent honor. According to an Associated Press story, the Woz was just inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame...
Or view the entire episode as originally broadcast... | |  |
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