As much as we like the functional design of the new iMac, there's no doubt that there's still some room for improvement. Possible enhancements range from the blindingly obvious (e.g. an optical drive mounted high enough that it can't smack into the keyboard when its tray is ejected) to the arguably superfluous but nice (e.g. a third joint on the display arm that would allow the screen to swivel left to right independently of the arm) to the outright goofy (e.g. an enclosure made entirely out of Gruyère cheese). Probably one of the most obvious improvements coming down the pike, however, is a larger screen.

Granted, the iMac's current display is a solid improvement in size over the previous model's, since a 15-inch LCD is physically larger than a 15-inch CRT because of differences in the way they're measured. The new iMac's screen has a chunk of useable space comparable to a 17-inch CRT while containing only a fraction of the calories. Still, Mac OS X has a "big" interface, so even the iMac's native 1024x768 resolution represents the lower end of the useability spectrum, realistically speaking. (Have you used Mac OS X on an 800x600 original iBook? It's like trying to put on a rubber tuxedo while locked in a burlap sack.)

Plus, screen real-estate is a notoriously one-way street: once you've used a larger screen, reverting to a smaller model feels not unlike being buried alive. Take it from us-- we were all set to get the 17-inch Studio Display, until we spent a few minutes using a Cinema Display at an Apple retail store. Afterwards that 17-incher felt like the 15-inch model, and we just had to go widescreen. Before we knew it, there was a $1500 hole in our budget. We've named it "Theo."

Anyway, after the iMac's previous design essentially locked Apple into providing the same display for three and a half years, this time around, the company got all clever and stuff: now that the display is stuck on the end of that arm-thingy, it's a reasonably simple matter to replace that 15-incher with, say, a 17-inch LCD panel running at 1280x1024, without requiring a complete retooling of the iMac's whole physical design. Just throw some extra sand in the base for stability, and voilà! The next iMac. What could be simpler?

So when will we see a bigger screen perched atop the iMac's shiny metal arm? Well, according to Mac OS Rumors, you shouldn't hold your breath; unless LCD prices really start to plummet, we probably won't see iMacs with either regular 17-inch screens or widescreen 16.3-inch ones until "early 2003"-- but as a little bonus, those models will also pack GeForce 4 MX graphics, USB 2 and FireWire 2, faster memory, and processors running at 1 GHz or higher. An all-Gruyère enclosure, however, is, sadly, not in the cards. Thus is progress in the field of edible Macs dealt another serious blow...