Speaking of the iMac and its vast supply, it sounds like production is just about ready to ramp up for the expected August 19th ship date. Mac the Knife reports that one hundred pre-production models have been churned out by Apple's Laguna West manufacturing facility. These early versions have probably reached New York by now, and in all likelihood are being set up by union Smurfs all across the Javits Center in preparation for abuse by the rabid Expo crowd. (Your friendly AtAT staff are included in that sweaty rabble, and fully intend to mess with the iMacs as much as possible during our Expo stay.) Though one hundred doesn't sound like many for a product due on store shelves in a month, fear not-- Laguna West claims they'll be able to push out 600,000 units by Christmas. Yow!

We at AtAT are pleased to hear that the iMac appears to share certain design features with Apple's sleek PowerBook G3 Series; according to the Knife, they use the same RAM and CD-ROM drive. Now, while the use of PowerBook RAM may conceivably raise the cost of upgrading the iMac, the use of PowerBook CD-ROM drives leaves a big opening for speculation: in the PowerBook G3 Series, the CD-ROM drive slots into a media bay that can also accept a floppy module. While it's a really slim chance that Apple would use the same kind of modular design in the iMac, it sure would be a nice surprise to hear that translucent blue internal floppy drives will be available, and can be hot-swapped with the CD-ROM. We're not holding our breath, though.

Also, as has been widely reported by all sorts of rumors sources, the Knife confirms that v.90 56K drivers for the internal modem will be available soon after the iMac's release. As for the reports that the preproduction iMacs are "higher-gloss and greener" than the prototypes shown at WWDC and on Apple's Road Tour, well, we suppose we can live with that. While the original Bondi-blue goes better with our decor, we certainly can't fault Apple for wanting a little luck of the Irish.