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20-inch iMac G5/2.1GHz

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At a Glance

  • Apple 20-inch iMac G5/2.1GHz

The new iMac G5s remain excellent computers for home and business use alike. The built-in iSight camera will open up possibilities of Internet-based video-conferencing to tons of users. But as exciting as it may be that Front Row provides a remote-driven media interface for the Mac, there are still quite a few kinks that must be worked out with that built-in application.

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At a Glance

  • Introduced in October 2005, the refurbished iMac line now comes with a built-in iSight camera plus a remote control. The latter comes in handy with a news software program that comes preinstalled on the iMac -- Front Row, a digital media application for playing back movies, DVD, QuickTime movie trailers, and video downloads from the iTunes Music Store. Photo Booth, another newly installed app, lets users take pictures with the iSight and edit them. In addition to a faster processor and frontside bus, this new iMac also ships with a Mighty Mouse multi-button mouse. In February 2006, Apple cut the price of this iMac G5 model by $200 to $1,499.

    Pros

    • Consistent organization of movies between computer and Front Row
    • Built-in iSight video camera
    • Includes fuller featured Mighty Mouse
    • Remote stows on side of iMac
    • Beautiful, bright display
    • Photo Booth software is really fun
    • Can support a maximum 2.5GB of RAM
    • Excellent general-use and business Mac

    Cons

    • Supports second display only in mirroring mode
    • Supports only VGA (analog) connection for additional displays
    • Remote control takes some getting used to
    • Front Row has numerous, irritating quirks and omissions, its Movie Trailers server intermittently returns errors and won’t play trailers, and it won’t let you bookmark video content
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