Apple’s iMac is the most talked-about computer of the year for a good reason — it shows how bad personal computer design has been, Chris Cobb opines in a tech column for the Orlando Sentinel . And the columnist offers some suggestions for improvements.
He’d love to see the display size increased from 15- to 17-inches, even if it means a price hike of US$200 or so. He’d also like to see Apple enable the screen so it could rotate from landscape to portrait orientation.
Cobb also thinks Apple needs to reevaluate some design elements. The power on-off button needs to be moved to the front, and a two-button mouse would be nice, he adds.
“The half-dome shape is eye-catching but really doesn’t serve any purpose,” Cobb writes. “To install extra memory, you have to hold the machine upside down — a risky maneuver, since the iMac weighs 21.3 pounds. Surely, the engineers can make it easier to add memory.”
On the other hand, he loves the bundled “digital hub” apps, and notes, “the Windows competition can’t match iPhoto, iTunes2, iMovie2 or iDVD2 for elegance and ease of use.” He also praises the iPod as a great peripheral for the new iMac.
“The iPod also has been given the ability to store and display contacts from your PDA or computer,” Cross said. “Just guessing, but I’d bet Apple will soon enable the iPod to show dates, memos and to-do’s, like a standard PDA.”