The new Imac’s come in either 21.5″ or 27″ and have either a Dual Core or Quad Core processor depending on desired configuration. For the remainder of this review we will be looking at the Dual Core 27″ model.

Features 

The new model iMacs come with wireless keyboard and mouse Magic Mouse as standard. In the past Apple has had these as optional  upgrades (at a cost of course). As usual there is a camera, Speakers and microphone built-in. The astute observer may even notice the SD card slot situated just next to the DVD drive. 

So What Makes the Magic Mouse so Magic?

Well I am glad you asked that question, the magic mouse makes use of multi touch technology . This simply means you can touch anywhere on the top surface of the mouse scroll and do other cool things like:

  •  Right Click (finally) 
  • 360 degree scrolling 
  • Zooming
  • Two finger swipe

Basically if you have used an iPod touch or iPhone you will know what to do. Looks like apple programmers are having fun with the cocoa touch framework. 

Technical Specifications

For all you geeks out there here are the tech specs taken straight from the Apple website.

27-inch iMac

  • Height: 20.4 inches (51.7 cm)
  • Width: 25.6 inches (65.0 cm)
  • Depth: 8.15 inches (20.7 cm)

Weight: 30.5 pounds (13.8 kg)

Connections and expansion

  • One FireWire 800 port; 7 watts
  • Four USB 2.0 ports
  • SD card slot

Communications

  • Built-in AirPort Extreme 802.11n Wi-Fi wireless networking IEEE 802.11a/b/g compatible
  • Built-in Bluetooth 2.1 + EDR (Enhanced Data Rate) wireless technology
  • Built-in 10/100/1000BASE-T Gigabit Ethernet (RJ-45 connector)

Audio

  • Built-in stereo speakers
  • Two internal 17-watt high-efficiency amplifiers
  • Headphone/optical digital audio output (minijack)
  • Audio line in/optical digital audio input (minijack)
  • Built-in microphone
  • Support for Apple Stereo Headset with microphone

Graphics and video support

ATI Radeon HD 4670 graphics processor with 256MB of GDDR3 memory.

Built-in iSight camera

Mini DisplayPort output port with support for DVI, VGA, and dual-link DVI (adapters sold separately). 27-inch models also support input from external DisplayPort sources (adapters sold separately).

Support for extended desktop and video mirroring modes

Simultaneously supports full native resolution on the built-in display and up to a 30-inch display (2560 by 1600 pixels) on an external display

Software

Mac OS X v10.6 Snow Leopard (includes iTunes, Time Machine, Quick Look, Spaces, Spotlight, Dashboard, Mail, iChat, Safari, Address Book, QuickTime, iCal, DVD Player, Photo Booth, Front Row, Xcode Developer Tools)

iLife (includes iPhoto, iMovie, iDVD, iWeb, GarageBand)

Processor and memory

  • 3.06GHz Intel Core 2 Duo processor with 3MB shared L2 cache
  • 4GB (two 2GB SO-DIMMs) of 1066MHz DDR3 SDRAM; four SO-DIMM slots support up to 16GB

Storage

  • 1TB 7200-rpm Serial ATA hard drive

Optical drive

  • Slot-loading 8x SuperDrive (DVD±R DL/DVD±RW/CD-RW)
  • Writes DVD+R DL and DVD-R DL discs at up to 4x speed
  • Writes DVD-R and DVD+R discs at up to 8x speed
  • Writes DVD-RW discs at up to 6x speed and DVD+RW discs at up to 8x speed
  • Reads DVDs at up to 8x speed
  • Writes CD-R discs at up to 24x speed
  • Writes CD-RW discs at up to 16x speed
  • Reads CDs at up to 24x speed

Really none of these words do this machine justice, once you use it you wont be able to go back to a normal PC. It is really good being able to load up a few tables watch some Digital TV and do some web browsing all on the one screen. Below is a low res screenshot to give you some idea of the size. In the future I hope to mount my 19″ flat screen in potrait mode and hook that up and use it for the poker rooms lobby and digital TV.

Snow Leo on 27 Inch Low Res Image Click for Larger

So far I am very happy with this machine. I will post more about my experiences in the coming weeks.