I recently was lucky enough to get a brand new iMac 24" equipped with a 2.16 GHZ Intel processor, 1GB of DDR2 SDRAM, 250Gb drive, running on OS X.4.8.

First impressions: WOW! When I took the iMac out of its box, I was totally impressed by the size of the display. I have a 17" dell display i bought 2 years ago, and it looks insanely small next to the iMac (click on the picture).

The brushed aluminium iMac stand is totally amazing. The display effortlessly tilts back and forth to accomodate your visual comfort.

Let's get it running. Out of the box, you simply plug the iMac with its power cord to the power source and you're running. The upgrade for this iMac includes wireless keyboard and mouse, and this is a neat upgrade to get, seriously. It works via the Apple Airport which is an internal wireless router basically.

You can plug a Ethernet cable to your Internet router or you can do as I did and wait for the Airport to connect to my wireless router and get the IP settings automatically, which worked great for me.

As soon as the iMac starts loading, it looks for the wireless keyboard/mouse and within a minute finds it. I have no problem with that. Of course, do not forget to put the batteries (provided in the box) for both the keyboard and the mouse...

The iMac display is as crisp as you could wish and it's extremely comfortable to spend hours on the computer now, a lot more comfortable than my 17" Dell that's for sure! The 1920*1200 resolution is good, but I could have gone with a higher resolution, I don't mind small fonts. Maybe a video card upgrade could have done the trick, but hell, it's certainly great enough like that!

Improvements from the G4s I used to own a G4 dual 500, I had to jump on a PC for several years for professional reasons, but I am glad I was able to get back on a Mac.

The noticeable (great) changes I found on the iMac 24 inches are:

• the Mac OS X registration process. A lot quicker and simpler, though it was not a hassle before.
• the Apple wireless mouse. I am not not sure if this is an improvement both on the wireless and corded mouse, but my wireless mouse has a really cool scrolling wheel on it. Well, on my old G4, the mouse basically just a giant button you'd click, that was it. The new one does a lot more. The wheel scrolls in every way possible: up, down, left, right, sideways, etc...a real efficient improvement.
• the OS X Tiger. Before getting rid of my G4, i was running the new OS X from OS 9, so it has been a while and Apple has really improve their operating system.

One of the questions that come up from people who see for the first time my iMac 24" is: "where the Hell is the tower?"

I am still totally amazed how everything can fit behind that 24" display. A 250GB drive, video card, motherboard with multiple USB ports, Ethernet port, firewire port, etc...Well, that's a the good thing everything is included, because you can forget about upgrading your iMac, I am sure it is possible, but you'll certainly have to spend quite some time and be really careful about what you're doing.

To wrap this up, I am really happy about my new iMac 24". I own a Dell desktop, a HP laptop, both have been perfect for what i needed the past 2-3 years, but my 17" desktop display is just too small when I spend 8+ hours on the computer each day.

One of the main reasons for this purchase was to get a bigger screen, a powerful computer and make more room in my office and the iMac 24" does it all.

To be realistic, the iMac 24" is not a cheap computer. When you have a $2000 budget, there are lots of options for you out there if you want a PC, and you can surely build a super performance machine with a giant screen for that price. But Apple knows how to build user friendly, powerful, efficient computers and the iMac 24" is ALL I needed!