Apple announced the iMac on 6
May 1998 and started shipping it on 15 August 1998. The
launch of the iMac was a landmark event for its time, and
had a massive impact on both the company and the computer
industry.
The iMac was dramatically different from any other
mainstream computers. It was not beige, but rather made of
translucent Bondi blue colored plastic, was not square or
pizza boxed shaped but egg-shaped and included a 15-inch
CRT. The computer interfaces were hidden behind a door that
opened on the right-hand side of the machine. Two headphone
jacks in the front complemented the built-in stereo
speakers. Jonathan Ive, currently Vice President of
Industrial Design at Apple, is credited with the design.
Legacy Macintosh peripheral connections, such as the ADB,
SCSI, and GeoPort serial ports, were eliminated in favor of
USB ports; the floppy drive was discarded. Although these
were aging technologies, Apple's move was considered ahead
of its time.
The keyboard and mouse were redesigned for the iMac with
translucent plastics and a Bondi Blue trim (Apple USB
Keyboard and Apple USB Mouse). The keyboard was smaller
than Apple's previous keyboards, with white letters on
black keys. The mouse was of a round, "hockey puck" design,
which was instantly derided as not being ergnomically
designed.
Specifications:
CPU
- CPU: PowerPC 750
- CPU Speed: 233 MHz
- FPU: integrated
- Bus Speed: 66 MHz
- Data Path: 64 bit
- ROM: 1 MB ROM + 3 MB toolbox ROM loaded into RAM
- RAM Type: 144 pin SO-DIMM
- Minimum RAM Speed: 100 MHz
- Onboard RAM: 0 MB
- RAM slots: 2
- Maximum RAM: 256 MB
- Level 1 Cache: 32 kB data, 32 kB instruction
- Level 2 Cache: 512 kB backside, 1:2
- Expansion Slots: mezzanine
Video
- Monitor: 15"
- VRAM: 2 -6 MB SGRAM
- Max Resolution: 16 bit 1024x768
Storage
- Hard Drive: 4 GB
- ATA Bus: EIDE
- Optical Drive: 24x CD-ROM
I/O
- USB: 2
- Audio Out: stereo 16 bit mini
- Audio In: stereo 16 bit mini
- Speaker: stereo, SRS
- Microphone: mono
- Networking
- Modem: 56 kbps
- Ethernet: 10/100Base-T
Miscellaneous
- Codename: Columbus
- Gestalt ID: 406
- Power: 80 Watts
- Dimensions: 15.8" H x 15.2" W x 17.6" D
- Weight: 40 lbs.
- Minimum OS: 8.1
- Maximum OS: 10.3.9
- Introduced: August 1998
- Terminated: January 1999