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Apple Ships First Intel-based iMacs

Apple CEO Steve Jobs debuted the first new iMacs based on Intel CPUs at the company’s MacWorld Expo in San Francisco on Tuesday -- two of them available immediately.

The new iMacs -- two desktops and two notebooks -- are built around Intel’s Core Duo dual-core processors and run Mac OS X. The design includes a built-in video camera for video conferencing out-of-the-box, and a remote control.

All four new machines feature a SuperDrive for DVD burning, and between 512MB and 1GB of 667MHz DDR2 SDRAM, which is expandable to 2GB, hard drive storage up to 500GB (on the desktops), and graphics driven by an ATI Radeon X1600 video card with 128MB of GDDR3 memory, the company said in a statement. Additionally, the new iMacs include built-in 10/100/1000 BASE-T Gigabit Ethernet, AirPort Extreme for 54Mbps wireless networking, and Bluetooth 2.0+EDR (Enhanced Data Rate).

The systems run on Mac OS X version 10.4.4 and include Apple’s Rosetta software translation technology, which is planned to be enabled in most OS X PowerPC applications.

A 1.83Ghz desktop system with a 17-inch display starts at $1,299, while a 2Ghz desktop with a 20-inch monitor starts at $1,699. Both are shipping now. The new MacBook Pro running at 1.67Ghz and with a 15.4-inch display costs $1,999 while one with a 1.83Ghz processor costs $2,499. The new MacBook Pros will ship in February, the company said.

About the Author

Stuart J. Johnston has covered technology, especially Microsoft, since February 1988 for InfoWorld, Computerworld, Information Week, and PC World, as well as for Enterprise Developer, XML & Web Services, and .NET magazines.

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