| Apple gets a bad rap for having "pricey" computers, but I've never found them to be such. Just look at what this baby comes with: 256 MB RAM.
The wonderful G4 processor, at 800 MHz, which is deceptively fast.
80 GB Ultra ATA Hard Drive
The SuperDrive which lets me burn CDs and DVDs.
A crystal clear 17" flat panel display. Flat panel monitors run into the HUNDREDS of dollars by themselves (...).
10/100 Base-T ethernet port.
TWO FireWire Ports
FIVE USB ports (three on the console, two on the keyboard)
NVIDIA GForce 4 MX Graphics card
Apple Pro Optical Mouse
Apple Pro speakers, and they are outstanding.
Built-in Microphone
Built in Airport antenna, for wireless networking.
Mac OS 9 and the luscious, UNIX-based Jaguar (OS X 10.2)
AppleWorks, a convenient suite of Office-type apps. Their database app is one of the easiest and friendliest around. I store lists of books, CDs and other such things with it.
Explorer
Quicken
The amazing iApps: iChat, iMovie, iPhoto, iDVD and iTunes, all of which make computing so easy and fun in the digital age.
And still more apps--too many to list here. To buy a quality PC with all of these things would cost about the same, if not more. The ports alone make this a good investment. Best of all, I know all the things in this computer will work together. That's what having a Mac is all about. As always, Apple doesn't do anything on the cheap, not even with their "everyman" computers, like the iMac. Everything here is top of the line, and it all works beautifully. The most taxing thing about setting up the computer was getting it out of the box (the design makes it more fragile than most computers). Once I had that done, I had it up and running in about 15 minutes--and some of that time was spent upgrading to Jaguar. Connecting to my husband's Powerbook through our DSL router was as easy as clicking on Connect to Server, then clicking on his computer in the listbox. Jaguar even recognized my son's PC, and I was yanking mp3s off there, very fast. The computer itself is very quiet, although the SuperDrive can get rather noisy at times. But the hard drive? Barely a peep out of it. The display is crisp and clean. The screen really does move with the touch of one finger--smoothly, effortlessly. The G4 processor screams through apps. Burning mp3s and CDs has never been easier, thanks to iTunes. Downloading mp3s and audio books to my iPod is a dream--and speedy indeed over the FireWire connection. I made a DVD the other day of just some clips that I'd collected over the years, and it was disgustingly easy with iDVD. I connected my new Olympus digital camera through the USB port; iPhoto popped right up and filled up the screen with thumbnails of my digital images--with only one click asking if I wanted iPhoto to always do that. Everything just WORKS with this computer, seamlessly, flawlessly, which has been the most refreshing thing about switching to Apple. But let's face it: Besides the fact that it's a Macintosh, which means a user-friendly computer with quality hardware, the real reason anyone buys this new iMac is because its design is flat-out cool. It is so beautiful that, even weeks after receiving it, I'll just sit there staring at it, still amazed that THIS is a computer. Having my computer's circuitry nestled under a dome rather than entombed in yet another rectangular box is a delight. A round computer case! Who but Apple would have thought of it? Everybody will copy this idea (Gateway[snort!] has already tried), but, as usual, no one will come close to matching the sheer ingenuity of what Apple has done. Don't be fooled by wannabes. This is the real thing, and it's worth every penny you'll spend on it--and then some. | 
"Irresistible but with a few catches."