Which Apple computer truly offers you the most bang for your buck? We will break down and compare the cost and features to determine which one takes the cake. Every week we will go over a different Apple Model.

Today we start with the 20″ iMac. All aspects will be given a rating from 1 – 10. 1 being poor and 10 being excellent in value.

At $1499, It comes in at a very unique price point. It is a price that is attractive to both institution and individuals. Institutions love them because one computer is capable of replacing them all. The iMac is a computer that dad can work on and kid can play on.

The biggest aspect of the computer is the display. A 20″ TFT LCD with a resolution of 1680×1050 is relatively high end. Apple has always used incredibly high quality monitors on all of it’s computers. The new generation of iMac is no different. The display makes this iMac the beautiful thing it is. 9 out of 10

CPU. This computer is powered by an Intel Core 2 Duo clocked @2.66GHz. A price of $164.99 means the CPU isn’t really out of this world. However, 2.66GHz goes further on a mac, and soon, even further. I would expect better from the high end 20″ line though. 7 out of 10

Drive Space. 320GBs is definitely moderate. Most people don’t need any more. But we also need to think about the Photographers, the Cinematographers, Recording studios, Film Editors, and a handful of other professions which require mass storage. In a day where we can get a 500GB SATA drive for around $70, I would expect to see nothing less then that in the high end iMac. 7 out of 10

The memory is a key factor when it comes to multi-tasking, something we are all doing more and more. 2GBs of PC2-6400 DDR2 is gonna be enough RAM for 80% of the people. As soon as we see Snow Leopard, 2GBs really will be enough. However, technology isn’t slowing down. When 4GBs of RAM costs less then $100, you can bet people are gonna be buying. So, while 2GBs is enough, you can never have enough ram. 7 out of 10

Graphics. This is one area where Apple really doesn’t skimp. The high end 20″ sports a ATI Radeon HD 2600 PRO GPU with 256MB of GDDR3 memory. This chip is capable of decoding 1080p Blu-ray video which means all you need to do is throw on an external BD drive and your good to go. 10 out of 10

Misc. The port lineup of the iMac is decent. Mini-DV, FW 400,FW 800, USB (3), Optical in, Optical out, 802.11n, and an ir port give the iMac many more ports then most other computers. The optical drive is capable of Slot-loading 8x SuperDrive with 4x double-layer burning (DVD±R DL/DVD±RW/CD-RW). 9 out of 10

Total=8.1 out of 10