Unfortunately I got intense headaches using it, due to the brightness & glossy surface, even in a rather dark room. The screen may look great under the bright lights in the AppleStore – where the high contrast and color saturation still makes things “pop” – the reality of extended use I found to be something entirely different. If you dial the brightness down to a more reasonable level [for me less than half] it takes away the color saturation, and you still have all the reflections to deal with.

At the suggestion of a couple of AppleStore employees with photography/video editing experience, I bought a connector to add my old 20″ matte cinema display. While not having the resolution or newer technology of the iMac screen, the color differences [even after both were calibrated] are quite clear. But more importantly, the comfort factor difference is astonishing. Apple Help has no idea what the native brightness standard should be prior to color calibration, and am awaiting a response from engineering to find out as at max brightness, it’s enough to burn holes in your eyes If calibrated to that standard, then dialed back for eye comfort any photo adjustments will then be off for printing or web use.

If you’re primarily using the machine to read/write text, play games, and watch DVD’s in very controlled lighting – then I can imagine this screen would be something you’d be interested in [however "overpowered" it would be to get the i5/7 version for that]. But if you are using it for media production, I have to reluctantly tell you to stay away unless you already have worked with this screen before.

The experienced AppleStore employees told me that I would never be happy with the glossy/bright screen [where were they when I was shopping - and was told it would be "incredible...perfect...fantastic" by others?] and should consider going with a matte screen [build-to-order option] with the MacBook Pro 15″ or 17″ and combine it with a matte monitor [I'm looking at Dell's 30" for $900 as Apple's old 30" is far more even on clearance]. Not exactly what I had in mind, and a lot more $$ – but at this point I know I can’t comfortably work with this screen.

Yes – the machine appears to be very fast [i7] even without the additional 8GB of RAM I bought but haven’t installed yet. And yes – eyesights are different – but now that I have the Issue, and have been doing a lot more reading about it, it appears I’m with the majority of users who do media work.

While wanting to avoid too much detail – transfer from my G5 Tower using Tiger was very seemless, with one glaring exception: there were 3 .dfonts that came up that the i7 said I should trash [lucinda, geneva, helvetica] in order for the new OS to work properly – which I did – resulting in most displays on the computer, from the browser to the screenbar being unreadable with capital “A’s” instead of the text…until I dumped them back into a font folder. AppleHelp still believes this will cause other issues down the road – but at least I can read the text on my screen now.

A keen disappointment, with many wasted hours and many yet to go before resolution, but I wanted to alert others who may be considering a purchase now.

But now to the iMac…
I have had no heat issues, no DVD slot issues. This iMac screen is big but not too big.
I was worried 27 was way overkill, but I enjoy the xtra realestate. Super clear picture screen, great sound from the built in speakers.
And I easily added 4 more GB memory via a removable slot at the bottom of the monitor. It takes small notebook-type memory.
Comes with 4GB (2-2GB mem cards = 4GB), but has a total of 4 slots. So you just need to add “two” more 2GB cards to get 8GB total.
Very simple to add. Just 3 screws to remove and pop the memory in. Many youtubes out there to show you in detail (if needed).
Just search youtube “imac adding upgrading memory”.

Everything worked right out of the box and on first power-up. Bluetooth mouse, keyboard paired right away.
Wireless mouse, keyboard, wireless internet. So you know what THAT means…? only one cable for the power.
No more messy multi cables. QUIET !!! These iMac’s make no sound. Total silence. iLOVE that!

Im totally new to the apple iMac and their OS system, and I have enjoyed the learning experience.
Had this new 27′ iMac for a while now, and never one blue-screen, never one freeze-up, never one system-hang. NOT ONE !!!
Love the new mouse and touch scrolling.. WOW!!! Love the small compact keyboard.

If you want to spend your time using the computer, and not waste time getting the computer to work, this is the
only way to go. Slick…Quiet…fast… (really fast), and just a true pleasure learning experience all around.

The 27″ display and 2560×1440 resolution is just awesome (although I may have to get new glasses). Adding printers, external drives, Mac and non-Mac software just works. No problems, no hunting and pecking, it just works with minimum effort. I even loaded my RealBasic development software and created my first Mac application. I tried connecting wired and wireless to my Dish internet service and it works perfectly. I’ve had none of the problems of other reviewers (yet).

The screen glare could be a problem but I like my lighting overhead and the rest of my office dark. The top of the display does get a bit toasty but not near as bad as some laptops I’ve had. The only real problem I can see is that Apple has a strange way of adding memory. The screws to the access door are so tiny and appear to be none standard, so I had a difficult time getting to the memory. I can see where those of you with sausage fingers and minimum dexterity with a screwdriver could strip the screws.

I’m still learning my way around the Snow Leopard OS with a couple of Dummy books but what I see so far is very impressive. If it changes I’ll report back.

This item says it will ship almost a month or more after its purchase date, but don’t believe that. I placed my order on Thursday June 10th. The following Thursday June 17th, I received an email saying and my item’s shipping date had been updated and it would ship out that day and shockingly, would be delivered the very next day. So really it took only one week and one day from the time I ordered it, to get the computer on Friday June 18th. Not so bad after all.

I wish Amazon would not sandbag so much on these lead times because I was very close to cancelling my order all week, taking the tax hit ($234) and just buying the i5 iMac directly from the Apple store down the street, since it was telling me I wouldn’t get delivery until July 16th-July 30th. I’m glad I waited though and didn’t act on that urge to cancel.

As for the item itself, everything arrived in ship shape, no damage, no issues and I’m loving the iMac so far. I didn’t give 5 stars because I think Amazon should stop over estimating these delivery times and be more realistic its customers. I guarantee they are losing business over it and scaring people off who would otherwise buy from Amazon and get a great deal. No one wants to wait a month or more to get something like this once they’ve finally made the decision to make such a big purchase and are excited and anxious to get it, regardless of the tax savings. But by offering this item tax free and shipping as fast as they did, it really is a huge savings and a great deal to buy through Amazon and I recommend it to everyone.