May 13th... I'm counting the days

I got confirmation from Apple this weekend that our iMac has shipped, and according to FedEx we should get it on May 13th.  NICE!

So five more days... 

FTW! Just ordered a 27" iMac for the house!

The new line of iMacs were released today, and since Flip and I have been looking at getting a desktop system for the house we decided to splurge some of our income tax return on an iMac.  Well it's done... I just clicked Submit on this baby:

27-inch iMac

• Ships: 2 - 4 Business days
• Delivers: May 11 - May 13 by Standard Shipping
• Part number: Z0M6

Configuration

• 2.7GHz Quad-Core Intel Core i5
• 4GB 1333MHz DDR3 SDRAM - 2x2GB
• 1TB Serial ATA Drive
• AMD Radeon HD 6770M 512MB GDDR5

• Magic Trackpad
• Apple Keyboard with Numeric Keypad (English) & User's Guide
• Apple Remote
• Accessory Kit

I really debated between the 21.5" with a Core i7 or a 27" with a Core i5, but honestly I think I'll use the screen real estate more than I'll use the extra seconds of processing time.  Most benchmark comparisons between the i5 and i7 weren't huge.  Yes, an i7 can rip a DVD and render video maybe 5% faster, but having that massive screen I think will be more beneficial given I'll probably be using it more with XCode, Eclipse, and NetBeans plus using the standards like iTunes, iPhoto, etc. 

So I'm pretty excited...  New Toy!

Buying an iMac soon... Yay!

For years Flip and I have used laptops as our primary systems, hers a Mac and mine Linux, but we've been talking more and more lately about getting a desktop computer.  So we're checking out the iMacs.  I was about ready to pull the trigger on my order when one of Flip's co-workers suggested we hold off until next week when hopefully the new line if iMacs will be released which I confirmed on a few Mac rumor websites.

But for the time being here's what I have spec'ed out:

• iMac 27"
• 3.20GHz Intel Core i3
• 4GB 1333MHz DDR3 SDRAM - 2x2GB
• 1TB Serial ATA Drive
• ATI Radeon HD 5750 1GB GDDR5 SDRAM
• 8x double-layer SuperDrive
• Apple Keyboard with Numeric Keypad (English) & User's Guide
• Magic Mouse + Magic Trackpad
• AppleCare Protection Plan for iMac - Auto-enroll

This comes to $1922 and probably in a few months I'll add 8 Gigs of Ram from Newegg for $90 (Apple wants $180 to add 4 Gigs) plus I'd like to add one if not two external 1TB drives for about $70 each also from Newegg (Apple wants $180 to add another 1TB of drive space).  I am sticking with the stock Core i3 processor but I'm upgrading the Video card from 512 Megs to 1Gig.

All and all this looks like a sweet system, so I'm curious to see what they change next week.  They're talking about adding Thunderbolt and Sandy Bridge, but I'm not sure I'll get much out of either of those but it'll be nice to have I guess.