The 27in iMac would make an excellent TV

Have the new iMacs taken us one step closer to having a full fledged computer in our living room? Hard core geeks have been attaching media PC’s to their home theatres for years, but they’ve ultimately acted as media players and not full fledged computers for most. Sure playing a video game on your LCD television is pretty badass, but television resolutions don’t add up to the same kind of quality you would get out of a monitor. With the release of the new iMac line, and particularly the 27in model, it’s becoming more of a possibility that we’ll start using monitors as televisions, especially when you consider what you can do with a full fledged OS X installation attached to it. Kinda makes the AppleTV look pathetic doesn’t it? A 27in iMac, with a 16:9 aspect ratio, and a total resolution of 2560 by 1440 pixels sure kicks a 28in, 1080p LCD TV square in the nuts.

Sure an iMac for 1,999.00 is a lot more expensive than a television for 499.00, but when you start to add in a blu-ray player, and a media centre pc you’re starting to get close the cost of an iMac. It makes me wonder a little bit where the iMac line might be headed. Could it be the Apple Television that has been buzzing around the rumour mill? Don’t forget that Apple currently makes a 30in Monitor that’s due for a refresh soon. It’s the only Apple product that hasn’t had a refresh to the new format, and it would certainly make an excellent TV once it does.

I’m not sure just how practical the setup would be currently, and the price is still a little steep for most budgets, but it’s certainly starting to enter the realm of possibilities, and I for one would be ecstatic if we started to see televisions with powerful computers built into them, and who better to start the trend than Apple. If they want us to give up disc players for digital downloads, it would certainly make sense that they’re working on a better way to get the content to the television, without having to stream across a network.

Man, the possibilities. Could you imagine playing Diablo III at full resolution on your television, instead of at your cramped desk? Bliss.

Joshua is the Content Marketing Manager at BuySellAds. He’s also the founder of Macgasm.net. And since all that doesn’t quite give him enough content to wrangle, he’s also a technology journalist in his spare time, with bylines at PCWorld, Macworld… Full Bio