So what, my 20" iMac that costs' $1199 isn't least expensive? May not have the best video card, but it gets the job done. Can't wait to see the cease and desist order from Apple.

For $399, you get a POS with no software. What a bargain. All the bells and whistles, including Mac OS X, cost extra.

I agree with lwdesign, at least on the computer. But I'm pretty sure forae isn't a word. I don't think that Apple clones are a good idea, but hopefully it'll wake Apple up a bit. What I want; a tower alternative to the 20" iMac. Same specs, but in a tower, which, correct me if I'm wrong, would allow Apple to sell it at a reduced price. Something to fill up that space between the Mac mini and the iMacs. Which isn't to say that I'd buy one of these clones over a Mac. I'll fork over the cash for an iMac, I'd just rather not have to.

Add this to the "I'm not a lawyer file," but it seems to me that the penultimate paragraph of the article is a bit inaccurate. The PC itself might not be in violation of the OS X EULA (for all you know, someone can buy it and install Windows or Linux on it), but advertising it as being capable of running OS X might. Also, whatever the company did to make it run OS X might run afoul of Apple's copyrights on its firmware.

I agree with this point except that the missing Mac that people have been discussing is not a sub-$1000 consumer-level system. Apple has the consumer space well covered with the Mac mini for casual users and the iMac for a range of consumer-grade computer users; Apple does not cater to the bargain basement market so the Mac mini is as low as it goes. Apple actually designs each system for a given market, so they do not strip down higher-end systems to sell them on the cheap. As Apple’s consumer-level systems goes, Apple actually recognizes that most in the market for a consumer-level system will not perform hardware upgrades beyond maybe adding RAM and have designed the iMac and Mac mini accordingly. Truly comparable Wintel PCs cost just as much as any given iMac and Wintel Mac mini clones typically cost $100 to $200 more than a comparable Mac mini.

The missing Mac is a prosumer/professional system that should be comparable to the Mac Pro in terms of processing power, less expandable than a full-sized tower like the Mac Pro, but expandable all the same unlike the iMac that is and has always been designed to suit the home/education market where hardware upgrades are of minimal concern. Thus, your specs are mostly correct:

• A chassis that is 1/3 to 1/2 the volume of the Mac Pro;
• A single, fast Core Duo for the low-end or a single quad-core Xeon for the higher-end models (this would of course mean two different motherboards);
• 2 internal SATA drive bays;
• a single SuperDrive (moving to SATA would be nice, but even the fastest optical drives are far from pushing the envelope of ATA-100);
• 4 FB-DIMM slots allowing up to 16 GB RAM (4GB is a minimum for many pro users);
• At least two PCIe slots (one for the video card); and,
• Built-in AirPort and Bluetooth.

Such a system would sell in the $1600 to $2600 range with Core Duo systems selling for up to $2000/2100 and the Xeons on the more expensive models. Where the Mac Pro is well suited to pro users that need to add specialized hardware out-of-the-box while maintaining room to grow, those that have large, on-demand, independent storage needs or those needing workstation-level processing capabilities, such users are actually in the minority of the pro market. The other group that benefits from a system like the Mac Pro are hardcore gamers, but the inexcusable lack of variety of cards available for the Mac and the fact that even the most powerful Mac-compatible graphics cards are typically lax compared to Wintel cards precludes the Mac Pro from competing against Wintel gaming rigs.

A constituency of pro users that generally do not perform processor-intensive tasks can get by just fine with something like the iMac. A minority of pro users in highly specialized fields need a system like the Mac Pro, but a large number, if not the majority of pro users, would be best suited by the missing Mac.

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“Cannot run out of time. There is infinite time. You are finite. Zathras is finite. This is wrong tool.” 2.3GHz Power Mac G5/4GB/500GB HDD/OS X 10.4.11/30-inch ACD, 60GB iPod (Color)

Violating the EULA would be on the part of the operator, not the vendor. Second, EULA's really haven't tested in court. On their face, they're a poor example of a solid contractual obligation.

I know people running OS X on off the shelf PC's with no mods to the OS. Apple would have to a sue many more vendors than just these guys.

You point has been brought to the table numerous times in the past and simply put, it is obviously not a concern for most people. Laptops, which are also all-in-one designs, currently outsell desktops, so having to replace everything when it is time to replace a system is apparently of less concern to most than the convenience that all-in-one's provide. The more technically inclined and IT types are more concerned with servicing issues involved with all-in-ones, the average user is not.

So, as I stated previously, the missing Mac is a system that fills the gap between the iMac and Mac Pro. It is that system that has been discussed here previously. In the past there was much discussion about a headless iMac, but it has been established that there is little need for Apple to design such a system for the iMac’s target market. Consumer-level Macs are all about convenience and the all-in-one design is about as convenient as it gets for people for whom having a plethora separate components taking over their desk is not desirable, as is the case for most home users.

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“Cannot run out of time. There is infinite time. You are finite. Zathras is finite. This is wrong tool.” 2.3GHz Power Mac G5/4GB/500GB HDD/OS X 10.4.11/30-inch ACD, 60GB iPod (Color)