Who gives a Rats arse?

Frankly. If.... IF.... Apple have printed something that just isn't so in their adverts (IE claimed "Millions" when it's "Thousands"), then the purchasers have been misled and deserve their money back. For something as subjective as whether the colours look "Flat" to you - you probably should have "tried before your buyed". At the end of the day, the monitor is still plenty good enough for surfing the net, watching videos etc etc. Which is what the Mac was sold to do.

I know they've been the darlings of people who need accurate colour for some time, but maybe Apple feel they're better off building a machine at a price that suits the mass-market, rather than building an expensive machine to suit one minority?

I know it sucks a fat one, but Apple are changing and moving from provider of specialist computers to a few minority markets to purveyor of mass-market technology to all-and-sundry, and their product focus has shifted to reflect this change in targetted demographic. I'm not sure it will work, to be honest. I think the Wintel PC may have too big a stranglehold. But, if it doesn't, at least they'll have iPod revenue to keep them going (unless they fuck that up, too..)

corrections

First: unless your images were taken with an extremely expensive tripple CCD camera supporting true 24 bit color, than even a 6 bit (technically 18 bit) color monitor can display every color and more your camera can represent.

Second: Apple's prices are not inflated. Go to Dell.com, try to build a comperable system to either an iMac, Mac Pro, Macbook, or Macbook Pro. You can't do it, the Dell systems are ALL more expensive. (if you leave out the webcam you can build a macbook clone that's $30 cheaper than Apple, but since Dell doesn't offer 13" system with dedicated video, you have to get a 14" which is bigger and weighs more than a pound more). You CAN build a cheaper Dell than a mini, but then it's also not 10" square... the Mac Pro ($2700) equiovolent from Dell, $4000...

Third, sicne dithering is done at 70Hz, and the human eye only sees at about 30, dithering 6 bit color can actually produce 100X more colors than the eye and brain are capable of seeing. (about 68 billion colors) Only in rare cases with specifically designed images can the difference be seen.

Fourth: Placing a dell screen side by side with any other, iMac or not, is not a fair comparison. The Dell screen you have likely has a much deeper black as most stand alone monitors do, and also will have a diferent pre-set contract rating. If you want a good screen, add a Cinema display beside your iMac, or get any one of a number from Acer, LG, or Samsung that use the 6ms display panels. They'll all outshine the Dell screen. On a side note, the Apple display is made by the same people that supply most of Dell's own monitor panels... I happen to have 3 Acer 19" monitors on my desk. All the of them show colors slightly different even though they're all the same model and all have the same software configuration. It took me hours of using the OSD controls to even get them close to each other... I have 2 Westinghouse (panels made by samsung) professional series 22" screens, and they are perfectly identical. The Westinghouse screens were designed for editing, the Acer not.

fifth: no real people expect you to do professional editing on an iMac. If you have a $2000 digital SRL or $400 hansol digital camera, a copy of Photoshop, and plan on taking high res 24 bit images, then realistically your looking at a system comperable to a Mac Pro, and you'll want a 24 or 30" display anyway. If you're editing the pics from your 8MP Sony camera, it's only a "simulated" 24 bit image, taken by snapping 3 quick images in succession on the same CCD panel, thereby being a DITHERED image in the first place, and with even lower accuracy than a 6 bit display (18 bit native color)

Six: The screen type used in the 24" mac is no longer available in 20" models. there was one choice; use a TN 20" instead of the ISP used in the 24", or go even further below to a TFT, which although techniocally has better color accuracy, but has visible range limits, requires more power, and is actually 2 screens glued together (and you can usually see the line halfway through and using metering devices tell a color difference between the top and bottom screens on most TFT displays). They're still displaying millions of colors. your eye can't tell it's being dithered.

Seven: Every single one of you posting in this column are either using TFT or TN screens, unless you happen to have a shiny new 23" plus screen that is true 8 bit (like a cinema diaplay from Apple) and connected using digital cables directly to a DVI or HDMI port.

eight: Apple does disclose in the white papers the specific details of the 20" and 24" screen. Just because the chose NOT to include this fairly irrelevent piece of information in the summary page on Apple.com for the general iMac itself does NOT mean they did not disclose this difference.

last: This lawsuit was filed by lawyers, not a complaining user or purchaser. therefore, this is nothing more than a troll lawsuit.