If you ask us, time's plowing forward way too fast these days. Can you believe that today marks the iMac's fifth birthday? That's right, it was exactly five years ago today that the iMac's original incarnation burst forth from Apple's forehead clad in Bondi Blue armor, carrying within it depths of wisdom that only now have become understood by the world at large. Oh, sure, there are still a few holdouts protectively clutching floppies to their chests with a grim look of determination, but for the most part the civilized world has come to accept the floppy's well-deserved demise as originally heralded by the iMac's debut. And what about the elimination of legacy ports? Five years ago the acronym "USB" stood for "What The Dingus Is THIS Port?" These days, however, USB isn't just ubiquitous, it's v-, w-, and x-biquitous as well. You can't buy a freakin' microwave burrito anymore without discovering at least two USB ports on the back.

(There was also, of course, the iMac-driven Colored Translucent Plastic Revolution, which, in these enlightened times, is rarely mentioned anymore-- and then only in guarded whispers by people glancing furtively from side to side. Now let us never speak of it again.)

But their paradigm-bending legacy aside, are the original iMacs still relevant half a decade later? Longtime viewers may recall that five years ago today, the AtAT staff actually woke up early on a Saturday (a feat we've only repeated since for Apple retail grand openings) and drove a couple of hours across state lines in order to purchase the only three iMacs on the planet that hadn't already been spoken for by anxious preorderers. One was for us, one was for Jack's dad, and one was for Amy-- a Friend o' AtAT who was trading up from a decidedly all-too-beige Power Mac 7300. We're not sure if Amy's is still in active service (she's since bought a Graphite iBook and then a titanium PowerBook G4), but ours is still running, albeit mostly as a sync station for one of our Treos, and Dad's is definitely getting plenty of use-- at least judging by the troubleshooting call we got just a couple of nights ago. (Helpful tip: a Pro Mouse probably won't work if it's plugged into the keyboard which is plugged into a hub which is plugged into the iMac.) So if you were wondering about an iMac's mandatory retirement age, apparently five years ain't it.

Still, even in the Mac world, where systems tend to stay usable and productive long after similarly-aged Wintels have been relegated to doorstop duty, five years is still a hefty chunk of time, so the original iMac is starting to look just a little bit tired. Its 233 MHz G3 processor is starting to fall below the minimum requirements of some new mainstream software. It lacks FireWire, so it can't host an iPod or an iSight. And while technically it'll be able to run Panther, we suspect that actually trying it might make you drastically redefine your internal definition of the word "run." (We'll let you know, since we'll probably try to shoehorn Panther on ours as soon as it ships.)

But just because it looks a little droopy doesn't mean it doesn't also look fantastic for its age. Industrial-design-wise, it still puts the vast majority of the Wintel world to shame, and if you ask us, it even holds up pretty well against the Apple products of today. Face it, this thing is aging like Cher. So happy birthday, iMac, and here's to many more years of fun before you leave a great-looking corpse!