Some tech you use for a few years and forget. Some, you look at 24 years later and your heart still skips a beat. For me, the iMac G4 is the second kind — the sunflower computer I collect, take apart, build projects with, and still hunt down one shell and one arm at a time, all over the world.
A full-box one that still runs
Right as Apple was launching its new products, I chose to unbox something very old: an iMac G4 still in its original box, in great shape, fully working and complete with everything it came with. For a lot of people, I think opening this box carries more emotion than holding a brand-new iPhone.
You can read the history of the iMac G4 almost anywhere — search the web or ask an AI and you’ll find a pile of great stories. Here I just want to share my own obsession with this design, for anyone who hasn’t met it yet and for everyone who still loves it.
Lift the lid and there’s the Pro Mouse, sitting neatly on top — then the machine, the keyboard and the clear speakers.
When computers were just boxes
The iMac G4 was unveiled on January 7, 2002 at Macworld San Francisco — 24 years ago now. Back then every computer was a boxy, clunky thing: a huge CRT in front, all the hardware crammed behind it. The iMac G4 flipped all of that on its head.
The entire computer — logic board, optical drive, power supply — lives in a white hemispherical base. The flat LCD seems to float above it on a gleaming arm. Even today, it still looks like nothing else.
In Apple’s entire lineup, to this day, this is the one product where I feel its makers truly dared to trade between art and technology to create something that sits right where the two meet.
— Duong Tran, Ariel Studio
A sunflower on your desk
The story often told: Steve Jobs suggested taking inspiration from the sunflowers in his garden. Apple never gave it an official name, but every Mac fan gets the idea — the base is the root, the arm is the stem, and the screen is the flower that always turns toward whoever sits in front of it.
People call it the “Sunflower”; some call it the “iLamp” because it looks like a desk lamp. Call it whatever you like — you recognize it the second you see it.
The arm — the soul of the machine
What I love most about the iMac G4 is this arm. Polished stainless steel that shines like chrome, with every cable routed inside, so from the outside you only see one clean curve. A spring inside balances the exact weight of the screen, so a light touch is all it takes to move it.
Watch closely: as you raise or lower it, the screen’s tilt barely changes. The display also tilts through about 35°, swivels 180° side to side and moves up or down about 18 cm (7 inches). In 2002, a computer that could move like that was an absolute delight.
The iMac G4 came in three screen sizes: 15-inch (early 2002), 17-inch widescreen (mid-2002) and 20-inch (late 2003). Each size has its own arm, with a spring tuned to the weight of that screen. So if you find an arm from the 20-inch — the rarest one — you can’t mount a 15-inch screen on it, because the spring inside is stronger. I’ve tried.
A light touch moves the screen up and down, and the tilt stays put.
That mechanism is still alive
Something you might not know: as I see it, that lift mechanism that keeps the screen’s angle is still around in Apple’s displays today — like the stand of the Pro Display XDR I use.
Mechanics, machining and metallurgy have come a long way, so everything got slimmer. But dig up a technical drawing and you’ll see the principle inside is almost exactly the mechanism from 24 years ago.
A computer with feelings
Why do I call the iMac G4 a meeting of technology and art? Because beyond being practical, fun and a break from the computer market of the time, its designers wanted it to feel human: emotional and interactive. You can make it nod, turn away, look back at you.
Find Apple’s TV ad for it from that year and you’ll see it portrayed as a character that moves. Even the disc tray sliding out and back in feels like an expression — playful and genuinely lovable.
The original video on the Ariel Studio channel (in Vietnamese) — 9 minutes of unboxing and storytelling.
The day I sat and talked to it
The inspiration I got from this machine years ago is exactly why I started collecting it — and then built Revive iMac G4, putting a Mac mini M4 inside a 2002 shell. The day I finished, I sat in front of it and talked to it for a long, long time. There was so much I wanted to say, so much I felt.
Maybe it’s because I come from a mechanical engineering background: I love products that are unique and packed with brainpower — with a big story behind them.
See the Revive iMac G4 project →
Revive iMac G4: a 2002 shell, a Mac mini M4 heart — and an evening spent talking to it.
Hunting it down, piece by piece
For years I’ve kept searching for iMac G4s in good shape, or loose parts of them. If I spot something beautiful online — in some other country, on eBay or Amazon — I buy it, ship it home and store it: a shell from one place, a body from another, an arm from somewhere else.
Like this 17-inch display shell — noticeably bigger than the 15-inch you just saw. Or the back cover of a 20-inch: I only found that one piece, but it’s in great condition. And this is a back cover I redesigned myself and had printed abroad in a transparent material — the idea was an iMac G4 with a see-through body. It’s still on the shelf; I haven’t taken it further yet.
And the most interesting, most unique part of the iMac G4: an arm in beautiful, like-new condition. I keep all of it, waiting for the day a better idea shows up — then I’ll start new projects that are more unique and more fun.
Why something this good lived so short
The iMac G4 was only sold for about two and a half years — from January 2002 to August 2004, when the iMac G5 took its place. That’s the flow of technology: the company grew, LCDs got thinner, and the trend shifted toward practicality and efficiency.
Perfecting small details and precision mechanics like these takes a huge amount of effort and time, with more risk and higher cost — so things got traded away bit by bit. From around 2005 on, practicality moved into Apple’s products, and you’ll notice they started to look more and more alike.
Every time feels like the first time
Every time I get another one, collect another part or build something with it, I feel exactly the way I did at the start. Because I love iconic products with great stories behind them — and the iMac G4 is a turning point in the industrial design of computers as a whole, not just Apple’s.
I think it’ll take a long time, a lot of luck, or a lot of conditions lining up before another product this iconic appears. Today everything is more practical and more data-driven. The question is: does anyone still dare to build breakthrough products and trade away that much for them? Only then do we get products worth looking at — and worth remembering.
My “white Apple” corner: the iMac G4 next to a Mac mini, an iPod and a white MacBook.
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