Apple Customers Report Flawed iMacs

Apple customers are complaining of problems with the 27-inch iMac, including flickering, cracked, or yellow-tinged screens.

More than 80 pages of complaints were listed on Apple's iMac support forum on Monday. The company did not respond to an InformationWeek request for comment in time for this writing.

However, resellers have reported to media delays in shipments of the 27-inch iMacs due to screen problems. On its Web site, Apple says orders for its largest all-in-one computer won't ship for two weeks.

A spokesperson for the company told PC Magazine that the company was "working hard to fulfill orders as quickly as possible." Apple did not acknowledge that there were any iMac flaws.

Nevertheless, the company's support forum indicated that flickering screens were among the most widespread problems. Some customers posted video of the problem on YouTube.

"My iMac arrived 2 days ago and yesterday I saw some flickering with sections going black for an instant, then one case where the whole screen went black momentarily," customer MarkyJ reported.

Others reported unpacking their new iMac only to find a cracked screen.

"I unpacked the i7 iMac just as you did," Macfrenzie said in response to another customer's complaint. "Box upright, and lifted it from the bottom edge of the screen panel -- on the aluminum base edge. The bottom packing foam on the bottom corners came up with the iMac. When I removed the foam -- then you see the crack. The crack is below the foam line border which leads me to think it's a production line defect."

The cracked display appeared to only affect the 27-inch iMac with the Intel Core i7 quad-core processor. The other problems appeared to be more widespread.

Apple introduced the 27-inch model in October. The system include an LED-backlit, high-definition display with a 178-degree viewing angle. The screen resolution is 2560-by-1440 pixels.

Apple in October reported selling 3.05 million Mac computers during the third calendar quarter, a 17% increase over the same period a year ago. Mac sales helped the company's profits and revenue for the period beat Wall Street expectations.