December 29, 1999: Apple begins transport its unfathomably giant 22-inch Cinema Show.

The largest LCD pc show out there wherever on the time, Apple’s all-digital flat panel is a far cry from the cumbersome cathode ray tube monitor of the favored iMac G3, which took the world by storm the earlier 12 months. Additionally it is Apple’s first widescreen show — and the primary to sport a digital video interface.

The Cinema Show: Apple’s finest show but

“That is the show we’ve all dreamed about for 20 years,” stated Steve Jobs, Apple’s interim CEO, on the time. “The Apple Cinema Show is indubitably the most important, probably the most superior and probably the most lovely LCD show ever supplied.”

Apart from its dimension and form, what was so dazzling about Apple’s $3,999 Cinema Show was its thinness and vibrancy. Thinness is one thing we now affiliate with Apple design. It’s straightforward to take as a right after years of more and more slim iPhones, iPads and MacBooks.

Nonetheless, when the Cinema Show shipped, Apple hadn’t but gotten round to its obsession with anorexic computer systems. In consequence, the existence of a flat-panel monitor appeared astonishing.

Elsewhere, Apple continued constructing CRT screens till 2006 — when it shipped its final CRT Mac — and common customers didn’t get flat-panel LCD shows till the iMac G4 in 2002. For one with a display near the dimensions of the Cinema Show, they needed to wait till November 2003. That’s when Apple debuted the 20-inch iMac G4, its largest flat-panel, all-in-one pc but. Even then, it couldn’t fairly match the 22-inch Cinema Show’s dimension.

Apple Cinema Show specs

By way of vibrancy, the show’s LCD colours popped in a method that they hadn’t on CRTs. It featured a 16:9 facet ratio and a show decision of 1600×1024. The purpose? Attraction to high-end graphics professionals and creatives, who had remained loyal (if pissed off) Apple customers through the earlier decade.

With that in thoughts, Apple designed the Cinema Show to work with the high-end Energy Mac G4 line. That pc supplied higher graphics efficiency and different superior options for energy customers. Apple’s concentrating on of these within the inventive industries was subtly made clear by way of the Cinema Show design, which included a stand paying homage to a painter’s easel.

Calling the display a Cinema Show additionally pointed towards a course Apple was simply beginning to discover: the pc as leisure hub. That very same 12 months, Apple launched its film trailer web site, apple.com/trailers, which let customers watch film trailers at a top quality unparalleled wherever else. It will be a number of extra years earlier than Apple began letting customers obtain films by way of the iTunes Retailer. However the Cinema Show helped make this service compelling.

Cinema Show goes bye-bye

Apple continued to be excited in regards to the Cinema Show for the following decade. The shows obtained bigger and bigger, ultimately topping out at 30 inches. The corporate ultimately discontinued the road in 2011, changing it with the Thunderbolt Show, which it stopped making in 2016.

That wasn’t the top of Cupertino’s dabbling in shows, although. Apple launched the high-end Professional Show XDR in 2019. With a 32-inch Retina 6K display and a $4,999 price ticket, it’s positively geared toward professionals. (An elective Professional Show XDR stands provides $999 to the worth.) Whereas the Professional Show XDR picked up awards, it stays out of attain of common customers.

The Apple Studio Show — a high-end monitor that prices “simply” $1,599 — arrived in March 2022 alongside the Mac Studio desktop. This midrange {hardware} barrage supplied elevated efficiency at extra reasonably priced costs than Apple’s professional desktop lineup.

Cinema Show’s design legacy

Nonetheless, a long time after its launch, the Cinema Show’s legacy can nonetheless be seen by any iMac. Regardless of a number of redesigns — the most up-to-date coming in April 2021 — the favored all-in-one pc carries the identical widescreen, flat-panel design that Apple launched again in 1999.

Did you personal an Apple Cinema Show? What’s your favourite Apple monitor of all time? Depart your feedback under.