Get ready to fry.

Earlier this week Apple announced the new iMacs in 21.5″ and 27″ screen sizes. The usual Cupertino Hype tells us there’s lots to like – bigger screens, slimmer, faster, etc. So it has an unusable high gloss mirror for a screen. A minor inconvenience for jewelry buyers.

But a moment’s review of the internal design gives one pause – and I’m speaking from expertise gleaned from having lost one iMac (a 20″) and almost lost another (24″) to bad thermal engineering.

Here’s how the new iMacs look under the skin:

The new 27″ iMac’s guts

Even those of you reading this without an honors degree in Mechanical Engineering (yes, I have one of those) who did not graduate at the top of your class (I did that too, around the time I took yesterday’s snap) can see the obvious design error in the older iMacs has been carried over to the latest iteration. The hot running CPU (because it is from a laptop, not built for desktop use) and the fan below are circled in red. The direction of the blast of superheated air emanating from this assembly is indicated by the green arrow. That hot air toasts the motherboard which is a seriously cramped and compromised design lifted from a laptop to ensure everything fits with Mr. Jobs’s thinness obsession.

I don’t think I need say more, even to readers who don’t know Farenheit from Celsius.

But wait, you exclaim. You said something about a toaster?

Why, yes. The bread goes in the right hand side, denoted by the yellow arrow. It has to be super slim, of course.