Gateway goes face-to-face with iMac

Gateway on Monday unleashed an aggressive ad campaign that directly targets the iMac and released six new Profile 4 PCs that closely match the pricing and configuration of Apple's trendy all-in-one PC.

Gateway's assault on iMac comes two days after Apple released a major upgrade to Mac OS X and amplified its "switchers" marketing campaign aimed at wooing PC users to the Mac.

But Gateway has an ad campaign of its own, which will pit Profile 4 against iMac in head-to-head comparisons--a rarity in the computer industry. Both companies target their all-in-one computers to consumers and use their own company stores to either promote or sell them.

The computers both incorporate liquid-crystal display (LCD) monitors, though the designs differ. The Profile 4 is built around the monitor, whereas the iMac suspends the display from a swinging arm attached to a half-dome base. Apple unveiled the flat-panel iMac in January and upgraded one model to a 17-inch monitor in July.

Gateway's iMac ad counterpunch will bear little resemblance to Apple's switchers campaign, which features former PC users raking over Windows computers as being too hard to use. In one Apple ad, Mac convert and writer Sarah Whistler describes her PC as a "horrid little machine."

Gateway's ads will focus on Profile 4's features and performance as compared with the flat-panel iMac. The spots will tout Profile 4 strengths, such as great memory and bundled software extras, over the flat-panel iMac. The ads will end: "Did we mention the Gateway Profile 4 costs less than the iMac?" Gateway estimates that 83 percent of U.S. adults would see the TV ads an average 14 times through September.

The Poway, Calif.-based PC maker also plans a series of magazine ads that pit the two computers against one other, capped with the headline: "It's a close contest. Until you turn them on."