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Shares of Apple on Thursday rose to their highest level in nearly four years ahead of the launch of Hewlett-Packard's version of the iPod digital music player and the launch of Apple's revamped iMac computer. "Tomorrow you've got HP doing their consumer electronics launch and the HP iPod launch, and next week there's the introduction of the new iMac," said Shannon Cross, an analyst at Cross Research. Shares of Apple rose $1.73, or 5.2 percent, to $34.78 on the Nasdaq, where they were among the most active issues. So far this year, Apple stock has climbed 63 percent.