History of the World in Apple Objects (15) : Macintosh LC

In the final instalment in this series we have the Macintosh LC. The LC stood for "Low Cost" though that was in relative Apple terms. The LC came in a slim line box known as the pizza box and was equipped with a Motorola 68020 processor and 2MB of RAM. It also had a hard drive.

It went on sale between 1990 and 1992 later superseded by the LC II and LC III, one of which I did have once too.

History of the World in Apple Objects (14) : Workgroup Server 60

The most unusual Macintosh in my collection, the Workgroup Server 60 was a version of the Centris 610 to support small networks of Macs (it came with AppleShare software). The Workgroup Server 60 was released in the Summer of 1993 and sold until the Autumn of 1994.

It had a Motorola 68LC040 processor, 4MB of RAM, an 80MB hard drive and mine has a CD-ROM (an early type of CD-ROM at that with a CD caddy). Not a bad computer for it's day!

History of the World in Apple Objects (13) : Macintosh IIcx

The Macintosh IIcx was introduced in 1989 and sold for two years. It was similar to the IIx though in a smaller and easy to open case which was also used by the more powerful Macintosh IIci which succeeded it. The IIcx came with a Motorola 68030 running at 16Mhz and could support up to 128MB of RAM (though that would have cost the GDP of a small country back then).

The IIcx ran Mac OS 6 up to 7.5.5. Unfortunately this one is unlikely to run anything anymore though still has the cute case!

History of the World in Apple Objects (12) : Macintosh IIci

The Macintosh IIci which was on sale between 1989 and 1993 was a more powerful version of the earlier IIcx and indeed was the most powerful Macintosh for some time. It had a 25Mhz 68030 CPU and at least 1MB of RAM. Now these do not sound much nowadays but back in the day it was a pretty good spec.

It came in a very nice compact case which remains one of my favourite Apple Computer cases. The top is easily removable so you can get at the innards and perform repairs or upgrades. A far cry from today's super locked down units. I'd love a modern Mac in such a case to be honest.

History of the World in Apple Objects (11) : PowerMac 7200

The PowerMac 7200 was one of the second generation PowerPC powered Macintoshes. It was introduced in 1995 with a PowerPC 601 CPU. The 7200 was a decent machine with CD-ROM, capable of running MacOS 7.5.2 up to 9.1 (though sometimes a bit slow on later OS releases). It came in the dull beige case common to Apple in the 1990s before the iMac and everything went colourful (for a bit anyway).

My 7200 was a work station at my first employer Tw2, used for producing web sites. Later it became a dedicated printer workstation. I rescued it when Tw2 went bankrupt.

History of the World in Apple Objects (10) : A2M2002 Apple Joystick

Obviously if you played games on your Apple //e you needed a joystick! The A2M2002 Apple Joystick is in the same grubby beige as the Apple //e itself. We can safely say Apple hardware design has come a long way. The design itself isn't too bad, certainly superior to the Atari type joystick most people used. Though I've never actually used it on my Apple IIs it does feel like it would be quite sensitive. The two fire buttons are a nice touch.

History of the World in Apple Objects (9) : M0001A Mac Plus

The Mac Plus was the third model of Macintosh computer after the 512K. The Mac Plus had a huge 1MB of RAM and could be expanded to a mind boggling (and especially wallet busting in 1986) 4MB! The Mac Plus also introduced the SCSI bus which became the main peripheral port for Macs until USB. Finally the Mac Plus was the first Mac in the Platinum colour which would become standard until the iMac (though earlier ones like mine were still in beige).

Otherwise the Mac Plus followed the same compact format as the two earlier Macs. Also later Macs like the SE and Macintosh II family eclipsed it it remained in production as the (relatively speaking) cheap low-end Mac until 1990. It had the longest production run of any Mac model and was supported until 1997, able to run Mac OS 7.

History of the World in Apple Objects (8) : M1212 Apple Macintosh Color Display

Another set of Apple objects/junk (depending on your point of view) from my collection.

The Apple Macintosh Color Display M1212 is, as you might guess, a monitor. For Macintosh computers. Although a CRT display and thus obsolete these days it did have a Trintron display so had a reasonable display for the time though only had a resolution of 640x480. It had a standard DA-15 Apple connector so could be used with a range of Mac desktops. Whether mine still works is unknown.

I can't remember where the monitor came from. It appears to have a "Faculty of C.I.S." sticker on it so perhaps it came from a university. I may have bought it off Ebay along with one of the Macintosh IIs I have though we are talking around fifteen years now since I last bought any Apple hardware off there!

History of the World in Apple Objects (7) : Macintosh 512K

Following on a few months after the release of the original Macintosh in 1984 was the Macintosh 512K (M0001W). The 512K referring to the memory, a whole half a megabyte of RAM! The original Mac had just 128K of course so the 512K was quite an upgrade. Otherwise the 512K was the same as the original Mac but the extra memory made it a much more useful computer.

Some new applications required the extra memory including Microsoft Excel which was first released for the Mac. The extra memory also enabled an early form of Mac multi-tasking and networking. The 512K remained on sale for 2 years.

The 512K is the oldest Mac in my collection. I use it as a stand for my bedroom clock. The Mac could still work though mine is a US 120v one so would need a converter to use power in this country.

History of the World in Apple Objects (6) : M0130 Macintosh External Floppy Drive

The Macintosh came with a built-in 3.5" floppy drive but in the days before hard drives having two floppy drives was a boon. M0130 was an external floppy drive for the original Macintosh, the follow-on 512K, the Mac Plus and the SE. It would not work with an Apple II.

The disk drive used 400K floppies formatted in the Macintosh File System format. And came in a nice neat beige box to match the original Mac.

History of the World in Apple Objects (5) : Macintosh SE

The Macintosh SE from 1987 was part of the second generation of Macintoshes coming out at the same time as the Macintosh II, unlike the II though the SE was an all-in-one computer like the first Macs. The SE had a number of improvements compared to earlier Macs like the 512K and Plus, it used the new Apple Desktop Bus interface for the keyboard and mouse. ADB would remain the Apple standard until the iMac and USB in the late 1990s.

The Mac SE was also the first compact Mac to have the option of an internal hard drive and had an expansion slot, SE actually standing for System Expansion. The Mac SE was on sale for 3 years, by then Motorola 68000 based computers were becoming a bit outdated and Apple was moving to faster chips.

The Mac SE shown below was the first Mac i ever bought, second hand from a Cash Converters! It did work fine and helped introduce me to the world of Apple in the mid-1990s. I still miss System 6 (a bit!)

History of the World in Apple Objects (4) : Apple IIc

The Apple IIc was Apple's first attempt at a "portable" computer. However it wasn't quite as we would expect a portable these days. Although fairly small and compact (though quite a bit bigger than the Macbook i am typing this on) and came with a carry handle it did not have a built in screen or power supply. Both had to be carried separately.

It was quite impressive from the point of view of technology of the time though (1984) with a built in floppy drive (5.25 inch one too!) and a good full size keyboard. However it lacked the expandability of the hugely successful Apple IIe and as it was released nearly at the same time as the Macintosh some of the technology already looked a bit dated. It was much cheaper than the Mac of course.

The Apple IIc introduced the "Snow White" design language which would define Apple hardware throughout the decade and beyond. Uniquely the Apple IIc was in an off-white colour called "Fog" which was not used on any other Apple computer, which is a shame as it does look pretty good. My Apple IIc did work the last time i tried it though that was a long time ago...

IIc atop the much larger IIe

Ports on the back, and the handle

Underneath

History of the World in Apple Objects (3) : A2M4090 Monitor IIc

The Apple IIc was Apple's first attempt at a portable computer, though was not a laptop as we might imagine today. Merely it was a smaller version of the 8-bit Apple II that was easy to carry around. However the computer needed an external power supply and monitor... the Monitor IIc.

If ever a monitor can be described as cute then the Monitor IIc is. It was small, just a 9" display and green on black. The Apple IIc was the first computer to use Apple's then new "Snow White" design language. Uniquely the IIc family are in a special off-white colour known to Apple as "fog". No other computers were released by Apple in this colour.

History of the World in Apple Objects (2) : M0110 Apple Macintosh Keyboard

A Macintosh is nothing without a mouse but also is a bit pointless without a keyboard too. M0110 was the original Macintosh keyboard from 1984. It was connected to the Mac via a telephone style connector. It isn't a bad keyboard to be honest with a reasonable feel and has a nice chunky solid feel about it.

Apple wanted people to only use the mouse to select items so the keyboard has no arrow keys. It also didn't have a numeric keypad. This came with the M0110A keyboard in 1986 for the Macintosh Plus. Both keyboards are displayed below, the M0110A is a fair bit bigger and also has arrow keys though has a similar feel.

History of the World in Apple Objects (1) : M0100 Macintosh Mouse

This new series is inspired by the "History of the world in 100 objects" and similar. Though will not actually explore the history of the world, instead it will look at some of the Apple items in my collection. Not just actual Macs but peripherals too. I'll be sticking to the classic era (when everything was beige or grey) before MacOSX and everything went transparent and then shiny.

Starting with the icon (ahem) that is the Apple Mouse. M0100 was the first Macintosh Mouse which shipped with the original Macintosh back in 1984. The Macintosh Mouse was actually just a modified version of the Lisa Mouse and they are interchangeable.

My M0100

The mouse is a pleasing block shape. I'm not sure how good this would be to use all day but it seems to be nice to hold. The single (of course) mouse button has a nice click to it even after all these years.

The Macintosh Mouse (like the Lisa one) uses a DE-9 connector. Then quite a standard connector for peripherals.

How do i connect this to my Macbook Pro?

Well the Apple Macintosh changed the world, or at least showed a different way in computing though it was a number of years before people were clicking icons instead of typing in commands on their personal computers. Without the Mac it may well have happened anyway but it is likely that Apple's stimulus bought about the mouse driven computer world just that little bit sooner.