MicroMac provided several products to upgrade the Color Classic, a perennial favorite among Mac collectors, as well as many other Macs. Although pages on the company website have not been updated since 1998-2000, we provide this as a look back at some very innovative upgrades.
Category Archives: All-in-One
As documented by Charlie Springer on his web page, the Macintosh SE in a clear plastic casing is a very rare find. Only a small number (reportedly 20) of the transparent cases were made from the SE case molds before they were textured – and only 10 of these were built into working computers.
The LC 580 (a.k.a. Performa 580 and 588) is essentially an LC 575 with a new logic board that supports an IDE hard drive (instead of the more expensive SCSI hard drive used in earlier 500 series Macs) and uses a less expensive monitor.
Apple released ten different “compact” all-in-one Macs between 1984 and 1993. Some used a 9″ b&w display, others a 10″ color screen. Some ran 68000 CPUs at 8 MHz, others 68030 CPUs at 16 MHz or 33 MHz. Some had expansion slots and drive bays, others didn’t. Memory ranged from 128 KB in the original […]
he LC 575 (a.k.a. Performa 575, 577, and 578) is essentially a Quadra 605 motherboard in an LC 520/550 case.
The first cable-ready Macintosh! No, not ready for a cable modem – ready for cable TV.
First available in Canada (1993), and then Asia and Europe (and never sold in the home US market), the Colour Classic II (also known as the Performa 275) shares the motherboard design of the LC III. Running at a relatively fast 33 MHz, memory can be expanded as far as 36 MB.
The LC 550 replaced the LC 520, increasing CPU speed from 25 MHz to 33 MHz. It was released at the same time as the 68LC040-based LC 575.
Take an LC III and graft on a 14″ Trinitron monitor along with stereo speakers. That’s what Apple did to create the 520.
The end of the Classic line in the North American market, the Color Classic (a.k.a. Performa 250) shared the motherboard design of the LC II – equally limited in RAM expansion, constricted by a 16-bit data bus, and able to use 16-bit PDS cards designed for the LC. The only significant difference is the presence […]
Introduced in October 1991, the Classic II (a.k.a. Performa 200) was both an upgraded Classic and a replacement for the venerable SE/30. Based on a modified LC motherboard, the Classic II shares a 16-bit data path and a RAM ceiling of 10 MB (the Classic II is slower than the SE/30, even though both use […]
Introduced as the first sub-$1,000 Macintosh in October 1990, the basic Classic came with 1 MB of RAM, a SuperDrive, and space to mount an internal SCSI hard drive. The hard drive version came with 2 MB of memory and a 40 MB hard drive. RAM expansion was via a 1 MB daughter card with two open slots, […]
Rolled out in January 1989, the SE/30 was the first compact Mac to come standard with the FDHD 1.4 MB floppy drive (a.k.a. SuperDrive) and support more than 4 MB of RAM. It was essentially a IIx in an SE case.
Introduced along with the Mac II in March 1987, the SE came with 1 MB of RAM, one or two double-sided 800K floppies, and space to mount an internal SCSI hard drive (the second drive bay held either a hard drive or second floppy – no room for both, although that didn’t stop some people from […]
Apple replaced the Mac 512K with a model supporting double-sided 3.5″ disks, just like the Mac Plus. Unlike the Plus, the 512Ke used RAM chips rather than SIMMs, just like the 128K and 512K. This precluded upgrading RAM beyond 512 KB by simply plugging in higher capacity chips, although some companies did make memory upgrade […]
Introduced in January 1986, two years after the original Macintosh, the Mac Plus shipped with 1 MB of RAM, a new double-sided 800 KB floppy drive, and a built-in SCSI port (the first Mac so equipped). Not only was 1 MB more RAM than PC-class machines could handle, but the Plus could be expanded to 4 MB total […]
Introduced to replace the Mac 128K in September 1984, the 512K had four times the RAM of the original Mac. This made it possible to work with larger files, more powerful software, and have more files open (running more than one application was still in the future, awaiting MultiFinder).
Introduced in January 1984 (along with a revised Lisa), this Macintosh didn’t have a model number – it was simply the Macintosh. There was no name on the front. Early 128Ks simply said Macintosh on the back, while later ones were marked Macintosh 128K to distinguish them from the later Macintosh 512K.
