Power Mac 5500 (Power Mac One)

The Power Mac 5500 was the second PCI-bus Power Mac with an integrated monitor; it replaced the slower 5400. It shipped in 225, 250, and 275 MHz versions. Xemplar distributed a 225 MHz educational version in the UK as the Power Macintosh One. A black 275 MHz “Director’s Edition” was available in Australia. The 5500 was the direct predecessor to the Beige Power Mac G3 All-in-One.

Power Mac 5400A reader notes: “Many PM 5500s sold in Australia in 1998 did not have any Level 2 cache fitted. This seriously hampered the performance.” Adding a 256 KB or 512 KB L2 cache makes these much better performers.

The logic board of the 5500 is based on the “Gazelle” architecture, which is shared by the 20th Anniversary Mac and the Power Mac 6500, the latter being essentially the same computer without a built-in display.

Details

  • 5500/225 introduced 1997.02.17, discontinued
    5500/250 introduced 1997.09.01, discontinued
    5500/275 introduced 1997.03.01, discontinued
  • requires System 7.5.5 through 9.1
  • CPU: 225, 250, or 275 MHz PPC 603e or 603ev
  • Bus: 50 MHz
  • Performance: not measured
  • RAM: 32 MB, expandable to 128 MB using two 64 MB 60ns 168-pin EDO DIMMs. Supports 4, 8, 16, 32, and 64 MB DIMMs.
  • video: ATI 3D Rage II chip set
  • VRAM: 2 MB SGRAM
  • resolution: 15″ screen, millions of colors at up to 832 x 624, thousands at up to 1024 x 768
  • L2 cache: 256 KB (apparently not present in some 5500s sold in Australia)
  • Hard drive: 2 GB IDE
  • CD-ROM: 12x or 24x max.
  • Microphone: standard 3.5mm minijack, compatible with line-level input including Apple’s PlainTalk microphone
  • ADB: 1 port for keyboard and mouse
  • serial: 2 DIN-8 GeoPorts on back of computer
  • SCSI: DB-25 connector on back of computer
  • bay for Apple TV/FM Radio System
  • video slot
  • PCI-based comm slot
  • one PCI slot

Accelerators & Upgrades

Online Resources

Cautions

  • Macs with IDE hard drive do not provide SCSI termination power, depending on external SCSI devices to provide it. For more details, see SCSI Termination Power.

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