Applied Engineering AE HD+ Floppy Drive

This article is adapted from a posting by Adam Takessian to the Vintage Macs email list. I would like very much to help other compact Mac users to know more about the AE HD+, because before I bought mine, the information on the Web was extremely limited, scattered across several different pages, sometimes inaccurate, and […]

Second Processor for SuperMac S900 and S910

A unique feature of the SuperMac S900 and S910 is their second processor slot. This slot accepts a proprietary CPU card and allows these machines to function as dual-processor computers without the need to remove the primary CPU and the expense of a dual-processor card. In a dual-processor system, the speed of the secondary processor […]

Apple 8•24GC Video Card

Mike Ford posted the following to Vintage Macs, our group for users of pre-PowerPC Macs. Well, people asked, and people sent me info, and I got curious and went hunting myself. This is a brief collection of what I have found, and what I believe to be accurate, YMMV, corrections and additions welcome. The 8•24GC […]

Raising the Dead, Part 1

2000 – Well, it finally happened. After years of dispensing advice on how to revive dead Macs, I finally had one go dead on me while doing email. The Mac in question is an old one – a Mac II that dates back to May 1988 (based on the date on the PRAM batteries). In […]

The Compubrick 160

Tom Owad likes repackaging Macs with toy bricks.* The Compubrick 160 takes a PowerBook 160 and converts it into a very compact desktop computer. In fact, Tom says the design was inspired by Apple’s Twentieth Anniversary Macintosh (TAM).

Mac Shopping at CompUSA

2000: My week started out with me deciding to upgrade to Mac OS 8.5. I hadn’t heard of too many problems with 8.5 running on a SuperMac S900. The only question that remained was where to find it because it is out of print.

The Main Difference between Steve Jobs and Bill Gates

Certainly Bill Gates doesn’t like to be characterized as a megalomaniac, and Steve Jobs doesn’t like to be described as a sociopath, but that’s what they are. Trust me.  – Robert X. Cringely, Accidental Empires: How the Boys of Silicon Valley Make Their Millions, Battle Foreign Competition, and Still Can’t Get a Date I am young […]

Installing Mac OS 8.1

2000 – These instructions were written specifically for installing Mac OS 8.1 on a large group of Power Mac 6100s. However, they can easily be adapted to almost any situation where you may be updating the Classic Mac OS. This was written when the I was the IT Manager at Baker Publishing.

Beyond the Box?

2000: Apple’s new breed of yet-to-be-announced “beyond-the-box” computers – which don’t fall into the four main categories of professional and consumer desktop systems and portables – will bring big changes to Apple’s marketing strategy.

The Bronze SE/30

From January 1984 through April 1987, all Macs were beige. Then Apple introduced “platinum,” a more business-like gray. That wasn’t enough, as we all discovered with the iMac in May 1998.

The S900 Chronicles

2000: This has turned into something of an interactive article. Everything in black was written by Eric. The blue text contains my comments as an S900 owner. Dan Knight, publisher Rome wasn’t built in a day, and neither was my SuperMac S900.

Low End Mac in 1999

Launched in April 1997 as part of my personal website, The New Low End Mac User has evolved and grown. At this point, we’ve served up somewhere around 6.5 million web pages. Wow! This article looks at some important site developments in 1999.

PowerBook Hard Drive Replacement Options

2000: As it approaches its first birthday, I am sorry to report that my PowerBook G3 Series 233’s 2 GB hard drive is beginning to get noisier, not as bad yet as my son’s identical machine became before it was stolen three days before Christmas, but it’s not the whisperingly quiet ‘Book it originally was […]

Adoption Notice for an SE/30

2000 – No, Annie and I have definitely not adopted a child. We haven’t given one of our many up for adoption either, although, on any given day, we might rent any one of them out cheap. 🙂 This is the short tale of an abandoned Macintosh SE/30 that I found sitting on the floor […]

New Years Rant

1999 started out on a real high note for me. I had a finally achieved the rank of MIS director, and with doing that I had finally reached my goal to be considered a serious player in the computer industry.

Why Macs Don’t Look Generic

New PCs from manufacturers like Compaq, Sony, and Gateway have gained some stylish design elements. Even the horrid eOne, with its copycat design and limited upgradeability (limited by how big a sledgehammer you have), looks better than a beige metal box.