Should I Buy a Used Power Mac 6100?

1998 – MJ writes: Long term(ish) I want to aim at a G3 something. But at the moment I’m just a hard-up student in New Zealand dreaming of the the day I win the lottery. But I figured why buy a new G3 machine when they are way out of my price range when I […]

Is a 56k Modem a Good Match for a Mac IIci?

1998 – DR writes: What kind of modem can I use with my Mac IIci? It has System 7.5.5 and a floppy disk drive (it’s a pretty much stock computer). I’d prefer a 56k modem, if possible. It will be primarily used for Internet access. I’ve had a tough time trying to buy a modem […]

The PowerBook I’ll Buy

1998: For too many years the PowerBook was the underpowered cousin of the desktop Mac. The original Macintosh Portable was a 16 MHz 68000-based beast and weighed over 16 lbs. The battery alone was a good 3 lbs., but it did provide five to ten hours of use.

Should I Accelerate My StarMax Clone or Buy an iMac?

1998 – TG writes: Current system: Motorola StarMax 3000 with 200 MHz 603e, 32 MB RAM, 4 MB VRAM onboard. Thinking: Vimage G3/240 processor upgrade, 32 MB more RAM, PCI video card with 2D-3D acceleration (total upwards of $700). Or buy an iMac. Whaddaya think? Mac Daniel writes: Let’s start with the iMac. The current […]

What Can I Do with a Performa 630?

1998 – DB writes: Wow, and I thought I was running a low-end Apple orchard . . . have an Apple IIe, Classic II, LC, and IIcx. My boss wants me to buy his 630CD . . . admittedly, it’s more machine than I have now, but it doesn’t seem like a wise move . […]

Time to Let the Big One Go

“Some people are under the impression that all that is required to make a good fisherman is the ability to tell lies easily and without blushing; but this is a mistake. Mere bald fabrication is useless; the veriest tyro can manage that. It is in the circumstantial detail, the embellishing touches of probability, the general […]

How Can I Be Ready for Mac OS X?

1998 – GD writes: I am an end user and have been a dedicated Macintosh user ever since I knew what a computer was. In high school, I used an Apple IIe. In college, I used a Macintosh Plus, which I upgraded to a severe 2 MB RAM! WOW!

Microsoft: Playing to Win

1998: Bill Gates plays for keeps. He always has. And, DOJ permitting, he always will. I’m not a Microsoft basher. I’ve used their BASIC, DOS, Word, and Excel. My favorite web font is Verdana, a font Microsoft owns and makes freely available on its website.

Mac 2000 Revisited, Part 1

1998 – Back in March 1992, MacUser magazine ran an article comparing past and then-current Macs. One comparison was the original Macintosh with the Quadra 900: 8 MHz 68000 vs. 25 MHz 68040, 128 KB RAM vs. 4 MB to 256 MB, no SCSI or hard drive vs. several internal drive bays and an external […]

Mac 2000 Revisited, Part 2

1998 – Back in March 1992, MacUser magazine ran an article comparing past and then-current Macs. One comparison was the original Macintosh with the Quadra 900: 8 MHz 68000 vs. 25 MHz 68040, 128 KB RAM vs. 4 MB to 256 MB, no SCSI or hard drive vs. several internal drive bays and an external […]

Mac 2000 Revisited, Part 3

1998 – Back in March 1992, MacUser magazine ran an article comparing past and then-current Macs. One comparison was the original Macintosh with the Quadra 900: 8 MHz 68000 vs. 25 MHz 68040, 128 KB RAM vs. 4 MB to 256 MB, no SCSI or hard drive vs. several internal drive bays and an external […]

What about Upgrading My Mac IIsi?

1998 – GHQ writes: What do you think of the Mac IIsi? Is it worth upgrading? At the MacWorks site, they were giving away older Macs as-is, untested, for the cost of shipping. So I sent off $50 and got a IIsi. Works great. Now . . . I’ve seen Sonnet upgrades for under $200. […]

The $30 a Month iMac

1998 – This is the weekend Best Buy joins the ranks of nationwide Macintosh resellers in the US. This means Macs will be available in dozens of communities that have Best Buy stores but don’t have CompUSA.

Working with FileMaker Pro on a Network

1998 – TG writes: I’m in a weekly newspaper office that has a couple of Performa 6116s and Performa 636s doing essentially the same job: email with First Class, minimal word processing with Word 5.1, and mostly shared access to FileMaker database of some size. The files themselves are on a Power Mac 7200/120. The […]

Windows Can’t Compete

1998.11: Steve Wozniak says that Apple won because all of today’s computers look like Macs. Bill Gates thinks Microsoft Windows won because he “borrowed” all of Apple’s good ideas. Sorry, but it just isn’t so.

Should I Push My Mac IIci Any Further?

1998 – GM writes: I have an old Mac IIci which I have already upgraded with a 2.1 GB hard drive, 32 MB RAM, and System 7.5.5. It however is too slow to support the graphics and word applications I’m using! Also most new programs now will not run on this 68030 processor!

Nightmare with Windows 98

1998: Once upon a time, I was a DOS geek. I cut my teeth on the Apple II+ and Commodore VIC-20. When we moved to Virginia Beach, Virginia, in 1987, I managed to obtain a sales position at the local Heath/Zenith computer store. I had no DOS experience and almost zero Mac experience, but they […]

The iMac 300

1998.10: Face it: The iMac was announced five months ago and is rapidly becoming dated. Look at the Wintel world. It’s getting hard to find a 233 MHz Windows computer these days, although they were hot when Steve Jobs first announced the iMac in May.

233 MHz iMac (Rev. B)

On October 17, 1998, Apple released Mac OS 8.5 and the first update to the popular Bondi iMac. CPU speed, base RAM, and most other specs were identical to the original iMac. In addition to coming with OS 8.5 installed, the Revision B iMac incorporates the faster Rage Pro graphics chip, has 6 MB VRAM, […]

More Evidence that Macs Last Longer

A recent study by Computers, Support and Consulting in conjunction with MacMarines surveyed Mac users about their computer systems, as reported in the current issue of The Mac Report (no longer online or in the Internet Archive). As the publisher of Low End Mac, most of the results didn’t surprise me, but they are interesting.