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 […]

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.

Mac OS X: Unix to the Core

1998: If you cut your teeth on the Mac or even a Windows machine, count yourself fortunate. A graphical operating system lets you play around and figure out how things work. It’s user-friendly, which is why the Macintosh caught on and influenced the shape of the dominant PC operating systems. The same concepts are playing […]

Mac Portable Benchmarks

The Mac Portable uses a 16 MHz 68000 CPU, so performance is about twice that of the 8 MHz Mac SE and Classic. The Portable and PowerBook 100 were the only Macs to use a 16 MHz 68000. The installed hard drive is a 40 MB Apple-branded Conner CP-3045 formatted with Apple HD SC Setup 7.0.1 […]

Planning Ahead

1998: When you’re responsible for dozens of computers on a network, you try to plan ahead while choosing the most cost-effective hardware to meet your needs. Since 1994, that has meant buying PowerPC Macs.

Grand Rapids (MI) Schools Standardizing on Windows?

June 1998 – The Grand Rapids Public Schools (GRPS) appear to be standardizing on Windows, if their current $795,000 purchase of Windows-based computer systems is any indication. This may mean they will phase out millions of dollars worth of Macintosh equipment (estimated at 2,000 computers), some of it installed as recently as the 1997-98 school […]

Is Apple Really Back?

1998: In his article, Apple Offers Sizzle in Forbes Digital, Michael Noer asks, “Is Apple really back?” Despite claims by Steve Jobs and the fact that Apple Computer is the sweetheart stock of 1998, Noer maintains that Apple is not back. Instead, he claims it is dying.

The Once and Future Mac286 Page

This page looks at the first MS-DOS coprocessor cards for the Macintosh, the Mac286 and its sibling, the Mac86. I have created this page in response to the lack of information about these cards that is publicly available.

Macintosh, a Long Term Solution

March 1998 – This letter was written in response to news reports that the University of Waterloo in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada, was considering phasing out Macs in favor of Windows computers. This letter should be appearing soon in Imprint, the university newspaper.

Red Box, Blue Box, Yellow Box

Rhapsody was Apple’s code name for what eventually became Mac OS X. Yellow Box became the OS X interface, and Blue Box became the Classic Environment, which allowed OS X users to continue to use Classic Mac OS software on their PowerPC Macs through Mac OS X 10.4 Tiger. Red Box, the planned PC Environment […]

Send for the Clones

1997: My, but we live in interesting times! Apple, consistently the most innovative vendor of personal computers and operating systems, has twice changed CPU platforms (from 6502-based Apple 1, II, and III to 680×0-based Lisa and Macintosh, to PowerPC-based Power Macintosh) and is on the verge of introducing a new (to Mac users) operating system […]

Dream MAChines

1997 – I’ve been using Macs since 1986, when I designed a 54-page booklet on a friend’s newly upgraded Macintosh (upgraded to a Plus with 1 MB RAM!) with Aldus PageMaker 1.0 and a LaserWriter printer. I sold Macs from 1987 to 1991, seeing the introduction of the first expandable Macs (SE and II in 1987), the […]

Umax SuperMac S910

The S910 was Umax’s most powerful, most expandable computer, differing from the S900 primarily in its use of a socketed 1 MB level 2 cache and in not having 16 MB of RAM on the motherboard. The S910 reversed the order of PCI slots compared to the S900, which helped video pros get around some […]

Umax SuperMac C500

The SuperMac C500 (known as the Apus 2000 series in Europe and Asia) was Umax’s entry level computer, perhaps the model that best met their corporate goal of making quality Mac OS computers at prices that could give PCs a run for their money. It may have been the least expensive Mac OS computer of its […]

Umax SuperMac J700

The SuperMac J700 (Centauri in Europe and Asia) was Umax’s least expensive computer based on the PowerPC 604e processor. Very expandable, it has 4 PCI slots, 5 drive bays, 8 DIMM sockets, and a replaceable CPU. The J700 uses the same CPU daughter cards as Apple’s Power Macs from the same era, giving the SuperMac J700 […]

Quadra 950

Apple replaced the Quadra 900 with the 950, boosting CPU speed from 25 MHz to 33 MHz. Because Apple removed some “wait states” from the video section, the 950’s internal video is about 20% faster than the 900’s – and the faster CPU helps things along even more. The 950 can display 16-bit video on […]