48-403: The Macintosh Portable is a portable computer that was designed, manufactured, and sold by Apple Computer, Inc. from September 1989 to October 1991. It is the first battery -powered Macintosh , which garnered significant excitement from critics, but sales to customers were quite low. It featured a fast, sharp, and expensive monochrome active matrix LCD screen in a hinged design that covered
96-553: A PowerBook, and was responsible for the power management of the computer. Identical to that of the Macintosh Portable, it controlled the display's backlight , hard drive spin-down , sleep and wake, battery charging, trackball control, and input/output (I/O). The 100 did add a new feature: 3.5 V batteries backed up permanent and expansion random-access memory (RAM) when the PowerBook ;100's battery
144-490: A backlit Macintosh Portable (model M5126). The backlight feature was a welcomed improvement, but it reduced the battery life by about a half. An upgrade kit was also offered for the earlier model as well, which plugged into the ROM expansion slot. The Portable used expensive SRAM memory in an effort to maximize battery life and to provide an "instant on" low-power sleep mode. In the newer backlit Portable, Apple changed SRAM memory to
192-475: A built-in floppy disk drive and second serial port, which the PowerBook 100 lacked. In early 1992, the PowerBook 100 was offered at $ 2,300 without the external floppy drive. By August 10, 1992, Apple quietly dropped the PowerBook 100 from its price list but continued to sell existing stock through its own dealers and alternative discount consumer-oriented stores such as Price Club . In these outlets,
240-562: A charge and allow the computer to start. As with other lead-acid batteries, such as automotive batteries, the sealed lead-acid (SLA) cells used in the Portable's battery pack sulfated and eventually failed if they were left for an extended time in a fully discharged state, such as when the computer was stored for a period of months or longer. It is possible to repack the battery with new cells, or use alternative 6 V batteries. There were three "X" size cylindrical sealed lead-acid cells inside
288-410: A configuration featuring 4 MB of RAM, a 40 MB hard drive, and a floppy drive was sold for less than $ 1,000, marking a substantial discount from the original list price of the equivalent 2 MB/20 MB configuration. On September 17, 1992, Apple recalled 60,000 PowerBook 100s because of a potential safety problem. It was discovered that an electrical short could lead to the melting of a small hole in
336-454: A desktop Macintosh. This provided a convenient method for software to be installed onto the PowerBook or transferred to the desktop, without the need for the 100's optional floppy disk drive. A specialized SCSI cable with a unique connector was required, however, to use any SCSI device on the PowerBook series. A second dedicated cable was required for SCSI Disk Mode. This feature was unique to the 100 until Apple introduced new PowerBooks more than
384-486: A hard drive and a floppy drive. The floppy drive is 1.44 MB. Most Macintosh Portable units came with a hard drive , a custom-engineered Conner CP-3045 (known by Apple as "Hard Disk 40SC"). It holds 40 MB of data, consumes less power compared to most hard drives of its time, and has a proprietary SCSI connector; adapters that allow standard SCSI drives to be used on the Portable exist, but they are expensive. At 16 pounds (7.2 kilograms) and 4 inches (10 centimetres) thick,
432-619: A lengthy development time with a silkscreen date stamp of 1987 on the production keyboard PCB, indicating a close-to-final design was likely to have been determined by then. The computer, however would not be launched for over two years, with the final launch date being September 20, 1989. The Macintosh Portable product launch was held at the Universal Amphitheater in Universal City, California at an estimated cost of $ 1 million with over 5,000 guests. The press reaction
480-417: A milestone that was reached despite the product facing shortages in supply. Apple soon solved the supply problems, and the proceeds from PowerBook sales reached $ 1 billion in the first year after launch. Apple surpassed Toshiba and Compaq as the market leader in worldwide share of portable computer shipments. The PowerBook 100, 140, and 170 contributed greatly to Apple's financial success in 1992. At
528-402: A printer or any compatible RS-422 device. It was the first Macintosh to omit an external modem port, instead offering an optional built-in 2400 baud modem for communications. As a result, for the first time a user could not print directly and access AppleTalk or a faster external modem simultaneously, and devices such as advanced MIDI interfaces could not be used because they required
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#1732780199604576-460: A tight budget." The PowerBook 100 continues to receive recognition from the press. PC World named the PowerBook 100 the 10th-greatest PC of all time in 2006, and in 2005, US magazine Mobile PC chose the PowerBook 100 as the greatest gadget of all time, ahead of the Sony Walkman and Atari 2600 . The PowerBook 100 received multiple awards for its design, including
624-444: A wallet or briefcase. Brunner said: "It says something about the identity of the person who is carrying it". Crystal Waters of Home Office Computing praised the PowerBook 100's "unique, effective design" but was disappointed because the internal modem did not receive faxes, and the 100 had no monitor port. The low-capacity 20 MB hard drive was also criticized. Once a user's core applications had been installed, little room
672-479: A year later. There are two versions of the PowerBook 100's QWERTY layout keyboard: a domestic US version with 63 keys and an international ISO version with 64 keys. The caps lock key on the PowerBook 100 did not have a locking position or a lighted indicator of its status, and to compensate, the System ;7 operating system software includes an extension file that causes an icon of
720-701: The Atari STacy , a version of the Atari ST computer with a built in keyboard and monitor. Macintosh Portable can run Macintosh System 6.0.4 through System 7.5.5 . By the late 1980s, Macintosh users yearned for a portable version of their computer. Don Crabb titled his February 1989 column in BYTE "Hey Apple, I Need a Laptop". While third-party Macintosh conversions such as Dynamac and Colby existed, they were very expensive, and some are as heavy as or heavier than Apple's compact Macs ; Crabb's column's subtitle
768-458: The System 7.0.1 operating system. It did not have a built-in floppy disk drive and was noted for its unique compact design that placed a trackball pointing device in front of the keyboard for ease of use. Apple's then-chief executive officer (CEO) John Sculley started the PowerBook project in 1990, allocating $ 1 million for marketing. Despite the small marketing budget, the new PowerBook line
816-470: The power adapter socket on the motherboard, which required a $ 400 replacement motherboard if the warranty had expired. Most of the PowerBook 100's internal components were based on its predecessor, the Macintosh Portable . It included a Motorola 68HC000 16 MHz processor, had 2 MB memory, no floppy disk drive , and cost approximately $ 2,500 with external floppy drive. Later
864-473: The Portable is a heavy and bulky portable computer. The main contributor to the Portable's weight and bulk was its lead-acid battery. Despite the dramatic improvement in terms of ergonomics offered by the responsiveness, sharpness, and uniformity of its active matrix panel, one of the primary drawbacks of the Portable was poor readability in low-light situations. Consequently, in February 1991, Apple introduced
912-448: The Portable took 5.4 and 2.6 seconds respectively. PC Week tested the battery life, which delivered 3 hours 47 minutes of use. Byte magazine ' s review concluded, "The PowerBook 100 is recommended for word processing and communications tasks; the higher-end products offer enough power for complex reports, large spreadsheets and professional graphics." MacWEEK described it as "ideal for writers and others on
960-430: The PowerBook 100 was offered without the external floppy drive for $ 2,300. The dimensions of the PowerBook 100 were an improvement over the Portable. It was 8.5 inches (22 cm) deep, 11 inches (28 cm) wide, and 1.8 inches (4.6 cm) high, compared to the Portable, which was 14.83 inches (37.7 cm) deep, 15.25 inches (38.7 cm) wide and 4.05 inches (10.3 cm) high. Another significant difference
1008-568: The PowerBook product line, in contrast to the $ 25 million used to market the Macintosh Classic . Medica, Battat, and Selvin used most of the money to produce and air a television commercial that viewers would remember. Advertising agency Chiat/Day filmed retired Los Angeles Lakers basketball star Kareem Abdul-Jabbar sitting uncomfortably in a small airline coach seat yet typing comfortably on his PowerBook. The ad caption read: "At least his hands are comfortable." Apple unveiled
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#17327801996041056-632: The PowerBook 100 on October 21, 1991, at the Comdex computer expo in Las Vegas, alongside two other models: the PowerBook 140 and PowerBook 170 . Both the promotional campaign and the product itself were successful. Apple set a target of selling over 200,000 units of the PowerBook within the first year, with peak demand anticipated in the initial three months following its release. By January 1992, Apple had already sold more than 100,000 PowerBooks,
1104-450: The PowerBook 100 the tenth-greatest PC of all time in 2006, and US magazine Mobile PC chose the PowerBook 100 as the greatest gadget of all time in 2005. From 1990, John Sculley, then CEO of Apple, oversaw product development personally to ensure that Apple released new computers to market more quickly. His new strategy was to increase market share by lowering prices and releasing more "hit" products. This strategy contributed to
1152-490: The PowerBook 100 top priority. Sony president Norio Ohga gave project manager Kihey Yamamoto permission to recruit engineers from any Sony division. Robert Brunner , Apple's head of industrial design at the time, led the design team that developed the laptop, including its trackball and granite color. Brunner said he designed the PowerBook "so it would be as easy to use and carry as a regular book". The dark granite grey color set it apart from other notebook computers of
1200-410: The PowerBook 100 was the low-end model of the first three simultaneously released PowerBooks . Its CPU and overall speed closely resembled those of its predecessor, the Macintosh Portable . It had a Motorola 68000 processor at 16 MHz , 2-8 megabytes (MB) of RAM, a 9-inch (23 cm) monochrome backlit liquid-crystal display (LCD) with 640 × 400 pixel resolution, and
1248-419: The battery pack installed. This is due to the relatively low power output of the included AC charger, 1.5A @ 7.5 V, which is insufficient to spin up the hard disk, which has an initial startup current draw requirement of 2-3 Amps. The battery pack must be installed and have sufficient charge to provide the additional current required during hard disk startup. Once booted and running, the total power required to run
1296-510: The battery pack, manufactured by Gates Energy Products (now EnerSys); the same cells were also used in Quantum 1 battery packs for photographic flash use. The battery pack can be rebuilt with new EnerSys "Cyclon" brand batteries, using either three part number 0800-0004 single cells of 2V each, or using one 6V monobloc part number 0809-0012. There is some indication that Apple executives at the time, particularly, Jean-Louis Gassée , were aware of
1344-411: The casing. This issue affected three out of the 60,000 notebooks manufactured between October 1991 and March 1992. On the day of the recall, Apple shares closed at $ 47, down $ 1.25, but some analysts discounted the recall's importance. In addition, the original power supplies had problems with insulation cracks that could cause a short in a fuse on the motherboard ; and the computer was prone to cracks in
1392-414: The commercial success of the low-end Macintosh Classic and Macintosh LC , desktop computers released by Apple in 1990. Sculley wanted to replicate the success of these products with Apple's new PowerBook line. Sculley began the project in 1990 and wanted the PowerBook to be released within one year. The project had three managers: John Medica, who managed engineering for the new laptop; Randy Battat, who
1440-449: The computer drops below 1.5A and the Portable can continue to run on the AC charger alone. Several popular unauthorized workarounds were devised to allow the Portable to boot without a battery pack installed, including using an AC power supply from the PowerBook 100 series, which provides higher output. The battery packs are no longer manufactured and it is very rare to find one that will hold
1488-520: The computer only generated lackluster sales of 10,000 units in its first quarter on the market. Apple then reduced the price of the Macintosh Portable by $ 1,000 in 1990, just 7 months after launch. The company discontinued the computer in 1991 with the launch of its replacement, the PowerBook series. Portable computer Too Many Requests If you report this error to the Wikimedia System Administrators, please include
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1536-406: The dedicated use of both ports. A third-party serial modem port could, however, be installed in the internal modem slot for consumers who needed traditional functions. When the computer was not in use, contents of the memory were preserved as long as the main lead-acid battery remained charged. The PowerBook 100 Power Manager was an integrated circuit , usually placed on the logic board of
1584-493: The design problems concerning the Macintosh Portable. These problems, combined with supply issues of the newly developed active matrix screen , caused numerous delays in launching the computer. While it cannot be determined what the initial internal intended launch date was, an AppleDesign illustration depicts prototypes dated 1986. Initial officially announced launch dates indicated that the Macintosh Portable would be available by June 1988. The Macintosh Portable itself also suggests
1632-584: The details below. Request from 172.68.168.226 via cp1108 cp1108, Varnish XID 217050793 Upstream caches: cp1108 int Error: 429, Too Many Requests at Thu, 28 Nov 2024 07:49:59 GMT PowerBook 100 The PowerBook 100 is a notebook-sized laptop computer designed and manufactured by Sony for Apple Computer and introduced on October 21, 1991, at the COMDEX computer expo in Las Vegas , Nevada. Priced at US$ 2,500 with external floppy drive,
1680-403: The end of the financial year, Apple announced its highest figures yet, $ 7.1 billion in revenues and an increase in global market share from 8% to 8.5%, the highest it had been in four years. However, the initial popularity of the PowerBook 100 did not last. Sales decreased, and by December 1991 the 140 and 170 models had become more popular because customers were willing to pay more for
1728-647: The existing product line. Apple approached Sony in late 1989 because it did not have enough engineers to handle the number of new products that were planned for delivery in 1991. Using a basic blueprint from Apple, including a list of chips and other components, and the Portable's architecture, the 100 was miniaturized and manufactured by Sony in San Diego , California , and Japan . Sony engineers had little experience building personal computers but nonetheless completed Apple's smallest and lightest machine in under 13 months, cancelling other projects and giving
1776-503: The first improvements to the PowerBook line as Apple benefited from the lessons learned in developing the more powerful models' enclosure. The 100 was designed between September and December 1990, and retained the same design elements, which were a variation on the Snow White design language Apple had been using since 1984. Specifically, 2 mm (0.079 in) raised ridges spaced 10 mm (0.39 in) apart intended to tie it into
1824-616: The international caps lock symbol (⇪) to appear in the upper right-hand corner of the menu bar when Caps Lock is active. The internals of the PowerBook 100 were the basis of the Apple Wizzy Active Lifestyle Telephone prototype. Both the PowerBook 140 and 170 were designed before the 100 by the Apple Industrial Design Group , from March 1990-February 1991. The 100's styling was based on those computers and represents
1872-461: The keyboard when the machine was not in use. The Portable was one of the early consumer laptops to employ an active matrix panel—only the most expensive of the initial PowerBook line, the PowerBook 170 , had such a panel. The machine was designed to deliver high performance, at the cost of increased price and weight. The Portable was discontinued in October 1991. The Portable has features similar to
1920-428: The less expensive (but more power-hungry) pseudo-SRAM, which reduced the total RAM expansion to 8 MB, and lowered the price. The lead-acid battery pack on the non-backlit Portable offered up to ten hours of usage time, and the Portable draws the same amount of power when turned off, and when in sleep mode. The Portable, unlike many later portable computers from Apple and other manufacturers, will not boot without
1968-419: The time and also from Apple's other products, which traditionally were beige or platinum grey. The trackball, another new design element, was placed in the middle of the computer, allowing the PowerBook to be easily operated by both left- and right-handed users. The designers were trying to create a fashion statement with the overall design of the laptop, which they felt made it a more personal accessory, like
Macintosh Portable - Misplaced Pages Continue
2016-440: Was "The time has come for a portable mac that doesn't strain your arms or your credit line". The Macintosh Portable's pointer is a built-in trackball that can be removed and located on either side of the keyboard, and can also be replaced with a numeric keypad if a mouse is being used. There were three drive configurations available for Macintosh Portable. A Portable could ship with one floppy drive, with two floppy drives, or with
2064-413: Was a success, generating over $ 1 billion in revenue for Apple in its first year. Sony designed and manufactured the PowerBook 100 in collaboration with the Apple Industrial Design Group , Apple's internal design team. It was discontinued on September 3, 1992, and superseded by the PowerBook 145 and PowerBook Duo series. Since then, it has been praised several times for its design; PC World named
2112-490: Was being replaced or when the 100 was otherwise temporarily removed from all power sources. This made it a perfect candidate for use with Apple's RAM disk to help increase battery life by accessing the hard disk less frequently, since the 100 was the only PowerBook that maintained the contents of RAM on shutdown in order to reduce startup time. The PowerBook 100 was the first PowerBook to incorporate SCSI Disk Mode , which allowed it to be used as an external hard disk on
2160-454: Was left for optional programs and documents. Waters concluded: "Having used the 100 constantly in the past few weeks, I know I wouldn't feel cheated by buying it - if only it had a 40MB hard-disk drive option." PC Week benchmarked the PowerBook 100, measuring it against its predecessor, the Macintosh Portable . The PowerBook 100 took 5.3 seconds to open a Microsoft Word document and 2.5 seconds to save it, while
2208-509: Was mixed, with many praising the clear LCD screen, but most shunning the computer due to its size, weight and high cost, with the Los Angeles Times stating "It’s too big, too heavy and too expensive." Others noted that the computer seemed behind the times compared to competing laptops, stating that "This machine would have been OK 12 months or 18 months ago. But not today." Apple had forecast first year sales of 50,000 units. However,
2256-553: Was the less expensive passive matrix display used instead of the sharper active matrix used on the Portable (and the 170). The PowerBook 100 included the System 7.0.1 operating system as standard, with support for all versions up to System 7.5.5 . Apple, however, released System 6.0.8L , which allowed the PowerBook 100 to run System 6 . It could also be used with some earlier System 6 versions, although Apple did not officially support this. The PowerBook 100 had one external serial port, designed for use with
2304-422: Was the vice president for product marketing; and Neil Selvin, who headed the marketing effort. In 1991, the two leaders in the laptop computer industry were Toshiba and Compaq , both of which had introduced models weighing less than 8 lb (3.63 kg). Medica, Battat, and Selvin deliberately designed the PowerBook to weigh less than its competitors. Sculley allocated a $ 1 million marketing budget to
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