Macintosh LC - Citizendia

Macintosh LC "pizza box" computer, circa 1990.

The Macintosh LC (meaning low-cost color) was Apple Computer's product family of low-end consumer Macintosh personal computers in the early 1990s. Apple Inc, ( formerly Apple Computer Inc, is an American Multinational corporation with a focus on designing and manufacturing Consumer electronics Macintosh, commonly nicknamed Mac is a Brand name which covers several lines of Personal computers designed developed and marketed by Apple Inc A personal computer ( PC) is any Computer whose original sales price size and capabilities make it useful for individuals and which is intended to be operated The original Macintosh LC was released in 1990 and was the first affordable color-capable Macintosh. Due to its affordability and Apple II compatibility the LC was adopted primarily in the education and home markets. The Apple IIe Card ( Apple Computer part #820-0444-A is in a sense the smallest Apple II " Computer " ever designed though as a hardware Together with the Mac IIsi, it introduced built-in audio input on the Mac. The Macintosh IIsi was a compact three-box desktop unit effectively a cut-down Macintosh IIci in a smaller case (used for no other Macintosh model made cheaper by the The "LC" name was subsequently used for a line of low-end Macintosh computers for several years and spanned the 68k to PowerPC transition. The Motorola 680x0 / m68k / 68k / 68K is a family of 32-bit CISC Microprocessor CPU chips and was the primary PowerPC is a RISC Instruction set architecture created by the 1991 Apple – IBM – Motorola alliance known as AIM

1 History
2 Features
- 2.1 Apple IIe Replacement
3 Screenshots
4 LC models
5 External links

History

Macintosh computers, especially the color Macs starting with the Macintosh II in 1987, had always been rather expensive computers with large profit margins. The Apple Macintosh II was the first personal computer model of the Macintosh II series in the Apple Macintosh line The original LC was an attempt at an affordable modular, color-capable Macintosh. Compared with earlier Macs, Apple cut some corners on performance and features in order to keep the price down.

The Mac LC sold well, and in 1991 was replaced by the LC II, which replaced the LC's 68020 processor with a 68030. The Motorola 68020 is a 32-bit Microprocessor from Motorola, released in 1984. The Motorola 68030 is a 32-bit Microprocessor in Motorola 's 68000 family. The LC II sold even better than the LC and this spawned a whole series of LC models, most of which later were sold both with the LC name to the education world and to consumers via traditional Apple dealers, and as Performa to the consumer market via electronics stores, and department stores such as Sears. The Macintosh Performa series was Apple Computer 's Consumer product family of Apple Macintosh Personal computers from 1992 until 1997 when the (For example, the LC 475 was also known as the Performa 475. ) All PowerPC-based LC models were sold as "Power Macintosh xxxx LC" (and as "Performa xxxx"). PowerPC is a RISC Instruction set architecture created by the 1991 Apple – IBM – Motorola alliance known as AIM The LC line lived on until the iMac was released in 1998. The iMac is a desktop Macintosh computer designed and built by Apple Inc The LC 580 was notable for being the last desktop Motorola 68k-based Macintosh of any kind. The Motorola 680x0 / m68k / 68k / 68K is a family of 32-bit CISC Microprocessor CPU chips and was the primary All subsequent systems used PowerPC processors and, later, Intel processors.

Features

Notably, the LC used a very small "pizza box" case with no NuBus slots, had a 16 MHz 68020 microprocessor and no floating-point coprocessor running on a 16-bit data bus (a major bottleneck as the 68020 was a 32-bit CPU), a limit of 10 mebibytes RAM and shipped with only 256 KiB of VRAM therefore only supporting a display resolution of 512 pixels by 384 pixels at 8-bit color on Apple's 12" RGB monitor. NuBus is a 32-bit parallel Computer bus, originally developed at MIT as a part of the NuMachine Workstation The Motorola 68020 is a 32-bit Microprocessor from Motorola, released in 1984. In Computing, floating point describes a system for numerical representation in which a string of digits (or Bits represents a Real number. A coprocessor is a Computer processor used to supplement the functions of the primary processor (the CPU A mebibyte (a contraction of me ga bi nary byte) is a unit of Information or Computer storage, abbreviated MiB. A kibibyte (a contraction of ki lo bi nary byte) is a unit of Information or Computer storage, established by the International The VRAM was upgradeable to 512 KiB though, supporting a display resolution of 512 pixels by 384 pixels at 16-bit color or, on a VGA-compatible display, 640 pixels by 480 pixels at 8-bit color. Nevertheless, most LCs were purchased with an Apple 12" RGB monitor with a fixed resolution of 512 pixels by 384 pixels. Many software programs that had been designed for other color Macs assumed that the minimum screen size was 640 pixels by 480 pixels. As a result, some programs simply would not function correctly on the LC, and for several years software developers had to add support for this smaller screen resolution in order to guarantee that their software would run on LCs. Overall, general performance of the machine was disappointing due to the crippling data bus bottleneck, making it run far slower than it should have been (e. g. the same 16 MHz 68020 based Macintosh II ran almost twice as fast as the Macintosh LC). One difference between the Mac II and the Mac LC is the latter had no socket for a 68851 MMU, therefore it could not take advantage of System 7's virtual memory features. System 7 (codenamed "Big Bang" and sometimes called Mac OS 7) is a single-user Graphical user interface -based Operating system for Macintosh The successor model LC II's 68030 has a built-in MMU. The CPU was the only major change to the LC II; the bus remained 16 bits. A full 32-bit bus had to wait for the LC III successor a year later.

Apple IIe Replacement

Despite the LCs lack of NuBus slots, it did come with a Processor Direct Slot (PDS). Processor Direct Slot or PDS, was a solution (actually a whole number of different solutions introduced by Apple Computer, in several of their Macintosh This was primarily intended for the Apple IIe Card, which was offered with education models of the LCs. The Apple IIe Card ( Apple Computer part #820-0444-A is in a sense the smallest Apple II " Computer " ever designed though as a hardware The card allowed the LCs to emulate an Apple IIe. The Apple IIe is the third model in the Apple II series of personal computers produced by Apple Computer. The combination of the low-cost color Macintosh and Apple IIe compatibility was intended to encourage the education market's transition from Apple II models to Macintoshes. Despite the LC's minimal video specs with a 12" monitor, any LC that supports the card can be switched into 560x384 resolution for better compatibility with the IIe's 280x192 High-Resolution graphics (essentially doubled). The Apple II graphics were comprised of idiosyncratic modes and settings that could be exploited

Other cards, such as CPU accelerators, ethernet and video cards were also made available for the LC's PDS slot. Ethernet is a family of frame -based Computer networking technologies for Local area networks (LANs

Screenshots

Macintosh LC II booting into System 7. 0. 1.

Macintosh LC II running System 7. 0. 1.

Macintosh LC III booting into System 7. 5

Macintosh LC III running System 7. 5

LC models

"Pizza boxes"

Macintosh LC (1990)

Processor: Motorola 68020 Recommended System Software: System Software 6. 0. 7-Mac OS 7. 5. 5 Fastest System Software: System Software 6. 0. 8L

Macintosh LC II (1992) — also known as Performa 400, Performa 405, Performa 410, Performa 430

Processor: Motorola 68030 Recommended System Software: System Software 6. 0. 8L-Mac OS 7. 6. 1 Fastest System Software: System Software 7. 0. 1

Macintosh LC III (1993) — also known as Performa 450. First LC with 32 bit wide system bus

Processor: Motorola 68030 Recommended System Software: System Software 7. 1-Mac OS 7. 6. 1 Fastest System Software: System Software 7. 5

Macintosh LC III+ (1993) — also known as Performa 460, Performa 466, Performa 467
Macintosh LC 475 (1993) — officially sold as Quadra 605, also known as Performa 475, Performa 476. The Quadra 605 is an entry level 68040 Microprocessor -based Apple Macintosh Personal computer code-named " Aladdin " First 68040-based LC.

All-in-one

Macintosh Color Classic (1993) Unofficial LC based on the LC II
Macintosh LC 520 (1993)
Macintosh Color Classic II (1993) Unofficial LC based on the LC 550 sold only outside the US
Macintosh TV (1993) Unofficial LC based on the LC 550 with dedicated PDS slot and limited RAM
Macintosh LC 550 (1994) — also known as Performa 550, Performa 560
Macintosh LC 575 (1994) — also known as Performa 575, Performa 576, Performa 577, Performa 578
Macintosh LC 580 (1995) — also known as Performa 580CD, Performa 588CD
Power Macintosh 5200 LC (1995) — also known as Performa 5200CD, Performa 5210CD, Performa 5215CD, Performa 5220CD
Power Macintosh 5260 LC (1996) — also known as Performa 5260CD, Performa 5270CD
Power Macintosh 5300 LC (1995) — also known as Performa 5300CD, Performa 5320CD
Power Macintosh 5400 LC (1996) — also known as Performa 5400CD, Performa 5410CD, Performa 5420CD, Performa 5430CD, Performa 5440CD, Performa 5420 (black case)

Standard desktop

Macintosh LC 630 (1994) — officially sold as Quadra 630, also known as Performa 630, Performa 630CD, Performa 631CD, Performa 635CD, Performa 636, Performa 636CD, Performa 637CD, Performa 638CD, Performa 640CD

Timeline of Macintosh LC models

See also: Timeline of Apple Macintosh models

The Color Classic used the same internal LC architecture as the 520, though technically a Compact Macintosh

Timeline of Apple II Family models

See also: Timeline of Apple II Family