My goal in collecting portable Apple computers isn’t to have one of every model, just to have one that personifies each major developmental step along the way. I have a nice collection started, but there’s several gaps I want to fill. Read on to find out what’s in the classicmacs.org portable collection already, and what I still scour craigslist and the LEM swap list for. Continue reading »
Which one of these fits a PowerBook 5300?
If you’ve assembled a nice collection of older Mac laptops, or if you just started a collection with a laptop that came without a power adapter, you may wonder what you need to power it.
Fortunately, Apple has a series of excellent articles in their KnowledgeBase that will point you in the right direction:
I completed my project to install 3 different versions of the Mac OS onto my recently acquired PowerBook G3 “Lombard.” Below are the resulting screenshots of the computer started into Mac OS 8.6, Mac OS 9.2.2, and Mac OS 10.3.9 “Panther.”
"About this Computer" window under Mac OS 8.6
Startup Disk control panel from Mac OS 8.6
Last week I posted an article about acquiring a 333 MHz PowerBook G3 “Lombard” to add to my collection of classic Apple computers. During my research about this computer I discovered that it has the ability to operate under three different major versions of the Macintosh operating system: 8, 9, and X.
Thus was born my idea to configure the Lombard with the ability to boot into each of these operating systems so that it might be a self-contained demo of the evolution of the Mac OS from 8.6 (May, 1999) through 9.22 (December, 2001) all the way to 10.3.9 (April, 2005).
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I recently acquired a beautiful Macintosh PowerBook G3 (Bronze Keyboard) via Craiglist. Known better by it’s nickname of “Lombard,” it features the smooth curvy lines and black case plastics that characterized Apple’s stylish portables from 1998-2000. As the third generation of the G3 PowerBook, this unit has a quirky combination of new and old features. This is the first portable Mac with a “new world ROM” – and the last with a built-in SCSI port. For the first time in the Apple portable line USB replaces ADB for connecting mice and keyboards, and the multicolored Apple logo is replaced by a white one.
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