The PowerBook 100 series is a line of
laptop
A laptop, laptop computer, or notebook computer is a small, portable personal computer (PC) with a screen and alphanumeric keyboard. Laptops typically have a clam shell form factor with the screen mounted on the inside of the upper li ...
PCs produced by
Apple Computer
Apple Inc. is an American multinational technology company headquartered in Cupertino, California, United States. Apple is the largest technology company by revenue (totaling in 2021) and, as of June 2022, is the world's biggest company b ...
.
In October 1991, Apple released the first three PowerBooks: the low-end
PowerBook 100
The PowerBook 100 is a portable subnotebook personal 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 ...
, the more powerful
PowerBook 140
The PowerBook 140 was released in the first line of PowerBooks. It was the mid-range PowerBook, between the low-end 100 and the high-end 170. As with the PowerBook 170, and unlike the 100, this PowerBook featured an internal floppy drive. Coden ...
, and the high-end
PowerBook 170
The PowerBook 170 was released by Apple Inc. in 1991 along with the PowerBook 100 and the PowerBook 140. Identical in form factor to the 140, it was the high end of the original
PowerBook line featuring a faster 25 MHz Motorola 68030 proce ...
, the only one with an
active matrix Active matrix is a type of addressing scheme used in flat panel displays. In this method of switching individual elements (pixels), each pixel is attached to a transistor and capacitor ''actively'' maintaining the pixel state while other pixels ar ...
display.
These machines caused a stir in the industry with their compact dark grey cases, use of a
trackball
A trackball is a pointing device consisting of a ball held by a socket containing sensors to detect a rotation of the ball about two axes—like an upside-down ball mouse with an exposed protruding ball. Users roll the ball to position the on-s ...
, and the clever positioning of the keyboard which left room for palmrests on either side of the
pointing device
A pointing device is a human interface device that allows a user to input spatial (i.e., continuous and multi-dimensional) data to a computer. CAD systems and graphical user interfaces (GUI) allow the user to control and provide data to t ...
. Portable PC computers at the time tended to have the keyboard forward towards the user, with empty space behind it, so this was a surprising innovation and set the standard layout all future notebook computers would follow.
The PowerBook 140 and 170 were designed first. The 100 benefited from their development and by components miniaturized by Sony after Apple sent them schematics of the
Mac Portable
Macintosh Portable is a laptop 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 ...
. The 100, however, did not sell well until Apple dropped the price substantially.
The 100 and 200 series PowerBooks were intended to tie into the rest of the Apple desktop products using the corporate
Snow White design language
The Snow White design language is an industrial design language which was developed by Hartmut Esslinger's Frog Design. Used by Apple Computer from 1984 to 1990, the scheme has vertical and horizontal stripes for decoration, ventilation, and to ...
incorporated into all product designs since 1986. However, unlike the Macintosh Portable which was essentially a battery-powered desktop in weight and size, the light colors and decorative recessed lines did not seem appropriate for the scaled-down designs. In addition to adopting the darker-gray color scheme which co-ordinated with the official corporate look, they also adopted a raised series of ridges mimicking the indented lines on the desktops. The innovative look not only unified their entire product line, but set Apple apart in the marketplace and had the added benefit of masking fingerprints while the ridges provided added traction with which to grip the PowerBook. These early series would be the last to use the aging Snow White look; a new look was debuted on the 190 and the 500 series.
The first series of PowerBooks were hugely successful, capturing 40% of all laptop sales. But several factors hampered Apple's efforts to introduce newer models and keep ahead of competitors. One was the departure of the original PowerBook team to work at
Compaq
Compaq Computer Corporation (sometimes abbreviated to CQ prior to a 2007 rebranding) was an American information technology company founded in 1982 that developed, sold, and supported computers and related products and services. Compaq produced ...
. Another was that Apple's plans to move on from the
68000
The Motorola 68000 (sometimes shortened to Motorola 68k or m68k and usually pronounced "sixty-eight-thousand") is a 16/32-bit complex instruction set computer (CISC) microprocessor, introduced in 1979 by Motorola Semiconductor Products Sector ...
and
68030
The Motorola 68030 ("''sixty-eight-oh-thirty''") is a 32-bit microprocessor in the Motorola 68000 family. It was released in 1987. The 68030 was the successor to the Motorola 68020, and was followed by the Motorola 68040. In keeping with general ...
CPUs were thwarted by overheating problems with the
68040
The Motorola 68040 ("''sixty-eight-oh-forty''") is a 32-bit microprocessor in the Motorola 68000 series, released in 1990. It is the successor to the 68030 and is followed by the 68060, skipping the 68050. In keeping with general Motorola nami ...
. The 100-series PowerBook were stuck with chips that could not compete with
Intel 80486
The Intel 486, officially named i486 and also known as 80486, is a microprocessor. It is a higher-performance follow-up to the Intel 386. The i486 was introduced in 1989. It represents the fourth generation of binary compatible CPUs following the ...
-based PC laptops introduced in 1994. For several years, new PowerBook and PowerBook Duo computers were introduced which featured incremental improvements, including color screens, but by mid-decade, most other companies had copied the majority of the PowerBook's features, and Apple was unable to regain their lead.
The original PowerBook 100, 140, and 170 were replaced by the
145 145 may refer to:
*145 (number), a natural number
*AD 145, a year in the 2nd century AD
* 145 BC, a year in the 2nd century BC
*145 (dinghy), a two-person intermediate sailing dinghy
* 145 (South) Brigade
* 145 (New Jersey bus)
See also
* List of ...
(updated to the
145B in 1993),
160
Year 160 ( CLX) was a leap year starting on Monday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Atilius and Vibius (or, less frequently, year 913 '' Ab urbe condita''). ...
, and
180
__NOTOC__
Year 180 ( CLXXX) was a leap year starting on Friday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Rusticus and Condianus (or, less frequently, year 933 '' Ab ...
in 1992, with the 160 and 180 having video output allowing them to drive an external monitor. The PowerBook 180 had a superb-for-the-time active-matrix grayscale display, making it popular. In 1993, the
PowerBook 165c was the first PowerBook with a color screen, later followed by the
180c. In 1994, the last true member of the 100-series form factor introduced was the
PowerBook 150, targeted at value-minded consumers and students.
The
PowerBook 190, released in 1995, bears no resemblance to the rest of the PowerBook 100 series, and is in fact simply a
Motorola 68LC040
The Motorola 68040 ("''sixty-eight-oh-forty''") is a 32-bit microprocessor in the Motorola 68000 series, released in 1990. It is the successor to the 68030 and is followed by the 68060, skipping the 68050. In keeping with general Motorola nam ...
-based version of the
PowerBook 5300
The PowerBook 5300 is the first generation of PowerBook laptops manufactured by Apple Computer to use the PowerPC processor. Released in August 1995, these PowerBooks were notable for being the first to feature hot-swappable expansion module ...
, and the last PowerBook model to be manufactured using a
Motorola
Motorola, Inc. () was an American Multinational corporation, multinational telecommunications company based in Schaumburg, Illinois, United States. After having lost $4.3 billion from 2007 to 2009, the company split into two independent p ...
68k-family processor). However, like the 190, the 150 also used the 5300
IDE-based logic-board architecture. From the 100's
68000
The Motorola 68000 (sometimes shortened to Motorola 68k or m68k and usually pronounced "sixty-eight-thousand") is a 16/32-bit complex instruction set computer (CISC) microprocessor, introduced in 1979 by Motorola Semiconductor Products Sector ...
processor, to the 190's
68LC040
The Motorola 68040 ("''sixty-eight-oh-forty''") is a 32-bit microprocessor in the Motorola 68000 series, released in 1990. It is the successor to the 68030 and is followed by the 68060, skipping the 68050. In keeping with general Motorola nami ...
processor, the 100 series PowerBooks span the entire Apple 68K line, with the 190 even upgradable to a
PowerPC
PowerPC (with the backronym Performance Optimization With Enhanced RISC – Performance Computing, sometimes abbreviated as PPC) is a reduced instruction set computer (RISC) instruction set architecture (ISA) created by the 1991 Apple Inc., App ...
processor. The PowerBook Duo spanned the
68030
The Motorola 68030 ("''sixty-eight-oh-thirty''") is a 32-bit microprocessor in the Motorola 68000 family. It was released in 1987. The 68030 was the successor to the Motorola 68020, and was followed by the Motorola 68040. In keeping with general ...
line of processors and sold through the PowerPC transition to the
PowerPC 603e The PowerPC 600 family was the first family of PowerPC microprocessor, processors built. They were designed at the Somerset facility in Austin, Texas, jointly funded and staffed by engineers from IBM and Motorola as a part of the AIM alliance. Somer ...
processor with the
2300, also based on the 5300's internal architecture.
In February 2005, ''Mobile PC'' magazine named the PowerBook 100 its choice as the "#1 gadget of all time."
Technical specifications
''Listed chronologically, by release date''
Timeline
References
External links
Apple-History
{{Apple hardware before 1998
100
Computer-related introductions in 1991