The Power Macintosh 5200 LC and Power Macintosh 5300 LC are a line of

personal computer A personal computer, commonly referred to as PC or computer, is a computer designed for individual use. It is typically used for tasks such as Word processor, word processing, web browser, internet browsing, email, multimedia playback, and PC ...

s that were a part of

Apple Computer Apple Inc. is an American multinational corporation and technology company headquartered in Cupertino, California, in Silicon Valley. It is best known for its consumer electronics, software, and services. Founded in 1976 as Apple Computer Co ...

Power Macintosh The Power Macintosh, later Power Mac, is a family of personal computers designed, manufactured, and sold by Apple Inc., Apple Computer, Inc as the core of the Mac (computer), Macintosh brand from March 1994 until August 2006. Described by ''Mac ...

, LC, and Performa families of

Macintosh Mac is a brand of personal computers designed and marketed by Apple Inc., Apple since 1984. The name is short for Macintosh (its official name until 1999), a reference to the McIntosh (apple), McIntosh apple. The current product lineup inclu ...

computers. It was mainly sold in the North American education market. When it was sold to the consumer market, they were marketed as the Performa 5200 and Performa 5300. The Power Macintosh 5200 LC was introduced in April 1995 with a

PowerPC 603 The PowerPC 600 family was the first family of PowerPC 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. Somerset was opened ...

CPU at 75 MHz as 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 ...

-based replacement of the

Macintosh LC 500 series The Macintosh LC 500 series is a series of personal computers that were a part of Apple Computer's Macintosh LC family of Macintosh computers, designed as a successor to the compact Macintosh family of computers for the mid-1990s mainstream educ ...

. Later models switched to the

PowerPC 603e The PowerPC 600 family was the first family of PowerPC 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. Somerset was opened ...

CPU and used model numbers above 5300, but kept the same motherboard design. Unlike previous education models, which prepended the model number with "LC", the 5200 / 5300 models use the Power Macintosh designation of Apple's main workstation line of the time, with "LC" appended to the end. The 5200 is closely related to the 6200, which uses the same logic boards in desktop cases without integrated monitors. In an editorial, ''MacWorld'' Magazine's Editor-in-Chief, Adrian Mello, wrote of the 5200: "The all-in-one design exhibits a lot of the same spirit that Apple vested in the original Macintosh. A deceptive minimalism belies this machine's utility and value. Apple has again figured out how to package a full-featured computer into the simplest possible shape. ..Its predecessors, which include the Performa 520, 550, 575 and now 580, all offer good functionality and value, but they lack the 5200's design integrity. In comparison, their efforts to mimic the appearance of a conventional three-piece desktop computer just made them look clumsy." Production of the 5200 and 5300 models was discontinued in the first half of 1996, with the

-based Power Macintosh 5260 (with Performa 5260CD and 5270CD variants) and Power Macintosh 5400 (with Performa 5400CD, 5410CD and 5420CD variants) being offered as replacements at different price points. The 5260 retained the overall design of the 5200 and was sold at a similar price point with similar features, but shared no parts other than the stand and lower faceplate. The more expensive 5400 was also visually similar but with a significantly different motherboard that offered

PCI PCI may refer to: Business and economics * Payment card industry, businesses associated with debit, credit, and other payment cards ** Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard, a set of security requirements for credit card processors * Prov ...

instead of

Processor Direct Slot A processor direct slot (PDS) is a slot incorporated into many older Macintosh models that allowed direct access to the signal pins of a CPU, similar to the functionality of a local bus in PCs. This would result in much higher speeds than having ...

expansion.

Hardware

The 5200 LC uses a 75 MHz

CPU. The 5300 LC replaced the CPU with the newer and faster

, though the rest of the Quadra 630-derived architecture remained unchanged. The monitor is a 15"

shadow mask A shadow is a dark area on a surface where light from a light source is blocked by an object. In contrast, shade occupies the three-dimensional volume behind an object with light in front of it. The cross-section of a shadow is a two-dimensional ...

CRT with a 12.8" viewable size. Supported resolutions are 640x480 @ 60 Hz, 640x480 @ 66.7 Hz, 800x600 @ 60 Hz, 800x600 @ 72 Hz, and 832x624 @ 75 Hz. The 5200 LC and 5300 LC contains a

for expansion, as well as an L2 cache slot for an optional L2 cache card.

Problems

By March 1996, a number of users were having problems with system freezes and color shifts. The problem was not solvable with a software update, so Apple instituted a program titled the "Repair Extension Program for the Apple Power Macintosh and Performa 5200, 5300, 6200, and 6300." While never formally described as a recall — a distinction Apple emphatically reinforced in its repair documentation — users were required to bring affected units to an authorized Apple reseller for a repair. The program remained in effect for seven years. During its lifespan, Apple updated the 5200 with a "Revision B" design, replacing the power supply, speakers, analog board, EMI shield, front bezel and rear housing with updated parts that are not interchangeable with those of the original model. The Performa 5200 line was beset with numerous problems. The 5200's usage of the original PowerPC 603 was also subject to some criticism. Low End Mac called the Performa 5200 series one of the worst Macs of all time.

Models

Introduced April 3, 1995: * Power Macintosh 5200/75 LC: Sold only to the education market. Features a 500 MB hard drive. US$1,699. Introduced May 1, 1995: * Macintosh Performa 5200CD: The Power Macintosh 5200 LC with a 790 MB or 1 GB hard drive. * Macintosh Performa 5210CD: Identical to the Power Macintosh 5200 LC (with different death chime from Performa 6200 instead of LC one), sold only in Asia and Europe. Introduced July 17, 1995: * Macintosh Performa 5215CD: The Performa 5200CD with a different software bundle. * Macintosh Performa 5220CD: The Performa 5215CD with a 500 MB hard drive, sold only in Asia and Europe. Introduced August 28, 1995: * Power Macintosh 5300/100 LC: 16 MB memory standard. Introduced October 17, 1995: * Macintosh Performa 5300CD: Consumer version of the Power Macintosh 5300 LC. * Macintosh Performa 5300CD DE: Special "Director's Edition" of the 5300CD with additional software. * Macintosh Performa 5320CD: 120 MHz version of the 5300CD, only sold in Europe and Asia.

Timelines

References

External links

Power Macintosh 5200 LC
an
Power Macintosh 5300 LC
at Apple History. {{Apple hardware before 1998 5200 LC Macintosh Performa 5200 LC 5200 LC Macintosh all-in-ones Macintosh case designs Computer-related introductions in 1995 Products and services discontinued in 1997