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20 Macs for 2020
with Jason Snell
Hosted by Jason Snell.
Jason Snell and a collection of long-time Mac watchers count down Jason's list of the 20 most notable Macs of all time, one per week.
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#10: Mac Portable (#11)
October 9th, 2020 · 24 minutes
Thank goodness there are second chances, because Apple's first attempt to make a portable Macintosh was as inauspicious at it gets.
#9: Twentieth Anniversary Macintosh (#12)
October 2nd, 2020 · 21 minutes
In an era where Apple liked to show concepts from its design lab in public, one weird Mac prototype somehow became a real product, and was unveiled at the end of the worst Apple keynote in history.
#8: Mac IIcx and IIci (#13)
September 25th, 2020 · 15 minutes
You know about the Macintosh, but do you know about the sequel? The Macintosh II was huge--literally. But its compact successors might be the pinnacle of late 80s/early 90s Apple design.
#7: Mac mini (#14)
September 18th, 2020 · 12 minutes
The popularity of the iPod led Apple to create a Mac designed specifically to tempt people to switch from Windows. It didn't go as planned, but the result was a Mac model that's been with us for fifteen years and counting.
#6: DayStar Genesis MP (#15)
September 11th, 2020 · 16 minutes
One of the most important developments in the history of the Mac was not created in Cupertino, but by a Mac clonemaker in a tiny town in Georgia.
#5: Blue and White Power Mac G3 (#16)
September 4th, 2020 · 16 minutes
Professionals were dragged out of their beige towers by an iMac-inspired Power Mac that featured a drop-down door, big plastic handles, and a raft of new technologies.
#4: PowerBook 500 and 5300 (#17)
August 28th, 2020 · 13 minutes
Apple follows up its groundbreaking original PowerBooks with a new set of laptops that ushered in perhaps the ugliest period in Apple laptop history.
#3: Xserve (#18)
August 21st, 2020 · 13 minutes
Apple had made numerous attempts to sell server hardware, including a strange non-Mac server that Steve Jobs likened to a bizarre dream. But in the early 2000s, Jobs decided to take another crack at it, and vowed that this time things would be different.
#2: PowerBook Duo (#19)
August 14th, 2020 · 13 minutes
The very first time Apple made a laptop that compromised in numerous ways, all in the question of being as thin and light as possible.
#1: Power Mac G5 (#20)
August 7th, 2020 · 21 minutes
The classic "cheese grater" design of the Power Mac G5 influences the design of the modern Mac Pro, and also represents (in the worst way) the last time Apple embarked on a chip transition.