October 17, 1996: Apple launches its Performa 6360 Mac in North America, offered elsewhere because the Energy Macintosh 6300/160.
A powerful multimedia Mac, the Performa 6360 comes bundled with a TV/video card. It additionally lets customers make cellphone calls, hearken to CDs, and watch tv — all of which appeared amazingly futuristic on the time. As Macs went, it was fairly reasonably priced, too.
Performa 6360: An important entry-level Mac
The Performa 6360 used the identical case because the earlier 12 months’s Performa 6200. Nonetheless, Apple vastly improved the pc’s insides. The Mac got here with a new “Alchemy” motherboard with 64-bit knowledge path and 64-bit DIMM RAM, PCI slot and 160 MHz 603e CPU. It additionally boasted an eight-speed CD-ROM drive, 28.8K modem and colour CRT monitor.
The 1996 Performa Macs bounce out at me for a cause that’s not significantly frequent with Apple merchandise — and positively wasn’t on the time. That cause? A surprisingly low worth level, which made them a good selection for individuals on the lookout for an reasonably priced multimedia laptop.
Right this moment, it’s completely doable to argue that Apple merchandise are reasonably priced when it comes to price versus capabilities. That argument may even be made within the Nineties, when a Mac may simply run into the mid-four figures. (The Twentieth Anniversary Mac price $7,499 in 1997 — the equal of $14,380 right now.)
Nonetheless, the Performa 6360 shipped for simply $1,499, which made it low-cost even when in comparison with far-less-capable PCs of the period. “These Performas symbolize the perfect worth/efficiency worth in both PCs [or Macintoshes],” analyst Tim Bajarin mentioned on the time.
The tradeoff? Performas nonetheless tended to be underpowered, though the 160 MHz 6360 significantly outperformed its predecessors. Actually, it wasn’t the high-spec Mac that some pro-level customers wanted on the time. However so far as a house Macintosh that may blow away your good friend’s PC went? This machine was a winner.
Do you bear in mind the Performa 6360? Go away your feedback under.