Macintosh Quadra 650

The Macintosh Quadra 650 and the Macintosh Centris 650 are two closely related personal computers that are a part of Apple Computer's Quadra and Centris series of Macintosh computers, respectively. When the Centris 650 was introduced in February 1993 alongside the smaller Centris 610, it was intended as the start of the new midrange Centris line of computers, a niche formerly occupied by the Quadra 700 which was discontinued. However, that proved confusing, and the Centris 650 was renamed to Quadra 650 in October 1993, with the CPU upgraded from a 25 MHz to 33 MHz. The Quadra 650 was discontinued without a direct replacement in September 1994, although the Power Macintosh 7100, introduced a few months earlier, which used the same case as the 650 (originally used on the Macintosh IIvx), had a similar target audience.

There are two versions of the Centris 650: One with 4 MB of RAM soldered to the logic board and an FPU-less Motorola 68LC040 CPU, and one with 8 MB of logic board RAM, a full Motorola 68040, and added an onboard AAUI port for Ethernet. The higher-end model also came with 1MB VRAM installed, enabling 16-bit color at 640x480 resolution. The availability of 16-bit color was significant, as it was the standard bit depth of Apple's then-new QuickTime video standard. The Quadra 650 is also available in the 4 MB and 8 MB onboard RAM variations, but always has the 68040 and AAUI.

Macintosh Centris

Macintosh Centris is a line of Macintosh computers, introduced in 1993, that were built around the Motorola 68LC040 and 68040 CPUs. The name was chosen to indicate that the consumer was selecting a Macintosh in the center of Apple's product line: lower performance (and price) than the Quadra computers, but higher performance (and price) than the Performa computers of the time. The name echoes other "neoclassical" prestige branding trends introduced at the time such as Lexus and Acura.

The name was used for the Centris 610 and Centris 650, which were introduced in March 1993. It was also used a few months later for the Centris 660AV.

Overview

The Centris 610 uses a 20 MHz 68LC040 CPU, which has no math coprocessor functions. It used a new "pizza box" case that was intended to be placed under the user's computer monitor. This case was later used again in the Quadra 610 and Power Macintosh 6100 lines of computers, and when these later computers were introduced, Apple offered consumers a product upgrade path by letting them buy a new motherboard. Apple's motherboard upgrades of this type were considered expensive, however, and were not a popular option. The Centris 610 also provided the base for the Workgroup Server 60.

Macintosh Quadra

The Macintosh Quadra series is Apple Computer's product family of professional high-end Apple Macintosh personal computers built using the Motorola 68040 central processing unit. The first two models in the Quadra line were introduced in 1991, and the name was used until the Power Mac was introduced in 1994. The product manager for the Quadra family was Frank Casanova who was also the Product Manager for the Macintosh IIfx. The first models were the Quadra 700 and Quadra 900, both introduced in 1991. The Quadra replaced the Macintosh II series as the high end computer in the Macintosh product line.

Models

The first computers to be part of the Macintosh Quadra series were the Quadra 700 and Quadra 900, both introduced in 1991 with a central processing unit (CPU) speed of 25 MHz. The 700 was a compact model using the same case dimensions as the Macintosh IIci, with a Processor Direct Slot (PDS) expansion slot, while the latter was a newly designed tower case with five NuBus expansion slots and one PDS slot. The 900 was replaced in 1992 with the Quadra 950, with a CPU speed of 33 MHz. The line was joined by a number of "800-series" machines in a new minitower case design, starting with the Quadra 800, and the "600-series" pizza box desktop cases with the Quadra 610.