I had completely forgotten about this.
Category: Apple History
On the Apple IIe Microloop System 1100 Spirometer, by Medical Graphics Corporation
I was recently idly scrolling through the vintage Apple listings on eBay and came across something I’d never seen before: the Microloop 1100 Spirometer.
According to the listing, this beast hails from 1987 and is built around an Apple IIe and a 9-inch CRT, with some extra goodies:
- A 5.25-inch floppy drive
- 80 column / RAM expansion
- An Apple CAT II modem
- An Apple CAT expansion card for 1200 Baud
- A Microbuffer II
- A Disk II card
- An 16 channel Interactive Structures A113-A A/D card
- A Titan accelerator
- A Titan 128K RAM expansion
This machine was crammed into a custom case and was hooked up to a spirometer, which is used to measure the volume and movement of air into and out of the lungs. This medical instrument interfaced with the Apple IIe via that 16-channel Interactive Structures A113-A card, which operated as an analog-to-digital converter for incoming data.
Memorable WWDC Moments⇢
Parker Ortolani has put together an amazing list of some of the most memorable moments from WWDC’s three decades of history.
Comparing the M1 iMac to the G3⇢
No one asked for this comparison, but I delivered anyway:
2001 Revisited: WWDC
In my series 2001 Revisited, I’m covering Apple’s major announcements from 20 years ago.
And yes, in 2001, WWDC took place in May. That may seem strange to us now, but from 1989 to 2002, that’s when Apple hosted the conference. It’s been in June every year since, except for 2006, when it slipped to August.
I think we can guess what was keeping Apple busy that year.
Turns out, finding video of WWDC 2001 was way harder than I thought it would be. There are videos of Macworld keynotes that year on YouTube, but I can’t seem to find the developer conference. If you know of a copy of it, please let me know.
The Throwback iMac⇢
There’s a lot to love about the new 24-inch iMacs, and Jason Snell has put together an excellent article showing how many of those reasons have to do with the past:
The new iMac, like the original, has the fortune to live in interesting times. Things may be a bit stressful and unsure, but at least we can look at the pretty colors.
2001 Revisited: The Apple Store Opens for Business
In my series 2001 Revisited, I’m covering Apple’s major announcements from 20 years ago.
It’s hard to imagine the Apple of 2021 without its huge retail footprint, but the first Apple Stores opened just 20 years ago.
Let’s jump right to the press release:
Apple today announced that it will open 25 retail stores across the U.S. in 2001, with the first two stores opening this Saturday, May 19, at Tysons Corner in McLean, Virginia, and the Glendale Galleria in Glendale, California.
MacPaw to Launch new Apple Museum⇢
The company’s CEO, Oleksandr Kosovan:
We’re counting months to opening the doors of MacPaw’s very own Apple Museum. 323 exhibits, fascinating stories about Apple’s behind the scenes, and one big mission to befriend humans and technology. Here’s how we’ve got here.
This looks really cool. I’m putting a tour of it on my nerd bucket list.
2001 Revisited: The iBook Settles Down
In my series 2001 Revisited, I’m covering Apple’s major announcements from 20 years ago.
On May 1, 2001, Steve Jobs unveiled an all-new iBook, and the new notebook was a huge departure from what came before it.
This came at a special on-campus event1 at Infinite Loop, and a somewhat-janky video of the event is still online:
This event came just a few months after the launch of the Titanium PowerBook G4, and Apple’s notebook game had never been stronger. In fact, Jobs announced that notebooks accounted for nearly 30% of the company’s Mac sales, up from less than 20% just a year before.
The Chin
Since the introduction of the iMac G5 way back in August of 2004, the basic building blocks of what makes an iMac an iMac have been the same:
From the front, it’s rather remarkable how little the iMac has changed in nearly two decades. The screen is front and center, surrounded by a bezel with a chin below the display. The whole thing is mounted on a foot that lets a user tilt the entire computer easily.
Mac Chimes of Death
We’re all familiar with the Mac’s startup chime. While it has changed over the years, it has greeted users with its friendly tone for decades.
What you may not know is that for years, the Mac also came with a death sound, that would play when the machine was unable to properly boot.
And they are glorious:
Macintosh II
The Macintosh II line used several different chimes. These large machines combined the Macintosh operating system with the open hardware of the Apple II, and while they aren’t as charming as the original Mac’s design, they were lusted after by many users in their day.
‘Welcome to Mac OS X’
If you want even more Mac OS X reading, I’ve got a couple of PDFs for you: