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Unboxing a Mac Classic

The Mac Classic was an unremarkable rework of the Mac Plus and the SE. It retained their 8MHz 68000 processor and 4MB RAM limit, with the 1.4MB FDHD SuperDrive from the later SE models. To reduce costs, it lacked the PDS expansion slot of the SE. The Classic case was new, but it took all of its visual cues from earlier compact Macs.

The only remarkable thing about the Classic was its price. For £500 (UK educational price), you could buy the single floppy drive model (ie no hard disk) with 1MB RAM, which made it the cheapest Mac to date.

I've added the unboxing here for comparison with the oppulent Twentieth Anniversary Macintosh and later models.

The Classic shipped in a plain brown box with black and white printing.

The other side of the Classic brown box.

The Accessory Kit came in a plain white box which contained manuals, warranty sheet and floppy disks.

Buyers received a useful bundle of manuals and system installation floppies. At various times, the Classic shipped with System 6.0.x and System 7.0.x.

HyperCard Basics was provided as a free extra to UK educational buyers, but was not included in the box.

Apple made a big fuss of their environmental credentials by shipping the Classic in plain packaging. Attractive boxes with full colour printing were discontinued (in Europe at least) for several years, and Macs shipped in plain brown boxes. The notable exception, of course, was the Twentieth Anniversary Macintosh.

The Classic shipped with a budget keyboard and a standard mouse. The keyboard was a significant downgrade from the one that shipped with the SE.

In spite of Apple's green claims, the Classic was encased in polystyrene inserts. The packaging only had room for the system box and the essentials.

Copyright information: If you wish to use any images on these pages, please contact the author, Phil Beesley on beesley@mandrake.demon.co.uk.

Last updated 14 October 2008.