From Portable to Pismo
From the first mobile Mac to one of Apple’s most-loved models
B ackin 1989, Apple introduced the Macintosh Portable. The LA Times wasn’t impressed: “It’s too big, too heavy and too expensive.” And it was, coming in at a whopping 7.3kg.
That’s heavier than five M1 MacBook Pros, while its $7,300 price tag then would buy you the equivalent of 13 M1 MacBook Pros today. But while the Macintosh Portable was more transportable than truly portable, it was the beginning of a new kind of computing. It had a sharp active matrix LCD screen, a hinge to fold it over the keyboard for easier transporting and a 40MB hard drive.
Apple’s 1990s PowerBooks were designed to look and feel as welcoming as real books.
The Macintosh Portable didn’t sell well – Apple predicted 50,000 sales in the first year but was well below its target after the first quarter; it cut the price by a seventh in 1990 and discontinued it completely in 1991. But its successor would attract much better reviews, tons of awards and better sales too. Apple called it the PowerBook.