30 Years of The Mac

This week we celebrate the 30th anniversary of the original Apple Macintosh - the piece of kit that kick-started the revolution of the PC.

January 24th 1984 is where it all began for the Mac with its 9-inch display, 128k of RAM and 8MHz 68k all-in-one processor. Who knew that this would open the floodgates of technology, three decades of them.
Apple CEO Steve Jobs introduced this Mac to the world which also boasted two revolutionary applications in the MacPaint and the MacWrite word processor.

A year later the Mac came fitted with two exclusive apps courtesy of Microsoft – Word and Excel. A couple of other milestones were achieved in the next couple of years too, with the Mac getting a major upgrade in 1986, called the Macintosh Plus. This model then had to make way for the Macintosh llx, which possessed a CD-ROM drive – one of the first at the time.

In 1989 though, the first Mac laptop was born which was another forward step for Apple. The following year Apple introduced its fastest computer to date, which resulted in the company claiming 20% of the computing market. For the next few years the Mac was to become faster, stronger and even more popular, selling its 10 millionth unit in 1993.

At this time, Microsoft was also climbing in popularity and power with the company claiming Windows was being used by over 25 million people. After the introduction of the PowerPC chips in 1994 and Apple licencing its OS in 1995, Steve Jobs returned to the company in 1996 after having left over 10 years earlier. He brought with him, his NeXT step operating system which helped Apple to become the company we know it as today.

1998 made way for a new era of Mac; the iMac. Apple had persuaded Bill Gates to buy $150 million worth of shares in the company the previous year, which made more people take the company seriously. The iMac had ditched the floppy disk drive and opted for easy internet hook up and USB which really took the world by storm.

If we take a leap to 2004 when the year was dominated by the iPod, the Mac had a complete revamp with floating LCD screens and hemispherical base which is how we recognise it today. The UK’s first Apple store opened in London. This was arguably the turning point in the future of Apple Mac’s, bringing a series of introductions including the MacBook, the MacBook Air, the MacBook Pro and the Mac Mini to name but a few.

The Mac Pro was released just last year and 2014 looks set to bring a number of revolutionary pieces of equipment and gadgets, including the iWatch, better Apple TV, the iPhone 6, the iPad Air 2, a cheaper iMac and a brand new MacBook Pro.

An impressive journey and one that we salute; 30 years and counting for the Mac.