I finally decided to sell my working Pippin proto. Prior to get my hands off of it I'd like to share with you some pics of it.
Pippin is just a Mac running OS 7.1 (or 7.0, i dont remember). Infact you can emulate it using SheepShaver.
Macs went from 68K to PPC so emulation isn't very surprising. Compare that there is a 68X processor in the above box vs a Power PC 6X in pippin. Its like comparing a CD32 to an A2000. The cpu originated CISC and became RISC I would consider this box to be the precursor to the pippin.
That they did. The powerpc mac's had a full software 68040 emulator built in to their Toolbox ROM, which allowed 68K apps to run on PowerPC architecture (and this included large sections of the System 7.1.x release.) The Pippin was based on the PowerMac 6100 mother board design, so the above model should have a PowerPC 601 at either 60MHz or 66MHz. Certainly, this is what the Pippin museum site claims for an almost identical model. I still have a 6100/66, and it's a good old box.
Apple had display machine for trade shows, etc. Bandai and Katz media licensed the hardware as a set top box like msn tv, or web tv. It had almost no support and died a fast death, but because it is apple, it is worth money. They sold them in Japan in far greater quantities than the US or EU, so the Japanese models are worth not much money at all. It had a keyboard, touchpad keyboard / tablet thingy, and a unique looking but crappy joystick that is more trackball than joystick. It could use modems and many apple peripherals like printers. It cost about 1/3 the cost of an apple machine so that was the appeal I guess.
The demo boxes are not all PPC, some are CISC 68K. I agree PPC macs were the best, I really miss them and their uniqueness. So different than PC. New apple computers are just skinned *nix boxes....
Not all Macs were 68K or PPC. The Apple IIGS, for example, used a 65C816 processor, which was also the basis for the SNES CPU. I'm not sure if the Apple IIGS is technically considered a Mac, though.
The IIGS is considered to be an Apple 2 in lineage. The Mac is a completely different platform, just as the Lisa (running the original OS) was a different platform again (though they rebadged the Lisa as the Mac XL using an emulator to run Mac OS after the Lisa tanked.)
First time I've seen such good, clear photos of this prototype. I really think the design is interesting, weird (looks like the front of the unit was dipped in clear coat) but interesting nonetheless. And I'm with ASSEMbler on PPC Macs. I still hold Mac OS 9.2 as the best version of Mac OS overall, and lately Apple has been going down the drain with increasingly stupid ideas that make their computers look more and more like a giant version of the iPhone, which is completely stupid in my opinion. But anyway... In any case, cool piece of hardware, thanks for the pictures
For those that asked me about this machine: It is now on eBay, only a couple days left. Details are on the ebay forum.
