Early Apple Computer Design Concepts

CommanderFrank

CommanderFrank

Cat Can't Scratch It
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Apple has always been just a little ahead of the design curve, but not always in step with the public at large back in the early 80’s. Steve Jobs knew enough to hire designer Hartmut Esslinger to come up with some original and memorable designs that would make a newcomer to the industry stand out from the crowd.
 
I guess I am really out of touch with today's movies. I had to google 4 of them, including the "winner", to have any clue what they were abut.

I do not watch enough TV to see many previews I guess. I consider that a good thing.
 
It really isn't fair to say "a little ahead of the design curve" unless you are not being totally honest.

Apple has been a trendsetter in many areas over the years. The only reason they seem to be "a little ahead of the design curve" is because every time they release a product that is revolutionary, every other company starts up their copiers.

Take for example, the original iMac. Shortly after it's release there were a whole slew of all-in-one machines copy cat machines. Then there were the computers, device, printers, and accessories with customizable colored plastic panels. Even the HP PC I used at work had iMac-esque replaceable color panels on it's case.

I could go on with other examples, like the iPhone.
 
Baby Mac looks uber awesome in the day, and that would probably define apple to what they are today. Beautiful, elegant designs, and with easy to user interface, hardly any problems, and good customer service I would think would make a good company in any part of the decade.
 
Funny I kind of remember seeing the mac phone advertised in a magazine.
 
That MacPhone was at least 3 decades ahead of its time. If they started making those I bet they could easily take a few percent of the market away from Cisco.
 
potency said:
That MacPhone was at least 3 decades ahead of its time. If they started making those I bet they could easily take a few percent of the market away from Cisco.
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They would still have to deal with AT&T from the 80's
 
From secondary link

the idea for the project was inspired by the work of richardson smith design agency (later acquired by fitch) for xerox, in which the
designers collaborated with multiple divisions within xerox to create a single high-level 'design language' that the company could
implement throughout its organization. jerry manock, the designer of the apple II and head of design in apples's macintosh division,
and rob gemmell, head of the apple II division created a plan in which they would invite global designers to apple headquarters and,
after interviewing all of them , stage a competition between the two candidates.

apple would choose a final winner and then use that design as the framework for its new design language. no one knew at that time however,
that we were in the process of transforming apple into a company whose design-based strategy and innovation-over-money approach
would make it a global success. (...)
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Even their design philosophy came from Xerox. So why did Xerox fall apart and apple soar?

BB
 
BB Gun said:
Even their design philosophy came from Xerox. So why did Xerox fall apart and apple soar?

BB
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Excerpt from an article about Xerox' GUI:
The Jobs visit may not have inaugurated the exodus of technology from PARC,
but it did launch the exodus of brainpower -- starting with Tesler, who
jumped to Apple a few months later, deeply impressed that Jobs had been
appalled Xerox was keeping its great technology under wraps.

"Why hasn't this company brought this to market?" Jobs had exclaimed during
the demo. "I don't get it!" That was a testament to Jobs' ability to detect
the promise in a novel technology several steps ahead of anyone else. The
same idea wasn't lost on PARC's frustrated innovators. Recalled Tesler: Apple
"understood what we had a lot better than Xerox did."
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Xerox couldn't see the success in their own software that Apple did, as they were content with their cash cow in selling printers and copiers. It was another invention from the PARC division that Xerox failed to commercialize. Steve Jobs even said in 1996 that Xerox could have dominated the entire computer industry and become the Microsoft/IBM of the 1990's if they capitalized on the possibilities of computing.
 
timta2 said:
Shortly after it's release there were a whole slew of all-in-one machines copy cat machines.
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I agree for the most part but you say this as if all-in-ones didn't exist before the iMac (as if they didn't exist before Apple in general).
 
So that's why apple costs 3x as much as a comparable pc it's all about the case ! I never could figure it out until now :)
 
They re-used most of these designs in later models.

The "Sony Style" evolved into the original Apple Macintosh, XL,SE, Classic from 1984.
The "Macintosh Studies" evolved into the Apple Performa 500 series from 1994.
The "Baby Mac" evolved into the iMac from 1998.
The "Macbook" evolved into the early Powerbook 100 series from 1991.
 
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