Macs > Power Mac
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Key dates
- November 10, 1997 — The Power Macintosh G3 is introduced at speeds of 233MHz or 266MHz.
- January 6, 1998 — A second 266MHz Power Macintosh G3 minitower model is added featuring a SCSI hard disk, 3D accelerator card and 128MB of RAM.
- March 2, 1998 — A new budget Power Macintosh G3 model with a modem as standard is added, aimed at home internet users. The prices of other models is lowered.
- March 18, 1998 — Two 300MHz Power Macintosh G3 models are added to the lineup and a DVD-ROM drive option is made available.
- March 31, 1998 — The Power Macintosh G3 All-in-one is launched based on the standard Power Mac logic board including PCI slots. It is available to education customers only.
- August 12, 1998 — The Power Macintosh G3 lineup is simplified to 4 models with speeds up to 333MHz.
- October 17, 1998 — The Power Macintosh G3 All-in-one is removed from education customer pricelists.
- January 5, 1999 — The Power Macintosh G3 gets a new Blue and White enclosure. USB and FireWire are now standard and the system bus is boosted to 100MHz.
- June 1, 1999 — Power Macintosh G3 models are bumped by 50MHz with almost no other changes.
- August 31, 1999 — The Power Mac G4 is introduced in 400MHz, 450MHz & 500MHz configurations. The low-end model uses a G3-derived motherboard. The other two feature a new design with AGP graphics and optional AirPort.
- October 13, 1999 — Apple reduces the speeds of its Power Mac G4 models by 50MHz because no 500MHz chips are available. Prices remain the same.
- December 2, 1999 — The Power Mac G4 gets an upgraded graphics card with DVI as standard. The low-end Power Mac also gets an AGP motherboard in line with the other models.
- February 16, 2000 — The Power Mac G4 is bumped back up to 500MHz with no other notable changes.
- July 19, 2000 — The Power Mac G4 Cube is introduced in a single 450Mhz configuration with 500MHz available build-to-order only. Meanwhile, the Power Mac G4 gets dual processors in the 450MHz and 500MHz models plus Gigabit Ethernet.
- September 13, 2000 — Around this time, a new 500MHz Power Mac G4 with DVD-ROM instead of DVD-RAM is added to dealer pricelists.
- January 2, 2001 — Power Mac G4 prices are dropped by as much as $1,000 days before being replaced. The Power Mac G4 Cube is also reduced to $1,499.
- January 9, 2001 — Power Macs finally reach beyond 500MHz with a new 733MHz model, which also features the first SuperDrive. All other models get CD-RW drives for the first time.
- February 22, 2001 — The Power Mac G4 Cube gets its price reduced to $1299 and CD-RW added as an option.
- March 8, 2001 — A new cheaper 733MHz Power Mac G4 model is added with only a CD-RW drive.
- July 3, 2001 — The Power Mac G4 Cube gets put "on ice" due to poor sales.
- July 18, 2001 — The Power Mac G4 gets a new enclosure and is bumped to 867MHz with a new flagship Dual 800MHz model.
- January 28, 2002 — A new Power Mac G4 line up is headed by a Dual 1GHz model, the first 1GHz Mac.
- August 13, 2002 — A new line up of Power Mac G4s features dual processors in every model for the first time, and speeds up to 1.25GHz. Al have a new Mirrored Drive Doors enclosure and Xserve-derived DDR architecture.
- January 28, 2003 — FireWire 800, AirPort Extreme and Bluetooth support are added to the Power Mac G4, which now reaches 1.42GHz.
- June 23, 2003 — The Power Mac G5 is unveiled with a choice of 1.6GHz, 1.8GHz and Dual 2GHz processors. A reconfigured 2002 Power Mac G4 is released for customers that need to run Mac OS 9.
- November 18, 2003 — The single processor 1.8GHz Power Mac G5 is replaced with a dual processor model for $100 more.
- June 9, 2004 — A new Power Mac G5 line tops out at 2.5GHz. All new models feature dual processors. Meanwhile, the Power Mac G4 is discontinued.
- October 19, 2004 — A new single processor 1.8GHz Power Mac G5 model is added to the line up, costing just $1,499. It features a logic board derived from the iMac G5.
- April 27, 2005 — The dual processor Power Mac G5s get faster processors up to 2.7GHz. All new models have Bluetooth 2.0, but the ADC port is replaced with a second DVI port and the model is now optional.
- June 15, 2005 — The Single Processor 1.8GHz Power Mac G5 removed from U.S. Apple Store. It is still listed on international stores and the Power Mac G5 specifications page.
- October 19, 2005 — The Power Mac G5 gets dual core processors. A new 2.5GHz Quad model tops the line.
- November 15, 2005 — The Dual 2.7GHz Power Mac G5 is retired, leaving only PCI Express based models.
- August 12, 2006 — The single-processor dual-core Power Mac G5s are removed from the Apple Store, leaving only the Quad.
- August 31, 2006 — The Power Mac G5 Quad is removed from the Apple Store around this date, giving Apple an all-Intel lineup.
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