Apple's Early-90s Multimedia Accessories

octobre 18, 2024 Mourad ELGORMA

The computer industry was swept by the CD-ROM and multimedia trend in the early 90s — and Apple saw it as a prime opportunity to differentiate its computers. Let’s check out some of the accessories the company produced at the time — including one particularly unique portable device.

Special thanks to Mac84 (https://www.youtube.com/c/mac84) for contributing some footage!

Sources:
Computer Chronicles CD-ROM episodes: https://archive.org/details/cdroms_2 and https://archive.org/details/CDROM10.3
Performa 600 photo: https://madeapple.com/macintosh-performa-600-600cd
AppleCD SC photo: https://www.worthpoint.com/worthopedia/vintage-apple-applecd-sc-plus-scsi-1857857104
AppleCD SC with SE/30 photo: https://www.reddit.com/r/VintageApple/comments/l2mp4w/applecd_sc_apple_cdrom_explorer/
« Apple Begins Shipping CD-ROM Player for Mac, » InfoWorld, May 16, 1988.
« AppleCD SC, » Macworld, November 1988.
« Apple’s CD-ROM bundle is smaller, less expensive, » InfoWorld, July 20, 1992.
« AppleDesign Powered Speakers, » PC Magazine, January 9, 1996.
« Apple bundles PC peripherals, » InfoWorld, September 13, 1993.
MediaVision Pro Audio Spectrum 16 card photo: https://www.wavetable.nl/used-to-own/mediavision-pro-audio-spectrum-16
« A CD Photo Album for Your TV or Computer, » Popular Science, December 1990.
Photo CD photo: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Kodak_Photo_CD_PCD_Master.JPG
« Electronic Bridge to the Future? » Popular Photography, December 1990.
« Kodak puts photos on compact disc, » InfoWorld, October 5, 1992.
Photo CD commercial: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z_riXLowyhU
Philips Eindhoven headquarters: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philips#/media/File:Lichttoren_Eindhoven_1.
Philips CD-i deck photo: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:CD-i_with_disc.JPG
Philips CDF-100 photos: https://www.ebay.com/itm/373888390783
Kodak PCD-880 photo: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Kodak_photocd_hg.jpg
« Apple nurtures multimedia, » InfoWorld, April 5, 1993.
PowerCD bundled media photo: https://www.worthpoint.com/worthopedia/apple-powercd-circa-1993-optical-1814856958
PowerCD presentation video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LGlnuSVWmj8
Grey PowerCD photo: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Apple-powercd_hg.jpg
Kodak PCD-860 photo: https://www.diyaudio.com/community/threads/harvesting-cdm9-44-laser-assemblies.378032/
Pippin console photo: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Bandai-Apple-Pippin-Console-FR.jpg
PC Magazine, May 12, 1992.
Myst box photo: https://macintoshgarden.org/games/myst