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Macintosh General Ownership Information

So, you want to buy your first vintage Mac. Which model should you go with? You probably already know that most Macintoshes require advanced repairs such as replacing capacitors and mitigating corrosion damage. This page should be able to help you figure out what model is right for you.

WARNING: This page contains my personal opinions. Feel free to disagree, and do not take my opinions and recommendations as fact.

There are no "Bad Macs"

It has long been perpetuated that some Macintosh models are better than others. The models that usually get thrown under the bus are machines like the first two Mac LCs, the Mac Classic II, and of course, the Power Macintosh/Performa 6200 series. Is it true that these models have issues that make them slower than other models? Yes!

Do these issues make them "Bad Macs" to own nowadays? No! Macs commonly trashed on, such as the Performa 6200CD do have some limitations due to the 32-bit data bus, and a couple of other things. However, that does not mean that they are not really fun and cool machines to own! First off, they can be upgraded to help with performance issues. Further software extensions can even bring its performance up to 6100 speeds, which isn't half bad at all! Even if you leave one stock, there is still plenty you can do with it. Just because it was a bad buy back in the 90s doesn't mean it is now.

So then, what is the best model to own?

As long as you are able to replace the surface-mounted capacitors on a Mac's motherboard, there is no "best model". You should just try to find any model that won't cost you a fortune, and make sure it is going to be repairable, because repairs will be necessary on any vintage Mac nowadays.

What's the best model in terms of reliability?

It depends.

Popular vintage Macs like the SE/30, IIci, and others often require extensive repair to get them running again. The usual suspects for what will make a Mac die are the following:

1. Leaking Capacitors - Capacitors on the logic boards of Macintoshes from the 1980s and 1990s usually fail and leak corrosive fluid all over the board. Replacing them, along with extensive cleanup is required at a minimum to fix most vintage Macs at this point.
2. Leaking PRAM Batteries - The PRAM backup batteries found on the logic boards of most Macintoshes are known for commonly leaking, or even exploding their guts all over the board. The first thing you should do upon aquiring a vintage Macintosh is to pull the battery and make sure it hasn't leaked yet. If it has, you may be out of luck on getting the board working again.
3. Faulty Power Supplies - Most power supplies found in Vintage Macs are known for being unreliable. While replacing faulty capacitors can often get them working again, many other non cap-related issues also often arise, leaving retrofitting a modern supply a common solution.
4. Brittle Plastics - Apple used poor quality plastic on most of its late 80s and 1990s Macintoshes. It has now become exceptionally brittle. This makes transporting and shipping computers very dangerous.

If you really want a mac that will require minimal work to get running, here are a few options.

Desktops

Laptops

The PowerBook 170 is a fast enough laptop with a really nice Active-Matrix LCD display. The 170 has (mostly) all solid capacitors and is overall a pretty reliable system, however, it still has other problems.

• Tunnel Vision - most 170s have a display issue known as tunnel vision. See the 170 issues page for more info.
• Brittle Plastics - The extremely fragile plastic causes the display hinges to self-destruct, requiring repair.
• Capacitors - the display inverter board still has a single electrolytic capacitor. It isn't very prone to failure, but it will still need replacement at some point.
• HDD Failure - the hard drives used in the 170 are nearly all dead. You can repair some of them, but it's still a pain.

The 540c is a good bit faster than the 170, with a 68LC040 processor instead of an 030. It still suffers from brittle plastics and unreliable hard drives causing the same issues the 170 has.

Page Unfinished. More will be added in the next release.