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Home > Classic Macintosh Section > The Macintosh TV
 Image Credit: Apple, Inc. View all posts by: John Ward | View all posts in category: Macintosh History Apple introduced the Macintosh TV on October 25, 1993. It was aimed at first-time Mac buyers, home users, and college students who wanted the "best of all worlds," a computer, TV, and CD player rolled into one sleek, black box[1]. The Macintosh TV was received with excitement in the Mac press until after careful analysis, its glaring deficiencies became known. Apple positioned the Macintosh TV as an entry level Mac and sold it for an affordable $2,079. Apple marketed the Mac TV primarily through consumer electronics channels[3] and sold it directly to college students at universities. 
In late 1993, consumers considered an internal CD drive a luxury. Couple that with the ability to watch cable TV along with the Mac TV's relative low retail price, and it is easy to see why Apple thought it had a winner. The Mac TV's performance was roughly that of the Mac IIvx/Performa 600, combined with a built-in 14-inch, cable ready television inside an LC 520 case that was painted black. Even the keyboard and mouse were black. The Mac TV featured a 32 MHz 68030 processor, a 32-bit data bus, 5 MB standard RAM (maximum of 8 MB), an integrated PMMU, and an integrated Apple 14-inch Trinitron display. Apple sold the machine in only one configuration: 5 MB RAM / 160 MB internal hard drive with an internal AppleCD 300i CD-ROM drive and 1.4 MB floppy disk drive[2]. The Mac TV's ports included the usual Mac connectors: SCSI, printer, modem, and two ADB ports. There was also a coaxial port that accepted a standard cable-TV hookup; a video-input jack that accepted a composite video signal from a camcorder or other source; and two sound-output jacks that enabled the Mac TV to connect to an external stereo system. On the computer's front panel, between the speakers, were volume control knobs, screen-brightness controls, and a headphone jack. The speakers themselves didn't sound as good as a pair of external speakers but they were acceptable for TV and CD listening[4].  Image Credit: MacUser, January 1994 The Mac TV was a machine with crippled performance. The main RAM was only expandable to 8 MB (even the low-cost, $1,000, black and white Classic II had max RAM of 10 MB). It is hard to understand why Apple limited the RAM to a maximum of 8 MB. This was barely adequate to run later versions of System 7 and by 1995, it was far too little to handle the increasing complexity of software and multimedia functionality users expected from a modern computer. Even with a 32 MHz 68030 processor, the Mac TV ran about 15% slower than the 25 MHz LC III and LC 520 because its bus speed was only 16 MHz. There was no FPU chip nor any way to add one. That wasn't a problem for most applications, but college students, one of the Mac TV's targeted consumers, often needed applications powerful enough to run scientific and mathematical applications requiring an FPU[1]. The nonexpendable 512K VRAM (Video RAM) limited the system to 8-bit color (256 colors)[2], clearly inadequate for users who preferred the Macintosh for its ability to display advanced graphics. However, the built-in 14-inch Trinitron monitor displayed 16-bit TV images. QuickTime images running on the Mac TV looked terribly grainy compared to other Macs capable of displaying 16-bit graphics. As a result, CD-ROM titles that depended heavily on QuickTime were unsatisfactory on the Mac TV[1]. The Mac TV came cable ready, so the user could watch full-screen cable TV on its monitor. Its RCA port could connect to a VCR, camcorder, laserdisc player (DVDs were not available at the time), or video game player. The Mac TV shipped with a palm-sized remote control. The remote sensor was built into the computer at top-center over the monitor. The remote control worked with both the TV and the built-in AppleCD 300i drive, which could handle audio CDs as well as PhotoCDs and data CD-ROMs. To get you started, Apple tossed in a batch of CD-ROM titles and software[1].  Image Credit: MacUser, January 1994 When you pressed the button on the remote control (or issued a customizable keystroke), the Mac's desktop faded out and a full-screen video image faded in. Press the button a second time and the TV signal surrendered to the video-input port, which yielded a blank screen unless a video source was connected. The Mac TV could not automatically sense if a video signal was present. Although the Mac TV would not allow simultaneously watching TV and working in Mac OS at the same time, it could play the TV's sound while the Mac's desktop was visible. The TV Setup control panel let you configure this, as well as lock out inactive channels and activate closed captioning. Parents and teachers could also specify a password that must be typed before the computer switched to TV mode, but it was easy to defeat by simply pulling the TV Preferences file out of the System Folder and restarting the computer[4]. There were significant problems with the Mac TV's ability to display cable TV. First, the TV video had a true resolution of 640 x 240 pixels, so images appeared jerkier and grainier than on a normal TV. Second, because the Mac, the TV, and the VCR didn't interact, viewing options were limited. The user could not watch TV while working in Mac OS. Although it was possible to capture a single frame of TV to disk by pressing the standard Open Apple-Shift-3 keys, there was no way to capture a series, even with third-party software. Creating QuickTime movies was out of the question[1]. Because the internal cable-TV tuner took up the space that would normally be given an expansion slot (Processor Direct Slot), the Mac TV could not be expanded with additional hardware. The Macintosh TV was considered a "closed box" with no easy method to upgrade its capabilities[4]. One possible solution to the problems of the Mac TV would have been for Apple to use a 68040 processor instead of a 68030 processor. The 040 would have been able to display a small TV window while using Mac OS, and maybe even allowed the ability to capture TV as a QuickTime movie[3], like the popular AV Macs of the time. However, the 68040 or "Quadra" Macs were extremely expensive in 1993. This would have made the Macintosh TV a high end Mac priced well out of the reach of its intended audience. The Macintosh TV was an interesting concept but its abilities just weren't up to the task of combining a cogent TV/CD-ROM system in an affordable package for low-end consumers. The Mac TV was a curious footnote in Apple history. Apple only produced about 10,000 units[3] before pulling the plug on it. It is perhaps one of the rarest Macs ever and is highly sought after by collectors because of it. The Mac TV was a great idea, but it just didn't have that right mix of affordability and capability to make it a serious offering. The Mac TV's lack of an expansion slot wouldn't have been as significant if the computer were faster. Its 68030 processor ran at a fairly swift 33 MHz, but the rest of the computer ran at half that speed. The lackluster performance was adequate only for running the types of entry-level applications that accompanied the computer. The Mac TV's mediocre performance and lack of expansion options detracted from its otherwise considerable appeal. The Mac TV did succeed in putting a computer, TV set, and CD player in a relatively small, affordable package. However, Mac users who could live without a built in TV could get faster performance and better expandability from several less-expensive Performa models available at the time without sacrificing the bundled software and hardware[4]. Macworld's buying advice in the April 1994 edition: "Buy yourself a TV set with the money you save [by buying a Performa]."  Image Credit: Macworld, January 1994 Macintosh TV Links on VAW:
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