Introduced in February 1993 alongside the first Macintosh Centris models, it was the first totally new Quadra model since the original Quadras, the 700 and the 900 / 950. It was positioned below the 950 (and the previous midrange Quadra, the 700, was discontinued shortly after the 800's introduction). Debuting at half the price of the 950, the 800 featured the same Motorola 68040 33 MHz processor as the 950 but its additional interleavedRAM running at 70 ns, as well as an enhanced video system and SCSI bus, enabled it to outperform the 950.[2] However, its tower case was smaller and much less accessible, giving it the reputation of being one of Apple's worst cases of all time.[3] The Quadra 800 was later joined by the multimedia-focused Quadra 840AV.
The Quadra 800 was discontinued in March 1994 in favor of the PowerPC-based Power Macintosh 8100. Both the 8100 and its successor, the Power Macintosh 8500, used the Quadra 800 case, as did the Power Macintosh 8200, a model only available in Europe which used the Power Macintosh 7200 logic board. A taller, highly modified variant of the case was also used for the Power Macintosh 9500.
Hardware
Case: Apple introduced a new mini-tower case design for the Quadra 800, which was subsequently used for the Quadra 840AV, Power Macintosh 8100, 8200 and 8500. Infoworld's review of the Quadra 800 described the case's design as follows: "Apple recommends that you take your machine into an authorized dealer to install additional memory. It’s no wonder — the procedure is fraught with difficulties (although not as bad as previous compact models such as the SE). In order to access the SIMM slots, you need to detach the logic board from its plastic holders (which are easily broken). You then flip the board over to access the slots. If you have any boards in the machine, you need to remove them. And when you try to put it all back together, you may find some of your internal SCSI connections have come loose."[1]
Video: The logic board has 512 KB of on-board VRAM; this is sufficient to provide 256-color (8-bit) support on monitors up to 16 inches in size. Two VRAM SIMM slots provide the ability to upgrade to 1 MB of VRAM, which allows for 32,768 color (16-bit) resolutions.[2] Unlike the preceding Quadra 700 and Quadra 900/950, on-board video provided by the Quadra 800 is not capable of operating at 24-bit color regardless of how much VRAM is installed, as 24-bit support was removed as a cost-saving measure. However, installing a 24-bit video card enables the user to use the Quadra 800 in 24bit mode.[4]
CD-ROM: Some configurations included an AppleCD 300i 2x CD-ROM. The Quadra 800 was one of the first Macintoshes shipped with a bootable CD-ROM.[5]
Models
All configurations include an external SCSI port, two ADB and two serial ports, 3 NuBus slots, a Processor Direct Slot, mono audio in, and stereo audio out. The inclusion of an AAUI Ethernet port varied by region. The newly-introduced Apple Desktop Bus Mouse II was included with all configurations.
Introduced February 10, 1993:
Macintosh Quadra 800:[6] Sold in multiple configurations.
