Second Class Macs & Road Apples

The Worst Macs

  1. 5200-53xx, 6200-6320 fouor
  2. Mac IIvx three
  3. Mac TV three
  4. PowerBook G3/233, no cache three
  5. LC two
  6. Classic II two
  7. LC II two
  8. Color Classic two
  9. Core Solo Mac mini two

Road Apples are Macs you should probably avoid, although some of them have their charms. (The Color Classic has a cult following, and Mac TV has its followers.) These are the Second Class Macs that earn two, three, or even four apples.

Apple has produced a few computers that could have provided more performance - and should have, based on the CPU they used. However, they were hobbled by other design considerations: keeping costs down.

These are Apple's more compromised hardware designs. For the most part, they're not really bad - simply designs unable to reach their potential. We divide these models into three categories:

The number of apples ranks Second Class Macs from somewhat limited (one) to Road Apples you should avoid at all costs (four).

  1. Mac LC two October 1990
  2. Classic II two October 1991
  3. Mac LC II two replaced LC in March 1992
  4. Color Classic two February 1993
  5. Mac IIvx three September 1992
  6. Mac TV three October 1993
  7. 5200-53xx and 6200-6320 four several different models sharing the same flawed design, introduced April 1995 and later
  8. 'MainStreet' PowerBook G3/233, no cache three May 1998
  9. Core Solo Mac mini two February 2006

If you would like to nominate another model as a Road Apple or Second Class Mac, send an email to Dan Knight explaining why. Thanks!

For another perspective, see The 10 worst Macs ever built by Remy Davison on Insanely Great Mac and What were the 10 worst Macs of all time?, a response by Charles Moore of Applelinks.

Second Class Macs is intended as a good natured look at Macintosh bloopers, not as an indictment of Apple, Inc. I'd rather have the worst of these than a Windows machines any day.

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