The Macintosh Color Classic was the first color compact Apple Macintosh computer. It was essentially a Macintosh LC II with an integrated 10" Sony Trinitron color display with the same 512×384 pixel resolution as an LC II with the Macintosh 12" RGB monitor. This integrated unit resembled the original Mac series, albeit slightly expanded, (see Macintosh Plus for an example), hence "Classic." In Japan, Canada[2] and some other markets - but not the US - Apple later released the Color Classic II which was essentially the same case but with the LC 550 logicboard that doubled both RAM and speed. The Color Classic was also sold to consumers in the United States as the Performa 250, and the Color Classic II as Performa 275. The Color Classic was the final model of the original "compact" Macintosh family of computers.

Like the Macintosh SE and SE/30 before it, the Color Classic did come with a single expansion slot: an LC-type Processor Direct Slot (PDS), otherwise incompatible with the SE slots. This was primarily intended for the Apple IIe Card (the primary reason for the Color Classic's switchable 560x384 display, essentially double the IIe's 280x192 High-Resolution graphics), which was offered with education models of the LCs. The card allowed the LCs to emulate an Apple IIe. The combination of the low-cost color Macintosh and Apple IIe compatibility was intended to encourage the education market's transition from Apple II models to Macintoshes. Other cards, such as CPU accelerators, ethernet and video cards were also made available for the Color Classic's PDS slot.

Introduced: February 10, 1993
Discontinued: May 16, 1994
Price: 1400 USD
CPU: Motorola 68030, 16 MHz
RAM: 4 MB, expandable to 10 MB/36 MB (CC II), 80 ns 72-pin SIMM
OS: System 7.1-Mac OS 7.6.1

Manufacturer: Apple
Date: 10th February 1993

This exhibit has a reference ID of CH4829. Please quote this reference ID in any communication with the Centre for Computing History.