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The PowerBook 100 revolutionised portable computing in 1991. Until the release of the 100, both Mac and PC portables were heavy, bulky affairs and were not really any more portable than a Mac SE, Plus or Classic. They were also underpowered, offered few ports and lousy screens. The Macintosh Portable was equally guilty, although in its defence it did offer items such as video out and an excellent active matrix B&W screen. Most PC portables ran 286 chips, ran DOS (most did not have sufficient memory or CPU power to run Windows 2.0, let alone Windows 3.x later on). And if you wanted to run DOS on a Mac you could always use SoftPC which ran DOS 4.0 capably on a 68000 processor.

To be entirely fair, the PowerBook 100 was not the first in its class, although it took a Mac OS based computer to show the way. The Mac Portable's main competitor was the Outbound which offered all of the Portable's innovations in a light, compact case. Moreover, the Outbound also promised upgradeability and more options, such as larger hard drives.

Enter the PowerBook 100. Apple market research had demonstrated that there was widespread demand for a capable, truly portable computer, regardless of its OS. The Mac Portable was too heavy and too expensive to attract much more than the professional Macintosh user who demanded a Mac for the road. As a result, Apple contracted Sony to produce a notebook to its specifications, using the Portable as a base (a similar deal was done with IBM Japan - a partnership which produced the PowerBook 2400). Sony took the Portable's internals and reduced the size of all the components. Most notably, they shifted the keyboard to the rear of the notebook, opening up the front for palmrests and battery and hard drive compartments. The screen was the same size as that of a compact Mac at 9", although it offered 640x400 resolution, an advance over the compact Macs. It's interesting to speculate how much Sony drew upon the Outbound design, although the Outbound has a forward-mounted keyboard. But let's take a glance at the 100's main features first:

CPU: 68000 at 16MHz
RAM: 2MB soldered; 8MB maximum
Display: Backlight, passive matrix supertwist B&W LCD; 640x400 resolution
Full-size keyboard
Trackball input device
Ports: ADB, serial, SCSI, sound out, floppy
Hard drive: 20 or 40MB SCSI
Floppy: External SuperDrive

Small and light, and with twice the processor clock speed of any other 68000-based compact Mac, the PB100 also introduced an innovation that did not even appear on the 100's more powerful siblings, the PowerBook 140 and 170: SCSI Disk Mode. You could - and can - plug a 100 into any SCSI-equipped desktop Mac and it instantly appears as a hard drive on the desktop's desktop! Hugely convenient for fast backup or transfer of files. Apple finally reintroduced this feature on the PowerBook 160 and 180. For more on SCSI Disk mode, check out PowerBook SCSI.
 

A Bargain PowerBook

In some respects, the PowerBook 100 might represent the best value among the entire PowerBook line. It still looks modern and it weighs only as much as a Duo, yet it has almost a full set of ports for far superior connectivity. Yes, the 68000 CPU is slow, there's no getting past it, but it's faster than a Plus or Classic and serves a number of purposes admirably. Let's say you're a cash-strapped college student who needs to take notes, write an assignment or ten, and wants modem access to email (or even ethernet access). It's all doable on a 100. You don't need colour, PC cards, a CD ROM and all the weight that comes with them. Just write on it. Word processing, spreadsheet, basic databases, drawing, painting, email, even DOS is possible as mentioned above.
 

What Works

Anything that doesn't require colour QuickDraw (68020 or better) or an FPU or PMMU works. The 100 was released with System 7.01, but can also run System 6.08L. Earlier versions of System 6 may work but are not supported by Apple. The 100 runs up to 7.5.5 and that's what I run my Classic on, but you're probably better off with System 7.01 or 7.1 if you're going to maximum speed and a smaller system heap. A moderate System 7.1 folder will probably only use around 1,100-1,200K. But System 7.5 or 7.5.1 would take up little more RAM than 7.1 and is probably worth the additional features. 7.5.3 is a free 19-disk download and a standard install would use around 8-9MB of your hard disk - but there's a lot of trash you can throw out. But if you're working with only a 20MB hard disk, you're going to want to conserve space carefully. 7.1 will only use around 3MB on average.

Caveat: If you want to use the special PB100 System 6.08L, you must install System 6.08 (standard edition) first.

There is a surprisingly large range of software available. A lot of it is obsolete so it's often almost given away. For word processing, ClarisWorks is king here. Version 2.0 or 3.0 are great packages, include painting, drawing, spreadsheet, database (a slimmed down Filemaker) and communications programmes. Version 4.0 or 5.0 are out as they require a 68020 (Colour QuickDraw) or later. Go for 3.0: it runs in 1MB of RAM and gives you everything in little disk space. By contrast, Word 5.1 and Excel 4.0 (or their earlier versions) offer little more (and sometimes less) in the way of features and instead offer bloat, sluggishness and occupy horrendous amounts of HDD space. Full installs of Word 5.1 and Excel 4.0 occupy more than 8 and 5MB respectively. Add 3-4MB for the System and you've almost filled your 20MB hard disk.

By the way, all versions of ClarisWorks offer translators. Known as 'Claris XTend', they permit you to open or save a variety of formats - say, Excel 4.0, Word 5 or WordPerfect. You can also exchange data with users of MacWrite/MacWrite Pro. ClarisWorks/AppleWorks 5.0 also contains the translater for NisusWriter. ClarisWorks 3.0 should be only around $19 or less in the US. Version 2.1 will be cheaper still. Should be some old stock still around.
 

Netting and em@iling

Yes it is possible on a PB100. Okay, so surfing is not really the 100's forte, but it can be done in a minor way. 100s, being different from the '030 and later PBs, need different connection tools though and only a limited number of things works Here's what you'll need to connect:

MacPPP 2.0.1
MacTCP 2.06
Internet Config 1.3 (optional but useful)

I don'r really recommend browsing on a 100 - it's just too slow. The only bets for text and graphics are MacWeb 1.1, MacWeb 2.0 (has good news interface and lets you send but not receive email) and NCSA Mosaic 1.0. But it'll be s-l-o-w. Rethink. Try MacLynx instead which's text-only, but works fine for browsing news pages and so on. Mind you, if you have 6 or 8MB of RAM, it may be possible to run MacWeb off a RAM Disk. This could make these old browsers run at a tolerable speed. MacWeb 1.1 is faster than 2.0, but 2.0 supports frames. All I can say is it's a pity you can't use the Wannabe or iCab browsers.

Email is a better bet. All you need is Eudora 1.3 (for System 6) or 1.5. 1.5 addss a few more features and is more customisable. Both are fast and certainly run more than adequately on the 100. If you want to run the net, you need a faster Mac. But for word processing, spreadsheet and email, what more could you ask for?

NewsWatcher 2.1 (or MacWeb 2.0) will run well on a 100. You'll need Internet Config (freeware) for MacWeb or NewsWatcher. Hotline doesn't work I don't think. I don't IRC so I have no idea what'll work. AOL won't work as I think you need v.3.0 or 4.0 and these don't run on a 68000.

NCSA Telnet will work fine, as will Better Telnet although the latter uses more RAM. Telnet can be great for accessing email at different locations from anywhere in the world. It'll take about 650K of disk space.
 

Expanding your Memory

The 100 only came with 2MB soldered but frankly I haven't met too many that still have that miserly amount. Most have been upgraded to at least 4MB which is a workable and sensible amount of RAM. The 100 has one RAM card slot that take a 2, 4 or 6MB card. Now while these are reasonably priced these days, you will still end up paying more per MB than for, say, a 32MB chip for a PB1400. But you've got to expect this. If you can afford it, go for the gold and get the full 6MB. But with any joy, you'll find a 100 with 6 or 8MB already. 4MB is the absolute minimum with which to set up a RAM disk. By default, the 100 saves its RAM Disk contents on shutdown so you'll always have it. 1.3MB is enough for a copy of ClarisWorks and the document you're working on. But don't let the batteries run out if you're in Sleep mode: the lithium batteries on the 100 which serve as backup are expensive to replace.
 

Peripherals

This is where the 100 excels. You can plug virtually anything into a 100 that you can into a desktop Mac, except video. Even that's possible if you can locate one of those rare old SCSI video adapters. But video aside, the PowerBook 100 is not limited by its 68000 CPU. It can still connect to Zip and Jaz drives, Syquests, external SCSI HDDs, scanners, printers and so on.

Okay. So what works?

Modems: The fastest internal modem is 14.4 and some may still have original 2400 modems which are almost useless. Almost. You can still email and fax with them though. Try FaxSTF 3 if you have a 9600 or 14400 modem or ValueFax (shareware) for fax software. Note that you might need to find a script in an old version of fax software.

There's a lot of debate about modem throughput on 68000 Macs. Experiment a bit to get the best setting. MacPPP lets you set the baud rate for instance. Some say using 38000 works well and I've used this on 68000s with no problems. Others set theirs to 19200 for more reliable throughput. Try both and see what works best for you.

Of course, you can use an external 28.8, 33.6 or 56K modem with the 100's serial port. But the 100 won't take advantage of the 56K's speed, so use a 28.8 or 33.6. They can usually deliver data faster than a 100 can handle it anyay, so they're plenty fast enough.

Zip and Jaz: Iomega driver 4.2 with System 6 or 4.3 with System 7. Iomega Guest from 4.3 also works with System 7. Make a bootable system on a Jaz or Zip disk in case your system gets corrupted.

External hard drives: If they're Apple branded use Apple's HDSC 7.3.5. If not, use something like SilverLining, Lido or FWB's Hard Disk Toolkit. Note that HDT 2 and later do not work on the 100. Use 1.7.5 or 1.8 or earlier instead. Note that you can format a drive usiung HDT 2.0 or later on a newer Mac and it will work when used with the PB100.

Internal hard drives: Later SCSI hard drives, such as those used in the  PowerBook 140 and 170 and the  PowerBook 160 and 180 may not necessarily fit correctly in the 100. If you buy a larger 3rd party drive, ensure you can return it if necessary.

Faster and more recent nternal hard disks in the 100 must be formatted with a 3:1 ratio (2:1 may work to your satisfaction as well). The reason is the drive speed. The disk can deliver data faster than the CPU and bus can handle it so a 2:1 or 3:1 interleave forces the drive to spin twice or thrice before delivering the data to the CPU. HDD formatters like FWB's HDT, Drive 7, APS PowerTools and even Apple's HDSC will permit you to set the interleave.

Note: You don't have to worry about the above if you're simply connecting an external HDD to the 100's SCSI port. The external SCSI bus runs at a slightly slower speed than the internal SCSI so the interleave can be 1:1. Setting the interleave to a lower rate and using that disk with a later, faster Mac would either (a) result in the Mac not working with the HDD or (b) result in a serious dimunition of the drive's performance. By default, nearly all formatters set the interleave at 1:1 so for an external drive, just do a standard/easy install.

Scanners: depends on the make/model. Make sure the software supports the 68000. Same with the OCR software.
Printers: HP DeskWriter 500 series; ImageWriter I or II; StyleWriter I or II; any PostScript laser printer. Stuart Bell, keeper of the PowerBook 100 FAQ, suggests that early versions of the HP DeskWriter driver (not the one currently available from HP) works with DeskJets like the 800 series (in B&W only).

For drivers, you can use up to the StyleWriter 1200 driver on the 100 for a StyleWriter or StyleWriter II. The neweer driver gives you more options like greyscale for example. Works on my Classic anyway. For any laser printer, you can use Apple's LaserWriter 7 driver (with System 7) for a small footprint and speed; or LaserWriter 8 up to version 8.3.3 for a greater number of features. Apple's LaserWriter driver works with any PostScript printer.

CD ROM: Any CD ROM drive should work, Apple branded or not. The CD ROM driver v. 5.3.1 which comes with OS 7.6 (and only with 7.6) works with most 3rd party CD ROM drives. Otherwise use the 3rd party driver or use an Apple CD ROM drive. You won't be playing multimedia CDs and QuickTime graphics though! Use a CD ROM for music (note that the 100 does not support audio playthrough so you'll have to connect external speakers to the CD player) or for loading software. You can boot from one using the Command-Option-Shift-Delete startup sequence.

Floppy: The 100 has a HDI-20 port for connecting an external floppy drive. Happily, unlike the Duo, you don't necessarily need a floppy drive. If yours is broken or you obtain a 100 without a floppy, don't worry. You don't need it that much. If you have an external SCSI hard drive or a Zip you can use those. They're much faster anyway.

Batteries: The PB100s are the only PBs to use lead-acid batteries. Consequently, although these give reasonable performance, they do not have a particularly long life and can be harder to find. Spares are highly advisable. Try turning off the backlighting. In the old days, enterprising companies made PowerBook lights which clipped onto the PB screen and shone a light into the display. Most desk lamps do an equally good job.

Ethernet: Farallon (still?) make a LocalTalk to ethernet adapter that plugs into your serial port. A less elegant solution is a SCSI-to-ethernet adapter sold by a few 3rd party manufacturers. You may occasionally find these at parts shops. But I don't recommend it unless ethernet is essential as it just hogs your convenient SCSI port.

DOS: Yes, DOS! I've run SoftPC - which includes DOS 4.0 - on a 8MHz Classic. So it should positively speed on a 16MHz 100. If you really need to run DOS, it works. I haven't tried later versions of DOS (5.0, 6.22) but there's no reason why they shouldn't work. Just don't try and load Windows 3.11 on it! Mind you, SoftPC was designed to run Windows (at the time Windows 2.0) and indeed MacUser got it running (slowly) on a Mac II and an SE. Hate to think how slow Windoze was on an SE... But as DOS is pretty light duty, 640K or 1MB RAM will do it. I give SoftPC 2MB memory on my Classic and it works fine. Old versions of Lotus 1-2-3, WordPerfect for DOS and Word for MS-DOS work fine. Though why you would want to is beyond me.

For more on PowerBook SCSI, go here

For Stuart Bell's PowerBook 100 FAQ, go here

Buyer's Guide:

In many respects, the PowerBook 100 is almost a sub-notebook in terms of size and weight. If you have no need for the additional speed - and weight - a 68030 PowerBook offers, the size of the 100 might suit you totally. For around $US 100 or less (depending on configuration), you have a Mac that can do much more than a SE, Classic or Plus can do. It is still a more than capable machine for word processing and email.on the road. Its price:capability ratio make it a bargain PowerBook.