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My complaint about the Classic II is that it is a degraded SE/30, with a maximum of 10MB RAM, no coprocessor, and no expandability except through the external S

My complaint about the Classic II is that it is a degraded SE/30, with a maximum of 10MB RAM, no coprocessor, and no expandability except through the external SCSI, compared to 128MB RAM, a coprocessor and a PDS with the SE/30. Restoration isn't any more difficult on SE/30, and network cards are not hard to find. Plus it can run A/UX and a modern OS, NetBSD 9 (but without a GUI, which is fine for many purposes), so the SE/30 is well worth the slightly higher investment price for a fixer-upper, and once restored, it is worth a $1000 or more, so easy to not only recoup investment, but make a tidy profit.

deleted 4y ago
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johndoe0815 4y ago
The Classic II is more or less just using the LC chipset in a compact Mac form factor, whereas the SE/30 was a repackaged IIcx and came out almost three years earlier. The initial price of a basic Classic II was US$1900, whereas the SE/30 cost a staggering US$6500. And don't remind me of the prices in Germany :). I remember seeing my first IIfx at our local Apple dealer, it cost about 35k German marks IIRC... a new VW Golf car was around 25k marks back then. More details on everymac.com: https://everymac.com/systems/apple/mac_classic/specs/mac_classic_ii.html https://everymac.com/systems/apple/mac_classic/specs/mac_cla... https://everymac.com/systems/apple/mac_classic/specs/mac_se30.html https://everymac.com/systems/apple/mac_classic/specs/mac_se3...
- Maursault 4y ago
  Apple's initial price for the SE/30 in the US was $4369, but price came down rapidly in the first year, ultimately costing less than a Mac II with greyscale card and monochrome monitor by the end of 1989. But that was 30 years ago. Today, there seems to be a Mac mafia buying up the lower priced auctions and then jacking up prices of these ancient machines on turnaround, but you can still find an untouched SE/30 within spitting distance of the cost of a Classic II. They're both attractive machines in the compact format, but I wouldn't accept a Classic II for free, where I'd be tempted to buy certain particular SE/30 models, depending on condition, for few to several hundreds of dollars.
  - johndoe0815 4y ago
    Interesting, the SE/30 page on everymac gives the initial price of $6500 I quoted above - but maybe this was not the price for the basic configuration. I had an SE/30 many years ago (gave it to a friend in the late 90s) and used it to run A/UX. Good times :). Now I only have a Classic II which badly needs recapping...
    - bombcar 4y ago
      Back then initial price may have had nothing to do with actual out to door price - as initial price was often set before the machines even could ship at all, let alone in quantity.
zargon 4y ago
The Classic II is a low budget machine and the SE/30 is a workstation. They're not competitors in the slightest and shouldn't be compared as if they were.
- Maursault 4y ago
  When they were new, agreed, but now they're both more or less 30yo Macs that roughly cost the same.
  - II2II 4y ago
    I would be surprised if the machines are remotely similar in price these days. The Classic II isn't a cost reduced version of an older model, it has also been crippled. For a lot of people, that's not going to matter. People seem to have the notion that old computers were only good for word processing and games. That is, more-or-less, what the Classic II was designed for. That is not what the SE/30 was designed for. The reality is that machines like the SE/30 were targeted at organizations and professionals with deep pockets. Throw in a display adapter and a two page display, and it was used for desktop publishing. Throw in a network card, and it was used as a server. If the standard System Software wasn't good enough, there was even a option to run A/UX. Even something as simple as RAM demonstrates how fundamentally different these machines were. The Classic II was capped at 10 MB of RAM. The SE/30 was certified for 32 MB of RAM, but the hardware design accommodated 128 MB of RAM. A Classic II can run almost any software that an SE/30 can, a bit more slowly and perhaps with an eye on the available memory. It would also be out of character for that machine. While basement tinkerers are not going to care about something being in character, collectors are going to care and collectors have a huge impact upon prices.
    - Maursault 4y ago
      While the top priced SE/30 today exceed the top priced Classic II, for the unrestored machines there is a lot of variance. You can find Classic II for sale on eBay for close to $400, but at times also find SE/30 for under $200. A lot depends on condition and whether the seller is a member of the classic macs cartel. There is a lot of screwing going on in the exchange of old macs. In the early 2000s, Classic II were consistently more expensive than SE/30.

deleted 4y ago

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johndoe0815 4y ago

The Classic II is more or less just using the LC chipset in a compact Mac form factor, whereas the SE/30 was a repackaged IIcx and came out almost three years earlier. The initial price of a basic Classic II was US$1900, whereas the SE/30 cost a staggering US$6500. And don't remind me of the prices in Germany :). I remember seeing my first IIfx at our local Apple dealer, it cost about 35k German marks IIRC... a new VW Golf car was around 25k marks back then. More details on everymac.com: https://everymac.com/systems/apple/mac_classic/specs/mac_classic_ii.html https://everymac.com/systems/apple/mac_classic/specs/mac_cla... https://everymac.com/systems/apple/mac_classic/specs/mac_se30.html https://everymac.com/systems/apple/mac_classic/specs/mac_se3...

Maursault 4y ago
Apple's initial price for the SE/30 in the US was $4369, but price came down rapidly in the first year, ultimately costing less than a Mac II with greyscale card and monochrome monitor by the end of 1989. But that was 30 years ago. Today, there seems to be a Mac mafia buying up the lower priced auctions and then jacking up prices of these ancient machines on turnaround, but you can still find an untouched SE/30 within spitting distance of the cost of a Classic II. They're both attractive machines in the compact format, but I wouldn't accept a Classic II for free, where I'd be tempted to buy certain particular SE/30 models, depending on condition, for few to several hundreds of dollars.
- johndoe0815 4y ago
  Interesting, the SE/30 page on everymac gives the initial price of $6500 I quoted above - but maybe this was not the price for the basic configuration. I had an SE/30 many years ago (gave it to a friend in the late 90s) and used it to run A/UX. Good times :). Now I only have a Classic II which badly needs recapping...
  - bombcar 4y ago
    Back then initial price may have had nothing to do with actual out to door price - as initial price was often set before the machines even could ship at all, let alone in quantity.

zargon 4y ago

The Classic II is a low budget machine and the SE/30 is a workstation. They're not competitors in the slightest and shouldn't be compared as if they were.

Maursault 4y ago
When they were new, agreed, but now they're both more or less 30yo Macs that roughly cost the same.
- II2II 4y ago
  I would be surprised if the machines are remotely similar in price these days. The Classic II isn't a cost reduced version of an older model, it has also been crippled. For a lot of people, that's not going to matter. People seem to have the notion that old computers were only good for word processing and games. That is, more-or-less, what the Classic II was designed for. That is not what the SE/30 was designed for. The reality is that machines like the SE/30 were targeted at organizations and professionals with deep pockets. Throw in a display adapter and a two page display, and it was used for desktop publishing. Throw in a network card, and it was used as a server. If the standard System Software wasn't good enough, there was even a option to run A/UX. Even something as simple as RAM demonstrates how fundamentally different these machines were. The Classic II was capped at 10 MB of RAM. The SE/30 was certified for 32 MB of RAM, but the hardware design accommodated 128 MB of RAM. A Classic II can run almost any software that an SE/30 can, a bit more slowly and perhaps with an eye on the available memory. It would also be out of character for that machine. While basement tinkerers are not going to care about something being in character, collectors are going to care and collectors have a huge impact upon prices.
  - Maursault 4y ago
    While the top priced SE/30 today exceed the top priced Classic II, for the unrestored machines there is a lot of variance. You can find Classic II for sale on eBay for close to $400, but at times also find SE/30 for under $200. A lot depends on condition and whether the seller is a member of the classic macs cartel. There is a lot of screwing going on in the exchange of old macs. In the early 2000s, Classic II were consistently more expensive than SE/30.