Macintosh Centris
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Macintosh Centris was a set of three 1993 Macintosh models that were built around the Motorola 68LC040 and 68040 CPUs. The name was chosen to indicate that the consumer was selecting a Macintosh in the center of Apple's product line: lower performance (and price) than the Quadra computers, but higher performance (and price) than the Performa computers of the time.
The name was used for the Centris 610 and Centris 650, which were introduced in March 1993. It was also used a few months later for the Centris 660AV.
The Centris 610, introduced in March 1993, used a 20MHz 68LC040 CPU, which had no math coprocessor functions. It used a new "pizza box" case that was intended to be placed under the user's computer monitor. This case was later used again in the Quadra 610 and Power Macintosh 6100 lines of computers, and when these later computers were introduced, Apple offered consumers a product upgrade path by letting them buy a new motherboard. Apple's motherboard upgrades of this type were considered expensive, however, and were not a popular option.
The Centris 650 initially used a 25MHz 68LC040 CPU; later models used a 68040. It used the same case as the older Macintosh IIvx and Macintosh IIvi computers, and subsequent computers using the same case were the Macintosh Quadra 650 and the Power Macintosh 7100 line.
The Centris 660AV used a 25MHz 68040 and also had a digital signal processor chip from AT&T. Like other "AV" computers from Apple, it had video input and output.
The name "Centris" was soon considered to be confusing to customers, and was abandoned. The Centris 610 and 650 were replaced about 6 months later by the Quadra 610 and 650 models, which kept the same basic case and design but raised the CPU speeds from 20MHz and 25MHz respectively, to 25MHz and 33MHz respectively; while the Centris 660AV was renamed to the Quadra 660AV without any actual design change.it:Famiglia Macintosh Centris fr:Macintosh Centris et Quadra