Macintosh

Macintosh, commonly referred to as the Mac, is a family of personal computers designed, manufactured, and sold by Apple Inc. The name derives from the McIntosh apple cultivar, with the spelling altered to avoid trademark issues. The Macintosh line is notable for popularizing the graphical user interface and the use of a mouse as the primary input device in mass-market personal computing.

Apple introduced the original Macintosh in 1984. It featured a built-in 9-inch monochrome display, an 8 MHz Motorola 68000 processor, 128 KB of RAM, and a built-in 3.5-inch floppy drive. It ran System Software, later renamed Mac OS, and emphasized a compact all-in-one design. The 1984 commercial directed by Ridley Scott helped popularize the Mac and the concept of desktop publishing.

Over the following decades Apple released numerous Macintosh models with increasing performance, color displays, and larger RAM, culminating in the all-in-one iMac introduced in 1998. The Mac platform moved from Motorola 68000 and then PowerPC processors to Intel processors in 2006, broadening software compatibility. Beginning in 2020, Apple began transitioning the Mac to Apple silicon, starting with the M1 and continuing with newer generations, offering improved efficiency and performance.

Software and ecosystem: macOS, formerly Mac OS X, is the operating system for Macintosh computers. It is UNIX-based with a proprietary user interface and supports a wide range of applications for productivity, media, and development. Today, Macintosh computers encompass a range of models including the MacBook Air, MacBook Pro, Mac mini, iMac, and Mac Pro.