Apple IIGS laptop

posted Apr 15th 2008 12:58pm by Will O'Brien
filed under: laptops hacks, macs hacks, misc hacks

I may hit my limit on DIY laptops soon, but [Ben Heck] has been extra quiet for a while. Now we know why. Just after the release of his PS3 laptop comes his Apple IIGS laptop. Thanks to [Ed] for the tip. It features original Apple hardware and even uses the original keyboard PC board. A CF drive adapter replaces the hard drive and a 15 inch screen shows off the true power of 8 bit computing.

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Comments [15]

Reader Comments

Hey, that’s 16-bit computing; don’t sell the poor little apple short! :P
(The IIgs actually does use a 65816).

Posted at 1:30 pm on Apr 15th, 2008 by Tyco

Was just going to defend the IIgs’s 16-bit honor, but now I’d like to say that building one of these is an unfulfilled dream for me. An emulator (even with the serial ports working right) is just too easy :)

Posted at 3:42 pm on Apr 15th, 2008 by mike

nF SAYS :
nice job ben.
Im also working on building a audio production system called A.i.M.S it stands for advanced internal midi system its basicly a desktop pc and a synth with midi interface for an external drum module and vocal FX all in one system.
I need help with chousing a power supply and building a case out of aluminum.
if you want to help me out email me.
thx
END OF TRANSMISSION

Posted at 3:51 pm on Apr 15th, 2008 by sinewave

I can appreciate a nicely crafted piece of equipment, but I’m not getting the perspective here. Perhaps my comments are based on a lack of understanding since the web link to the creators page didn’t work. I would expect that since the resume of this modder includes the IIGS laptop and the PS3Laptop that the comodore, amiga, Xbox, atari, MAME, 8088, and NES laptops are yet to come? I guess I don’t see the point in resurrecting system that has no practical use today. Maybe he should try to do an old IBM AS series laptop and jam a room into a lunch box. That might be more interesting… but I can still do more with my HP calculator, so it seems like a waste of time. It adds no cool feature other than to spark up nostalgia.

Posted at 4:08 pm on Apr 15th, 2008 by doughboy

WOW, i haven’t seen a iigs in years

Posted at 5:19 pm on Apr 15th, 2008 by alex mccown

This totally made my day. I’m going to have to try my hand at one after the “Making Of” gets posted.

Posted at 5:53 pm on Apr 15th, 2008 by rory

Remember, the CF drive doesn’t exactly “replace” a hard drive when most IIGS owners never had one. :P It’s more of a replacement for 3.5″ and 5.25″ floppy drives (by placing disk images on the CF drive). Still, very cool. And you have to love GS/OS – a high-res, color operating system that even the unexpandable Mac itself couldn’t possess for years!

Posted at 6:36 pm on Apr 15th, 2008 by Miles Attacca

when i first saw this system i thought it was an 8 bit system some times it hard 4 me to tell xD im a kid who grew up with win 95 playing 32bit quake :-)

Posted at 7:40 pm on Apr 15th, 2008 by SyNtAx

Does it have the whopping 1MB RAM, as well? :)

Posted at 8:57 pm on Apr 15th, 2008 by codi-Lee Wong

@doughboy: he has already done an X-Box (and a 360) and Atari computer laptops, and has made hand-held portables of Atari 2600 and NES. While not MAME, he has made a handheld Neo Geo MVS.

“It adds no cool feature other than to spark up nostalgia.” That’s more than enough for most people. Though, to be honest, this doesn’t impress me much. This is probably a commission from someone that Ben built.

Kind of funny that this shows up around the same time as the demo of Second Life being displayed on a IIGS.

Posted at 10:53 pm on Apr 15th, 2008 by tom61

am i the only one not impressed with this creation? Personally i think ben gets too much attention to his stuff, lately there have been much better mods out there that are not getting any attention. anyway back to this thing. the IIgs was a very small apple to begin with compared to other apples at that time. He really did not have to work much at all compared to something like the ps3 or the 360 to get it in a shell. all his shells any more are the same. sorry i’m just not even a little impressed with this one.

this mod is IMHO a thousand times the work that one was

http://retroactive.be/multari/

Posted at 10:53 pm on Apr 15th, 2008 by h_2_o

doughboy:

“It adds no cool feature other than to spark up nostalgia.”

afaik, that seems to be pretty much the whole point of it. but i still like it :)

and yes, the iigs is 16-bit, not 8-bit, though I bet he’s probably running mostly 8-bit apple ii programs on it as it is.

Posted at 10:57 pm on Apr 15th, 2008 by andrew

Though pretty neat for nostalgia, what purpose does it actually serve, other than proving he could do it? I meam aside from “Can play Arkanoid II!”

Now, put an Amiga in this sort of config, and maybe you got something! Aftter all there’s still all kinds of stuff I could actually use a portable Amiga for, especially for music applications. As fat as a iigs, I see very little practicality in it.

Posted at 11:21 am on Apr 17th, 2008 by AdamG

Doing something just because you can is a powerful reason to do so. Who cares if it is not practical. Some of us do not live practical lives; therefore practicality is not necessary. Achievement is the forward motion that makes the world turn. Keep on trucking ben!!!

Posted at 3:08 am on Oct 7th, 2009 by or_muddslinger

this made me cry

Posted at 9:20 am on Oct 16th, 2009 by pete