Last week the Apple Macintosh was twenty-five years old.
The fact prompted me to go through, in my mind, all the Macs I've owned.

I've worked with Apple Macintosh computers daily since 1990, after watching my colleagues working with them for five years.
The first machine I was forced to work with was a IIFX. You could have bought a Mercedes Benz for the same price.
I rather liked the Mercedes – I hated the Mac. It was what the Germans term as a Shrinking Violet (Mimose) – very sensitive.
On some days I got the distinct feeling that I only had to look at the thing and it would crash!

Here are the machines, I've been proud to own:

1991 Quadra 700
1993 Quadra 660 AV
1995 PowerBook 5300
1996 PowerBook 1400 cs
1997 PowerMac 8600
1998 PowerMac G3
1999 PowerBook G3 (Lombard)
2001 PowerBook G3 (Titanium)
2002 PowerMac G4
2004 PowerMac G5 (I'm writing on it at this moment)
2005 PowerBook G4 17"
2008 MacBook Pro 15"

Just for the record: 1999 Newton 120 – the neatest piece of computer hardware I ever owned!

Not bad, I suppose, twelve computers in seventeen years.
Theoretically that means each one lasted one-and-a-half years.
I sold most of them on and many are still alive today – I visit them sometimes.
I've lost track of how many Macs I got through at the various places I've worked, but at the place I work now, I've had five.

You'll have noticed that half of the machines I owned were laptops, which I always had parallel to my desktops. I spent a great deal of my time on the road. The first two, the 5300 and the 1400, were painfully slow but since then the Mac books have always been able to keep pace with a desk-top – once they were booted.

I only recently sold my 17" G4 and replaced it with an Intel model.
Not that I wasn't satisfied with the G4, but occasionally I need to test something on a Windows machine. For this purpose I purchased a Sony Vaio 12" which is a wonderful little machine. My new MacBook, however runs Windows a lot faster and having two systems on one machine means less clutter on my desktop.

I've mentioned before that I have a number of (working) Macs on shelves in my office. Some of them, such as my Quadra 660, I've used myself, some I've collected to save them from being binned. I'm still looking for a Color Classic, which was produced in 1993, so if anyone knows where there might be one lying around ...

Happy Birthday, Mac!