Last week, Apple announced imminent updates to the PowerBook 1400 series, which should interest anyone planning to buy a 1400 this month.

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Out with the Old -- For those who don't memorize PowerBook specs, PowerBook 1400s have the BookCover feature for customizing their cases and the pop-out keyboard for easy access to the innards (see TidBITS-350 and TidBITS-371). They are based on the PowerPC 603e chip, come with built-in 6x CD-ROM drives and hard disks sized from 750 MB to 1 GB. The old line included four models, ranging from the 1400cs/117 with a dual-scan screen to the 1400c/133 which offered an active-matrix screen and 128K of level 2 cache. Estimated retail pricing ranged from $2,500 to $4,000.

In with the New -- The new series has three models with faster CPUs but similar screens: the 1400cs/133, 1400c/133, and 1400c/166, and estimated pricing from $2,500 to $3,500. Each machine has an 8x CD-ROM drive, a 128K level 2 cache, and comes with either a 1.3 GB or a 2 GB hard disk. These PowerBooks will begin shipping with either Mac OS 7.6 or 7.6.1, not Mac OS 8. In related news, Apple has delayed shipment of the sub-compact PowerBook 2400c until August, ostensibly so that it can ship with Mac OS 8 installed.

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