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Macintosh Quadra 650

personal computer by Apple

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General referenceInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionFeb 1, 2026
Entity authorityQ3086117
Source-derived summary

The Macintosh Quadra 650, originally sold as the Macintosh Centris 650, is a personal computer designed, manufactured and sold by Apple Computer from February 1993 to September 1994. The Centris 650 was introduced alongside the smaller Centris 610 as the replacement for the Macintosh IIci and Quadra 700, and it was intended as the start of the new midrange Centris line of computers. Later in 1993, Apple decided to follow an emerging industry trend of naming product families for their target customers – Quadra for business, LC for education, and Performa for home – and folded the Centris 650 into the Quadra family. The renamed Quadra 650 also received a speed bump from 25 MHz to 33 MHz for its 68040 CPU.

The Quadra 650 was discontinued without a direct replacement in September 1994, although the recently introduced Power Macintosh 7100, which has the same IIvx desktop case as the Quadra 650, had a similar target audience and was sold in the same price range.

Models

There are two versions of the Centris 650: One with 4 MB of RAM soldered to the logic board and an FPU-less Motorola 68LC040 CPU, and one with 8 MB of logic board RAM, a full Motorola 68040, and an onboard AAUI port for Ethernet. Each can be configured with an 80 MB, 230 MB, or 500 MB 3.5-inch hard drive. Standard equipment on all Centris 650 models includes onboard video (with VGA support via an adapter), 3 NuBus slots, a Processor Direct Slot, two ADB and two serial ports, an external SCSI connector, and a 5.25-inch drive bay. There are four SIMM slots that support 4, 8, 16, and 32 MB SIMMs, allowing for a maximum of 132 or 136 MB of RAM depending on the amount of soldered memory. System 7.1 was included as standard and is the minimum required version.

The higher-end model also came with 1MB VRAM installed, enabling 16-bit color at 640x480 resolution.

Editorial summary

This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Macintosh Quadra 650” as personal computer by Apple. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.

Editorial reviewA practical starting point whose main value is the path it opens into stronger specialist and primary sources. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1993, 1994—that can be checked directly. The selected authority fields contribute no independent date. The account is most persuasive where Macintosh, Quadra and personal can be independently traced.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The subject matters to the general reference register because the source frames it as personal computer by Apple. Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.

Evidence profile

Named sources, stable identifiers and responsible institutions provide the strongest route from overview to verifiable evidence. The source revision retrieved here is dated Feb 1, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q3086117. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1993 and 1994.

Critical limits

The absence of detail may reflect summary conventions rather than a lack of surviving documentation. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.

Best used for
  • Subject orientation
  • Search vocabulary
  • Locating named sources
Verify next

The closest primary source, responsible institution and strongest cited specialist reference.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Macintosh Quadra 650”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Macintosh Quadra 650 primary sources, Macintosh Quadra 650 archive and Macintosh research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Macintosh Quadra 650”?
  2. Which institution is responsible for the underlying evidence?
  3. Which cited source is closest to the event, object or claim?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from Macintosh Quadra 650” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.