Apple Pippin


The Pippin is a defunct open multimedia technology platform, designed by Apple Computer. According to Apple, Pippin was directed at the home market as "an integral part of the consumer audiovisual, stereo, and television environment".
Pippin is based on the Macintosh platform, including the classic Mac OS architecture. Apple built a demonstration device based on Pippin called Pippin Power Player and used it to demonstrate the platform at trade shows and to the media, to attract potential software developers and hardware manufacturers. Apple licensed the Pippin technology to third-party companies. Bandai Company Ltd. developed the ATMARK and @WORLD models, and focused them on the gaming and entertainment business in Japan, Canada and the United States. Katz Media developed the KMP 2000, and focused it on vertical markets throughout Europe and Canada.

Naming

The Pippin platform was named for the Newtown Pippin, an apple cultivar, a smaller and more tart relative of the McIntosh apple. According to Apple, it intended for Pippin to be more than just a platform for game consoles. "Apple believes that over time Pippin will take many forms, including home telecommunication devices and much more. Apple did not want to choose a name that would be specific for certain market space, as it will certainly appeal to many types of consumers and be shipped in a variety of forms from many manufacturers." It was initially named "Sweet Pea" during the initial planning of the console.
The word "pippin" was used by Apple prior to the Pippin platform. The Apple ProFile, an external hard disk drive for the Apple III and Lisa, used the codename Pippin during development.

History

Apple never intended to release Pippin on its own. Apple intended to make the Pippin platform an open standard by licensing the technology to third parties, much like how JVC shared the VHS format in the 1970s. Relying on third-party companies to produce Pippin systems was a way to increase Macintosh's market share – a goal identical to Apple's clone attempt in the late 1990s. It even encouraged differentiation between systems, in order to encourage competition – as long as the systems stuck to Apple's reference design to avoid fragmentation. The licensees could improve their systems by improving industrial design, integrating telephony, improving video and audio capabilities, increasing memory capacity, and more.

Bandai and Apple

In 1993, Bandai wanted to deliver a scaled-down version of the Macintosh purely for CD-ROM game-playing. Bandai President and CEO Makoto Yamashina chose the Macintosh platform over other platforms available at the time.
In early 1994, Bandai approached Apple with the gaming console idea. The original design was based on a Macintosh Classic II 16 MHz Motorola 68030 running Macintosh system software. Apple's involvement would be to define the initial logic board design, and Bandai would provide the casing and packaging. This was considered the fastest delivery solution to market at a very reasonable return on investment for Apple and Bandai.
As Bandai specifically marketed its Pippin models as game consoles, many of the releases are games, entertainment software, or edutainment software. However, unlike conventional gaming consoles, the Pippin has no dedicated graphics or sound processors. Because the Pippin platform is based on Macintosh system software, graphic services such as 2D and 3D QuickDraw are available to developers. Early on, Apple encouraged hardware developers to produce 3D rendering hardware so that the RISC processor could be free for other processing. The MPEG codec is not supported by the system software, as QuickTime is the only video format supported by the platform.
Originally, Bandai never intended to develop a system with Internet connectivity. However, Apple and Bandai received customer feedback requesting a system with Internet connectivity. To make that possible, Apple incorporated a modem into the Pippin design. Two years earlier in 1992, Apple had already moved away from the older serial interface with an external Hayes-compatible modem on its Macintosh systems, and switched to a serial interface which included GeoPort – a serial data technology that allowed software to emulate a modem. Implementing GeoPort into the Pippin platform required Apple to make a major change in its design – moving away from the 68030 footprint and to a PowerPC footprint. Apple chose the PowerPC 603 32-bit processor, as it was designed to be a low-cost, low-end processor for embedded use.
On December 13, 1994, Apple announced the Pippin platform in Tokyo, and its partnership with Bandai. In March 1996, the white-colored Bandai Pippin ATMARK went on sale in Japan at a price of 64,800 yen, which included a dial-up modem and four bundled CD-ROMs. Yamashina predicted 200,000 Pippin ATMARK systems would be sold in Japan within the first twelve months.
Once Bandai licensed Pippin from Apple, Apple made no effort to market the Pippin platform. All the marketing was to be done by the licensees. Bandai spent US$93 million in marketing alone to sell the Pippin line. As part of the licensing agreement, both Bandai and Katz Media were not allowed to use the term "computer" when marketing the Pippin systems, so that the systems would not be confused with Apple's own Macintosh product line. Apple expected to receive $20 from Bandai, Samsung, and other hardware vendors for each Pippin sold, and a couple of dollars for each software title.
In October 1995, the Nikkei reported that Mitsubishi Electric would follow Bandai as a licensee to the Pippin technology. Although Mitsubishi did not actually sign a license agreement with Apple, it did manufacture the systems for Bandai on an original equipment manufacturer basis.
Bandai originally planned to launch the Pippin in 1995, but the release was later pushed back to March 1996 for Japan and June 1996 for the US. The black-colored Bandai Pippin @WORLD went on sale in the United States in June 1996 at a price of US$599.00. The @WORLD bundle included a six-month unlimited Internet account from PSINet at a cost of US$24.95 per month. Bandai predicted 200,000 Pippin @WORLD systems would be sold in Japan in its first twelve months, and 300,000 systems sold in the US within twelve months of being released there.

Developer marketing

To encourage software developers to create content for the Pippin platform, Apple attempted to sell the platform as being scalable, in that applications written, for example, the ATMARK or @WORLD would work in future models of Pippin. In Apple's Q&A document, Apple contrasted its scalability with the Nintendo system, where the "Nintendo 8-bit NES cartridges don't work on the 16-bit SNES." The CD-ROMs do not contain region protection so that releases made for the ATMARK would also run on the @WORLD. Apple also promised the developers that, "Apple has no intention or desire to enter the business of regulating an industry which should be encouraged to exercise freedoms needed by the creative artists which Apple wants to evangelize
onto the platform. Apple will abide by whatever ratings systems are regulated by governments. Apple, where reasonable, will endorse those systems which reduce excessive oversight and permit the freedom to the artists." An example of this is the Yellows series by Akira Gomi; originally a book displaying nude Japanese women, it was converted to an electronic database.
Pippin application developers had to first register as Apple developers and receive the developer kits, and to receive discounts on equipment required for Pippin development, such as the Power Macintosh AV system. At the May 1995 World Wide Developers Conference, details were made available to potential developers. Bandai also issued a "Pippin Security Key" in the Pippin hardware development kit, which when inserted into the AppleJack ADB port allowed an off-the-shelf Pippin system to bypass the authentication system when running non-authenticated CD-ROMs.
Merlin Media was contracted to produce Pippin demonstration CD-ROMs.

Network Computer Platform

On May 21, 1996, Oracle Corporation, along with 30 hardware and software vendors, announced an intent to build computers that are designed around the Network Computer platform. The idea was to design technology based on a Network Computer Reference Profile including diskless computers, commonly coded applications using languages such as Java, and interface with the Internet using common software such as Netscape Navigator. In May 1996, Apple became a partner in the network computing effort through Pippin. Katz Media attempted to use the network computer platform concept to push the Pippin to eliminate the floppy disk, the Pippin was about two years ahead of the iMac in this effort.
A June 1996 Pippin Special issue of Mac Fan magazine in Japan is dedicated entirely to Pippin.

Unfulfilled roadmap

Apple intended to grow the Pippin platform alongside the rest of the Macintosh line. In a July 1996 Apple developer publication, Apple's CEO Gil Amelio announced the Pippin 1997 Reference Platform, and suggested that the platform would include the latest Macintosh technologies, including IEEE 1394 or FireWire, and a 25-pin external SCSI port as standard interfaces. In May 1997, Bandai announced a docking station that would include Ethernet support at US$139.00, although such a peripheral was never made available.
In 1997, Bandai developed two prototype units and displayed them at the MACWORLD Expo/Tokyo '97 event. The Bandai ATMARK-PD was designed as a direct replacement of the original ATMARK footprint, and would have included an internal drive that can read a standard CD-ROM disc, and read and write to a magneto-optical WORM PD disk with 600 MB of storage capacity.
The Bandai ATMARK-EX was to feature a footprint similar to a Macintosh desktop unit. It was designed to include 8 MB of RAM and the ability to utilize standard 72-pin EDO-DRAM modules, instead of the proprietary memory modules used in the ATMARK and @WORLD. The chassis can handle a half-sized PCI card internally. The displayed unit contains a PCI card-based Ethernet interface, and a built-in analog modem. An infrared-based ADB interface is in the prototype, for a new line of peripherals.