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== Transition ==
The first public demonstration of the new Power Macintosh — specifically, a prototype of what would become the [[Power Macintosh 6100]] – was at an Apple Pacific sales meeting in Hawaii in October 1992.<ref name=pmbook/> The demo was a success, and in the following months, the product plan expanded to include three models: the entry-level 6100, a mid-range [[Power Macintosh 7100|7100]] housed in the [[Macintosh IIvx]]'s desktop case, and a high-end [[Power Macintosh 8100|8100]] based on the [[Macintosh Quadra 800|Quadra 800]]'s mini-tower case. A fourth project, the [[Macintosh Processor Upgrade Card]], was started in July 1993 to provide a straightforward upgrade path to owners of Centris- and Quadra-based Macintosh computers.{{r|pmbook|p=23}} The importance of this was especially significant for the [[Macintosh Quadra 700|Quadra 700]], [[Macintosh Quadra 900|900]], and [[Macintosh Quadra 950|950]], which were not going to receive full logic board replacements. Computers upgraded in this fashion received new names such as "Power Macintosh Q650" and "Power Macintosh 900".
The original plan was to release the first Power Macintosh machine on January 24, 1994, exactly ten years after the release of the [[Macintosh 128K|first Macintosh]].{{r|pmbook|p=26}} Ian Diery, who was EVP and general manager of the Personal Computer Division at the time, moved the release date back to March 14 in order to give manufacturing enough time to build enough machines to fill the sales channels and to ensure that the Macintosh Processor Upgrade Card would be available at the same time. This was a departure from prior practice at Apple; they had typically released upgrade packages months after the introduction of new Macintoshes.
Apple unveiled the first Power Macintosh models on March 14, 1994.<ref name=pmbook/> These used the 32-bit [[PowerPC 601]] CPU, manufactured by IBM/Motorola. The first portable Mac models to use PowerPC processors were the [[PowerBook 5300]] series, released on August 25, 1995, and featuring the [[PowerPC 603e]] chip.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Macintosh PowerBook 5300ce/117: Technical Specifications |url=https://support.apple.com/kb/SP180 |publisher=Apple |access-date=February 1, 2021 |archive-date=July 29, 2012 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120729131941/http://support.apple.com/kb/SP180 |url-status=live }}</ref>
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