Director of product design and kinetic sculpture artist Phil Letourneau has introduced two of his pals with a most uncommon marriage ceremony current: a fully-functional basic Apple Macintosh in miniature, custom-printed and powered by a Raspberry Pi Zero 2 W single-board laptop (SBC).
“I constructed a Tiny Mac for @lindadong and @clarko as a marriage present,” Letourneau introduced on Mastodon of the mission. “Unsurprisingly, I added some particular touches, resembling an inside speaker, and coloration matched Bluetooth mouse & keyboard.”
This tiny little desk accent, constructed as a marriage present, is a fully-functional Apple Macintosh in miniature. (📷: Phil Letourneau)
The design of the miniature machine, which got here full in a present field with clear window, is predicated on the unique Apple Macintosh — launched in 1984 because the successor to the Apple Lisa, and maybe finest recognized for being the topic of Apple’s iconic Tremendous Bowl XVII advert as directed by Ridley Scott. There’s one main distinction, although: Apple’s model sits in your desk, whereas Letourneau’s variant can sit on the palm of your hand.
“The case is 3D printed,” Letourneau writes, having used recordsdata initially designed by Chuck Genco and revealed to Thingiverse beneath a Inventive Commons license. “I gained’t accept ugly layer strains, so I sanded it as much as 600 grit, and utilized a skinny textured clear coat to approximate that basic Mac plastic texture. Discovered a present field I used to be capable of retrofit with some laser-cut inserts and a few superior adhesive-backed jet black velvet. I angled the insert to point out extra of the Mac’s quantity.”
Contained in the Mac-style shell is a fully-functional laptop, full with show operable in unique black-and-white or fashionable coloration modes and operating an emulator for the true Mac OS expertise. “It runs Mac OS 7.5.5 utilizing the outstanding Mini vMac emulator,” Letourneau explains. “It is absolutely featured, runs like a dream in each black and white and coloration modes. Every little thing runs on a Raspberry Pi Zero 2 W — that are in extremely brief provide [but] fortunately I had one in my stock.”
The construct features a compact speaker and amplifier, similar to the unique machine. (📷: Phil Letourneau)
To complete the construct, and the match the performance of the unique, Letourneau crammed a compact speaker and Adafruit amplifier into the case for stand-alone sound — utilizing a USB sound card soldered on to the Raspberry Pi Zero 2 W. And as for the recipients’ reactions: “I CANT STOP PLAYING WITH MY NEW TINY MAC,” Linda Dong posted to Mastodon in response.
Extra particulars can be found in Letourneau’s Mastodon thread.
