Files
website/content/museum/bebox.md
T
yann64andClaude Opus 5.5 b274874139 All machines linked to their forum thread (full comment import)
1,289 discussions, 9,527 archived comments; pages no longer carry the comments themselves.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5.5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_01YDRjtmAiNpo5mK5N3d7QwZ
2026-10-13 17:26:43 +02:00

118 lines
4.7 KiB
Markdown
Raw Blame History

This file contains invisible Unicode characters
This file contains invisible Unicode characters that are indistinguishable to humans but may be processed differently by a computer. If you think that this is intentional, you can safely ignore this warning. Use the Escape button to reveal them.
---
title: BeBox
categories:
- Computers
types:
- Professional Computer
origins:
- U.S.A.
years:
- '1995'
cpus:
- Two RISC-based PowerPC 603
params:
name: BeBox
image: /media/museum/photos/be_bebox_syqtem_s1.jpg
company: /companies/be
company_name: Be
specs:
- label: NAME
value: BeBox
- label: MANUFACTURER
value: Be
- label: TYPE
value: Professional Computer
- label: ORIGIN
value: U.S.A.
- label: YEAR
value: October 1995
- label: END OF PRODUCTION
value: '1997'
- label: KEYBOARD
value: Standard PC-AT
- label: CPU
value: Two RISC-based PowerPC 603 or 603e
- label: SPEED
value: 66 or 133 MHz
- label: RAM
value: Up to 256 MB (up to 8 72-pin SIMM modules)
- label: ROM
value: Unknown
- label: TEXT MODES
value: 80 columns x 25 lines
- label: GRAPHIC MODES
value: 640x480 to 1600x1200
- label: COLORS
value: 256 to 16.7 million
- label: SOUND
value: 16-bit stereo sound system - Dual MIDI channels
- label: SIZE / WEIGHT
value: 21 (W) x 39.8 (H) x 46.1 (D) cm
- label: I/O PORTS
value: 4xserial, Parallel, 3xInfrared, SCSI II, 2xjoystick, 2xMidi, GeekPort
- label: BUILT IN MEDIA
value: 3.5'' 1.44 MB FDD, SCSI & IDE HDD
- label: OS
value: BeOs
- label: POWER SUPPLY
value: Built-in 240W PSU
- label: PERIPHERALS
value: 3 x PCI and 5 x ISA card slots
- label: PRICE
value: Unknown
tabs:
- photos
- emulators
- links
forum_thread: 1112
photos:
- title: COMPLETE SYSTEM
subtitle: ''
text: Picture taken from a Be brochure. Notice the two LED Bar-graphs that showed the processor work loads.
image: /media/museum/photos/be_bebox_system_s2.jpg
- title: MOTHERBOARD DIAGRAM
subtitle: ''
text: ''
image: /media/museum/photos/be_bebox_motherboard_s1.jpg
- title: BEOS GUI INTERFACE
subtitle: ''
text: ''
image: /media/museum/photos/be_bebox_beos_s1.jpg
emulators:
- title: MESS
url: http://www.mess.org
platform: Multiplatform
text: The newest MESS version can emulate the BeBox
links:
- title: Beatjapan.org
url: http://www.beatjapan.org/mirror/www.be.com/products/bebox/dual603spec.html
text: Mirror of be.com, the official Be web site, now closed
- title: BeBox Zone
url: http://www.bebox.nu/
text: The BeBox Zone offers a wealth of information about the BeBox
oc_id: 1142
source:
url: https://web.archive.org/web/20230604181440/http://www.old-computers.com/museum/computer.asp?c=1142
date: '2023-06-04'
---
In October 1995, Be, Inc. unveiled its first (and last) computer, the BeBox.
Be was founded in 1990 by Jean-Louis Gassé, former manager of the French Apple subsidiary.\
For almost 5 years, 12 engineers from Apple, NeXT and Sun designed the BeBox and its operating system, BeOs. The total design cost was about US$9 million.
BeBox hadware was based on a dual PowerPC 603 C.P.U. running at 66 MHz (later 133 MHz). The motherboard was not really innovative but featured a large range of Input/Output ports, including IDE and SCSI HDD interfaces, standard PC card slots, MIDI, audio, infrared ports plus a special GeekPort for hardware experiments.
The Be Operating System was also developed from the ground up. It aimed to be an alternative to the "Heavy weight" Windows and Mac OS's, which were handicaped by backward compatibility hardware and software issues.\
BeOs was a clear and clean multi-processor (up to 8), multi-threading, multi-tasking, GUI-based operating system, optimized for digital media management.\
The first BeBox machines were mainly intended for use by software developers, BeOs was delivered with Metrowerks CodeWarrior and C++ languages.
In spite of its numerous advanced features, the BeBox never met the success expected by its designers, mainly because it was compatible with nothing else in the computing industry. Less than 2000 machines were delivered between October 1995 and January 1997, when production ceased.
In 1996, BeOs was ported to Apple PowerPC machines but Apple eventually preferred the NeXT basis for its future Mac OS X. Two years later, BeOs ran on Intel machines.
Because of the small size of the company and the competition from much larger competitors, the Be adventure finally ended on Novembre 2001 when the company sold all of its intellectual property and technology assets to Palm. Just before this happened, J.L. Gassé offered for free the lastest version of his OS (R5) to Intel PC users.\
Nowadays, Although marginal, BeOs is still alive, and new releases and updates are regularly announced by the BeOs community.
<table> <tr> <td></td> <td>We need more info about this computer ! If you designed, used, or have more info about this system, please send us pictures or anything you might find useful.</td> <td></td> </tr> </table>