The 225 and 250 MHz models were produced in beige and black, whilst the rarer 275 MHz models were only black.
External ports: External ports include two
LocalTalk/
GeoPort serial ports, a
DB-25 SCSI port, an
ADB port, a stereo sound input port, a built-in microphone above the monitor, stereophonic sound output ports, a headphone jack on the front, a stereo miniphone jack on the back.
Memory: Unlike the 5400, the 5500 has no soldered on-board memory. There are two JEDEC-standard DIMM slots (168- pin, 60 ns or faster, 2K refresh rate, 5-volt buffered EDO DIMMs), which can support up to 64 MB each, for a total maximum memory of 128 MB, 8 less than the 5400.
Cache: The processor makes use of 32
kilobytes (KB) of L1
cache, with an option for a 256 or 512 KB L2 cache (the latter being available only on the 275 MHz model) cache operating at the stock 50 MHz bus speed.
Hard disk: The 5500 includes a larger
ATA hard disk than its predecessor. The computer came stock with a 2
gigabyte (GB) hard disk, but the 275 MHz model came with a 4 GB drive; a faster
SCSI CD-ROM drive (12x in early models and 24x in the top-end).
Video: An accelerated ATI 3D Rage II+ DVD graphics card, containing 2
megabytes (MB) of dedicated SGRAM and allowing for resolutions up to 832x624 at 32 bits per pixel, 1152x870 at 16 bpp, and 1280x1024 at 8 bpp. An optional video connector kit is available which adds a
DB-15 output port to the back; the output of this display mirrors the main screen, suitable for presentations.
Floppy disk: The 5500 includes Apple's standard
SuperDrive 1.44 MB floppy drive.
CD-ROM: All 5500 configurations include either a 12x or 24x CD-ROM.
Multimedia: 5500s came with optional multimedia expansion cards, that connect via internal cables. In European models, these were an
S-Video card and a
Philips TV tuner card that also had an audio input. Black 5500s with this configuration were marketed as
Director Edition in
North America and
Australasia and the 225 MHz version had the phrase printed on the case.
Expansion slots: The 5500 has one
PCI card slot.
Operating system: The 5500 supports
System Software versions 7.5.5 through 9.1 –
Mac OS X is not officially supported on this machine. However, it can be run with
XPostFacto but is not recommended, due to the 5500's lack of a
G3 processor and RAM ceiling of 128 MB. In the general case, 128 MB of RAM is the minimum required for OS X to run (a G3
iMac can run OS X with this amount of RAM), but only on machines with a G3 processor. == Models ==