Designed as a replacement for the PowerMac 7500, the PowerMac 7600 was very much more of the same - so much so that the only thing that actually changed was a switch from the Motorola 601 running at 100MHz, to the newer Motorola 604 running at either 120MHz or 132MHz. If buyers were looking for radical changes then they were going to be massively underwhelmed.

Originally released in April 1996, the 120MHz machine was replaced less than three months later with the improved 132MHz machine (which sold at the same price). This, like the entire PowerMac 7600 series, added nothing new aside from the speed boost. With the revised 200MHz machine though things did change a little as an S-VHS video output socket was added and the Motorola 604 processor was replaced by the Motorola 604e - hardly radical stuff and the machine wasn't even available to the US market.

Although little had changed over the older 7500 series, this didn't make the 7600 unattractive to buyers as it retained the AV connections seen on the older machine. Users could still import video (and export it using the 200MHz model) and the phono input and output connections made connecting up an external audio source total child's play.

A solid performer with excellent expansion and connectivity options (both in terms of network and devices), the 7600 was eventually replaced with the PowerMac 7300 series (a rare example of Apple using a lower number for a newer machine) but a lot of people were left asking the question: Why not just stick with the 7500 name?

To look at, the 7600 is d-u-l-l. Sharing the same case as the 7200, the G3 (desktop) and a swathe of other Macs released in 'the bad old days' (of beige hell) it's easy to simply dismiss it as being just another 'beige Mac'. In many respects that's not too bad an assessment. Scoot round the back though and the 7600 starts to become a bit more interesting. Like the Quadra 840AV and the Quadra/Centris 660AV, the 7600 sports a wealth of audio/video connectors and this is where the machine starts to stand out from the crowd.

I'd landed the 132MHz version (for a stupid £5) so it lacked the S-VHS output and, as you can imagine, this was a soul-destroying blow (not). That it has the added phono and video connectors is a plus but suggestions online about turning a 7600 into a media centre are just totally impractical. Yes the 604e CPU is a massive step up from the 68040 seen in the Quadra but, as a whole, the machine still doesn't have the kind of horsepower needed to realistically deal with full screen, hi-res video output. It'll do a great job as an audio machine but video is just too demanding for it (in terms of a Media PC, as a video editing box then it's not too bad).

Overall the 7600 is, like most of the 'beige Macs', solid but unremarkable. It does what it does, it even does some things pretty quickly but it just doesn't do them with any finesse. It's still a step up from 7500 series but if you're looking for a beige Mac then I'd save those extra pennies and aim for a G3 instead.