Our Quest is at an end.

[John]

Yes folks, it's finally finished. The Banana Jr. lives! I have to say that I'm pretty happy with the final results.

The Inspiration

The Banana Jr. 6000 comes from the mind of Berkeley Breathed and was featured in the mind twistingly amazing comic strip Bloom County, a cherished memory of my youth. Some more info about the Banana Jr. and some of the strips it was featured in can be found here.

A Sunday strip featuring an advertisement for the Banana Jr. 6000.

On the outside.

1 Highly modified Mac Plus

The feet are plywood that have wood putty added to give them a bit of shape. The legs are two shift boots, bought at an automotive store. The floppy port slot now houses a usb port and I filled in the spot on the lower front right where the keyboard would normally plug in on a mac plus.

Down with Big Blue!

Here is a closeup of the modified mouse and keyboard.

Mmmm! Banana-y.

I know it's a bit of a crossover - But it just makes sense.

On the inside.

1 Mac Mini 1.5 Ghz PowerPC G4

1 Lilliput 8" Touch Screen LCD 1024 x 768 (Native Resolution of 800 x 600)

1 USB Hub

1 Set of Speakers

1 Power Strip

The power supplies for all of the above.

Somewhere Steve Jobs feel a disturbance in the force!

The power strip is actually attached to the original Mac Plus switch and it uses the original plug receptacle as well. I converted the Mac Plus brightness knob into a push button for turning on the system.

I used two speakers that were actually in other macs. I attached these to the amplifier from a set of desktop speakers to give my Banana Jr. stereo.

BananOS

The system is running Leopard but I've customized the OS to make it as Banana Jr-ish as possible. The only thing I wasn't able to change was the Apple Menu.







Why does this picture look familiar?

[Wholly Mindless]

Stunning detailed work, John. I'm sorry we guilted you into completion but your mother wouldn't do it.

Thanks for sharing and putting up with our abuse. But to make something "Greatly Insane"(tm) there's a certain amount of abuse that must be endured.

"Greatly Insane" is a trademark of Sirius Cybernetics Corporation

[applefreak]

while i am generally not so thrilled about mac mod's
the 'banana jr' has a lot more to offer

well done ! !

[Crowden Satz]

As a long-time Bloom County fan AND a mac-geek who does all his cartoon artwork on a mac, I have to pronounce this device as being über-awesome. To the max.
Toonfully yours,
Crow

http://www.nicky510.com

[Crowden Satz]

BTW - I found it via a tweet by Bill Amend, of Foxtrot.

[John]

Thanks for all the comments! And thanks for all the support and prodding to get this project finished :) . The extra time was not wasted though, as it gave me a chance to really think about the best way to go about getting the look I wanted. Now if I could just figure out what to do about the inside...

[maxheadroom]

well done John!

[Richard Thompson]

Awesome job!!!!

Great to see if finally done. Well worth the wait.

[Steve Sarrica]

Awesome project! Glad to see it come to fruition! (ha, ha, ha)

Would a new Mac Mini fit in the case? With its internal power supply, there would be slightly less clutter in there, assuming it fits.

[applefreak]

The Banana is an Apple II clone

[applefreak]

Why does this picture look familiar?

office assistant ?