Introduced on 24 January 1984, the Lisa 2 adopted the same 400 KB 3.5″ floppy drive as the simultaneously introduced Macintosh. It was available with the same 5 MB ProFile hard drive as the original Lisa or an internal 10 MB hard drive.
View the profiles of people named Lisa Mac. Join Facebook to connect with Lisa Mac and others you may know. Facebook gives people the power to share. Luckily, unlike the Mac, the Lisa's (68000) ROM isn't used for much except the POST (Power On Self Test) and booting. Though it is possible for a Lisa Operating system to access the ROM, the functions it would call are limited to reading blocks off the floppy or Profile.
Best of all for Lisa 1 owners, the Lisa 2 was available as a free upgrade.
![For For](/uploads/1/3/4/4/134479693/951822936.jpg)
The Lisa 2 was repackaged as the Macintosh XL in January 1985, then discontinued in April 1985.
With MacWorks XL, the Lisa 2 and Macintosh XL can run a fair bit of legacy Macintosh software compatible with System 3.2 and earlier. In 1988, MacWorks Plus was introduced, which emulates the Mac Plus and can run System 6.0.3. A later version, MacWorks Plus II, supports System 6.0.8, the last version of System 6.
- Got a Lisa? Join LisaList.
Details
- announced 1984.01 at $3,500 to $5,500; discontinued 1985.04
- requires Lisa OS or MacWorks Mac emulator
- CPU: 5 MHz 68000
- ROM: 16 KB
- RAM: 512 KB, expandable to 2 MB
- 12″ b&w screen, 720 x 360 rectangular pixels
- keyboard attached via coiled telephone-like cable
- mouse attached via DB-9 connector
- two DB-9 serial ports
- parallel printer port (used by internal hard drive on Lisa 2/10)
- three expansion slots
- floppy: 3.5″ 400KB drive
- sound: beeps
- size (HxWxD): 15.2″ x 18.7″ x 13.8″
- Weight: 48 lb.
- Gestalt ID: 2
Online Resources
- Apple Lisa group on Facebook.
- The Five Weirdest Macs of All Time, Benj Edwards, Macworld, 2012.10.12. Flower Power and Blue Dalmatian iMacs. Twentieth Anniversary Mac. Power Mac G4 Cube. Macintosh XL. Power Mac G3 All-in-One.
- Lisa’s DNA is all over modern computing, Ray Arachelian, Apple Seeds, 2007.06.06. Those who label Apple’s Lisa a failure are ignoring the computer’s legacy that shows up in every personal computer sold today.
- Using Apple’s Lisa for real work, Ted Hodges, Vintage Mac Living, 2007.04.02. The Lisa Office System has some advantages of modern computers for word processing and other production work.
- Bringing my Apple Lisa back to life, Ted Hodges, Vintage Mac Living, 2007.03.26. The floppy drive wasn’t working the keyboard was rough. Some homebrew fixes got everything working again.
- Lisa emulator released, allows OS X and Windows users to experience Apple’s Lisa, Ted Hodges, Vintage Mac Living, 2007.02.27. Nearly a decade in the making, the Lisa Emulator Project now has a working Lisa emulator for Windows PCs and OS X Macs.
- Interview with Ray Arachelian, creator of the Lisa emulator, Ted Hodges, Vintage Mac Living, 2007.03.13. Ray Arachelian spent most of a decade creating the world’s first working Lisa emulator. Why he did it and some of the obstacles he had to overcome.
- Retro computing: First impressions of a newly acquired Apple Lisa, Ted Hodges, Vintage Mac Living, 2006.02.14. Saved from the trash and given a new home, this old Lisa is a slow, friendly computer.
- Which system software is best for my vintage Mac?, Tyler Sable, Classic Restorations, 2005.11.22. Which system software works best depends to a great extent on just which Mac you have and how much RAM is installed.
- A history of Apple’s Lisa, 1979-1986, Tom Hormby, Orchard, 2005.10.05. Originally envisioned as a business computer to replace the Apple II, the Lisa brought the mouse and GUI to the computer market – only to be felled by the less costly Macintosh.
- The Lisa legacy, Dan Knight, Mac Musings, 2003.01.20. On the Lisa’s 20th anniversary, we should remember how Apple’s innovation paved the way for all future computers.
- The innovative Lisa, Dan Knight, Online Tech Journal, 2001.05.31. Perhaps the most innovative computer before the Macintosh, Lisa paved the way for a GUI future.
- Tales from Tessler: History of the Lisa Computer, Larry Tesler, 2000.11.28
- What ever happened to Lisa?, John C. Dvorak, Computer Shopper (republished by Jags House)
- Apple’s Twiggy Disks, Eric, Retro Computing, 1996-99
- 20 Spectacular Failures, Byte, 1995.11. One paragraph on the Lisa – and one on the ill-fated Apple ///.
- Heart of the Apple Lisa, Jordin Kare, 1995
- The Legacy of the Lisa, David T. Craig, 1993.02.16
- Lisa Emulator Project. A work in progress.
- Apple Lisa, Obsolete Computer Museum
- Apple Lisa Tribute, Simon White
- Apple Lisa 1 and 2 XL, DigiBarn Computer Museum
- Apple Lisa: The First Affordable GUI, Apple Museum
- Macintosh XL: Technical Specifications, Apple
Keywords: #applelisa2
Short link: http://goo.gl/K54Ify
searchword: applelisa2
2020.08.24: | Released the 3rd Release Candidate of 1.2.7 for macos X + source here. |
2020.08.03: | Released the 2nd Release Candidate of 1.2.7 for macos X + source here. |
2020.06.05: | Released the 1st Release Candidate of 1.2.7 for macos X + source here. |
2019.11.11: | Released the first beta version of 1.2.7 for macos X + source here. |
2020.04.12: | Released the second beta version of 1.2.7 for macos X + source here. |
2019.11.11: | Released a 2nd alpha version of 1.2.7 for macos X here. |
2019.10.15: | Released an alpha version of 1.2.7 for macos X here. |
2019.10.15: | 1.2.7 Alpha source code can be found at github here. |
2015.09.03: | Released a version for Raspberry Pi off the 1.2.6 tree here. |
2008.03.31: | Still no update just yet. 1.3.0 has some serious CPU bugs that I haven't been able to fully remove. There's one left over bug that causes Lisa Office System to get stuck in the Environments window. This seems to be CPU related and doesn't seem to have anything to do with the COPS421 emulation. |
2007.12.13: | LisaEm 1.2.6 is now available for download.. Provides more bug fixes. |
2007.11.25: | LisaEm 1.2.5 is now available for download.. Provides more bug fixes. |
2007.11.11: | LisaEm 1.2.2 is now available for download.. Provides several bug fixes. |
2007.09.23: | LisaEm 1.2.0 is now available for download.. If you don't have ROMs but wanted to try LisaEm, now's your chance. 1.2.0 is |
2007.07.10: | LisaEm was added to the FreeBSD Ports |
2007.07.08: | 1.0.0-Release (OS X, Source) is available for download on the downloads page. |
2007.07.05: | The LisaEm User's Guide is available for download on the downloads page. |
2007.06.28>: | Release Candidate 2 is available for download on the downloads page. |
2007.04.04: | Release Candidate 1 is available for download |
2007.04.02: | Welcome Slashdotters! |
2007.04.01: | Happy 30th Birthday Apple, Inc. |
2007.03.15: | Beta 2 is up for OS X, Linux, Win32 users. |
2007.03.14: | New Release available today! Head on over to the downloads page for LisaEm 1.0.0 Beta. This new version fixes a lot of issues, and I'm sure introduces new bugs as well. Have fun! |
2007.03.04: | Another day, another hard drive crash. Sorry about that, took me far longer to rebuild this machine than I would have liked. Should have a new release of LisaEm fairly soon. I'm having a bit of trouble getting printing to work the way I'd like it to. |
2007.01.28: | New preview version of LisaEm is available for downloading, as well as the first bit of source code (just libdc42 for now.).Visit the downloads section for fun and profit! |
2007.01.24: | Happy Birthday Lisa 2.Speaking of which, you should head on over to the downloads page and see what's there today. |
2004.02.22: | I've let this web page stagnate for quite a long time. Sorry... there has been some work on the emulator, but it's not quite ready. :) The emulator attempts to boot, but crashes in the process. I've also done some work on the Lisa File System, and the CPU core. See the [Lisa Emulator Status] page for details. If you've found this site from a search engine (i.e. teoma) and wish to bookmark it, pleasebookmark it as http://lisa.sunder.net and not www.sunder.net. |
Want to know why I'm doing this? Click here.
Ever wanted to see a Lisa's internals? Click here.
Need Lisa Documentation? Click here.
Curious about how the emulator is designed? Here are the project docs.
Impatient? Click here to see the status of the emulator.
And here to find out what's left to be done
Want to find other Lisa sites? Click here.
(Except maybe for UAE)- A CPU board containing a 68000 clocked at 5Mhz (due to memory access issues,) a proprietary MMU, and a video state ROM which is really a hard to access chip containing only the serial number of the machine!
- An I/O card containing 2 VIA 6522 chips for the Parallel port and access to the COPS 421 microcontroller to controll the keyboard and the mouse, as well as the soft power switch. (In the Mac, the mouse is software driven.) Additionally, the I/O board also has a 6504 CPU with it's own ROM to drive the floppies/twiggy drive. On older Lisa's there's also a socket for an Amd 9520 Math Co-Processor.
- Up to two memory boards
- Up to three expansion port slots i.e. dual parallel port cards for access to Profile drives
To make things even more complex, there are special memory addresses that turn on or shut off various flip flops. For example a memory parity error detector, a video scan line interrupt, and the MMU. The VIA's are not identical in access. One lives in offset of two bytes, the other in an offset of 4 bytes. The 6504's 1024 bytes of memory is battery backed up (this is what the four NiCAD AA's on the I/O board are for.) The 6504's address space is available to the 68000, but in two byte skips as opposed to linearly. That is memory addresses 0,1,2,3 on the 6504 are 1,3,5,7 on the 68000.
The video circuitry is fairly simple - a dumb frame buffer that shares its memory with the Lisa's memory space. As such another memory area register can be changed to 'page' through the various memory areas.
Luckily, unlike the Mac, the Lisa's (68000) ROM isn't used for much except the POST (Power On Self Test) and booting. Though it is possible for a Lisa Operating system to access the ROM, the functions it would call are limited to reading blocks off the floppy or Profile.
Yes, the Lisa does support at least three operating systems: Lisa 7/7, MacWorks (which with a bit of hardware an RAM can run upto System 7.5), and Microsoft Xenix (yes, Microsoft Xenix, not SCO: This was before Microsoft spun SCO off!) I've read on other web pages that there was a port of CP/M to the Lisa CP/M 68, but I don't have that OS. I've also seen one refrence to something called UniPlus which is supposedly a Unix SRV implementation. DTC mentioned that this later might have become A/UX... Though I'm not 100% sure, it's likely that either www.unipress.com or www.uniplus.com is the author.
As to how I got started on the project: I went on the web and searched for Lisa and Emulator and found many web pages related to the Lisa. I eventually came across one that mentioned that David T. Craig had lots and lots of Lisa documentation, and so I contacted him. He's been an invaluable resource... This project would have been close to impossible without his Docs. I just wish more people took his example and saved any technical internal docs about hardware they may have. I wish to write a Xerox Star and/or Altos emulator, but I just can't find enough detailed docs!
Actually, the emulator works and IS available for download, at the downloads page!
Here lies obsolete project documentation, which you'd have to be insane to believe.
The links page has moved to the LisaFAQ instead
Local Mirrors of dead Lisa Sites
Lisa Forman
If you own these, or know where the owners have moved to please let me know.- Mirror of [email protected] Circa Jan 1999
- Partial Mirror of Desie Hay's ([email protected]) Site Circa Nov 1998
Live Lisa (or Lisa Related) Sites
Lisa For Mac Os
Lisa Macleod Twitter
- A ProFile EmulatorHardware ProFile Emulator that attaches to an IDE drive - note this is to port 8000 incase your firewall blocks outgoing connections.
- History of Computer Design: Apple LisaA page about computer Designs.
- The Pirates of Silicon Valley A TNT Movie about Steve Jobs VS Bill Gates - Aired June 20th, 1999 @ 8:00pm. Will play again Mon Jun21 @ 11pm, Wed Jun23 @ 8:00pm, Sat Jun26 @ 6:00pm EST, Sun Jun27 @ 2:00pm and 10:30pm.
- Justin Maynard's Lisa Page - A few pix and a story.
- Owen Ink: The Mac Bathroom Reader contains a chapter on the Lisa... No longer there. :(
- The Dustbin - Lisa Page - A small one paragraph page... more to come later?
- Binary Dinosaurs - Apple Lisa Page - Adrian Graham's Museum..
- The Computing Museum's - Lisa Page - Description and links..
- The Apple Renaissance - A very nicely done history time line!
- Mesa Menagerie - Creepy Demise of Technology - very brief
- Museo AppleA Brazilian(?) page about Apple history with a Lisa section.
- Number Crunchers German page about Apple History.
- Siliciam - Le musée de l'informatiqueA French Computer Museum page >
- Doug Coward's Museum of Personal Computing MachineryPicture and a bit of text.
- Whatever happened to the Lisa? Article by John C. Dvorak. at Jaghouse
- Failure As Driving Force Great article! Lots of Lisa and Xerox PARC mentions.
- Mail and Guardian: An insanely great ride through the Apple core. by Jack Schofield's
- Net Guide to Computing A brief Lisa Article.
- Mining Co Article: Happy 15th Birthday Macintosh!
- Kiosks Protecting User Interfaces, not as easy as 123!!
- Hitchhiking from CP/M to ProDOS to MacOS to SunOS and Back (In Only Fourteen Days) Mentions Lisa.
- Terak Workstation The connection between the Terak and the Lisa
- Byte: 20 Spectacular Failures One Paragraph on the Lisa
- Great Microprocessors of the Past Mentions the Lisa
- Microsoft Hall of Innovation Article mentions things borrowed from the Lisa
- MacKido Contributions Article Mentions who contributed what for Mac/Apple
- LisaWorks Project - They're going to be working on the project with me. Nothing yet, but they'll likely port it to MacOS.
- Apple II HistoryIncludes a mention of the Lisa and the Apple ///
- History of Home Computers Brief Lisa page
- Benchmarks for various computers. Note the entries for the Lisa. One indicates a System 5 OS called UniPlus... Anyone have any clue where to get this from?
- Archaic Apples WEB site. - Has BOOT ROM sources and other stuff - (like who doesn't these days?) :)
- Justin Maynard's Site. Some info and pictures about the Lisa.
- Computer History Timeline Lisa is mentioned.
- Jones Telecommunications and Multimedia EncyclopediaAnother timeline
- NC Company Profiles Mention of a company that made plotter drivers for the Lisa...
- Languages for the Apple2Several mentions.
- CLI vs GUI A Paper by J. Luhman mentioning various User Interfaces and the Lisa.
- Steve Jobs - A Manager Paper on Jobs and the Lisa.
- Memorial A Memorial Page to various Computers - Lisa included.
- OS Development PaperDoes mention the Lisa
- Apple's Lisa Specs The video info is wrong, it's 720x384!.
- UNM's Apple Hardware (scroll down to Lisa entries) -- Is this still alive?
- UNM again - but telling it to search for Lisa for you -- Is this still alive?