Gestalt ID

[5300cs]

Ok, this may be a stupid question, but WTF is the/a Gestalt ID? This has been driving me crazy for a while now. I Googled & Apple site support-surfed but came up empty-handed ...

Anyone?

[TMA]

Sorry I can't give a very detailed answer, and i'm not even sure it's 100% correct but here goes.

The gesalt ID is a number that represents the family of macs that your computer belongs to. e.g Powermac Performa 6200 series = 42. Not sure how many families there are, but it must be based on something like motherboard and form factor so there could be hundreds. So basically it's just a code for your type of mac.

Your machines gesalt ID is used when installing software, such as the Operating System, to calculate what sort of machine it's being installed on and therefor which specific componants (if any) need to be installed.

[Doraemon]

The Machine Gestalt ID is the unique identification of a Macintosh logicboard. Its part of the ROM.

When Apple replaced the original ROM with the NewWorld ROM in 1998, all Macs got gestalt ID 406. In order to differentiate the different models, Apple introduced the machine identifications (RackMac1,1 etc.).

Here are some links:

NewWorld ROM (http://www.theapplemuseum.com/index.php?id=tam&page=facts)

Machine Identification (http://www.theapplemuseum.com/index.php?id=tam&page=products&subpage=newworld)

Machine Gestalt ID of Apple's personal computers (http://www.theapplemuseum.com/index.php?id=tam&page=personal_id)