1984: Steven Jobs, chairman of the board of Apple Computer, leaning on the new "Macintosh" personal computer. It had a 7.83MHz processor, 9" monochrome screen, one floppy disk and no hard drive. Priced at $1,995 to $2,495, it was intended to challenge IBM for the business personal computer market

1984: Thousands of Apple Macintosh computers sit on double decked manufacturing lines for their 48 hour "burn in" in Freemont, California. 50,000 were sold in quick order – but sales then slowed

23 January 1984: the Apple Macintosh was unveiled in Cupertino, California at Apple's shareholder meeting.

1984: Drexel University President William Hagerty, left, talks with chemistry Professor Allan Smith after the Institution helped unveil Apple Computer's new Macintosh in Philadelphia. The Macintosh was to be the mandatory "electronic workhorse" for the school

1986: David Bonilla (left) and Albert McFarland use word processing and graphics software on Macintoshes at the Creative Arts Computer Lab at San Francisco State University to block and plan a video shoot

1987: John Sculley, chaiman of Apple Computer Inc., shows off the new Macintosh II computer at news conference in Los Angeles. Two new computers – the Macintosh II and Macintosh SE – were introduced, and were the first sold by Apple able to run programs written for IBM-type personal computers.

1994: Apple's PowerBook Duo presages its descendants, with a large space to rest your hands. The round "trackball" was later dropped in favour of a simple "trackpad".

1995: Steve Kahng, President and CEO of Power Computing stands behind his company's versions of the Apple Macintosh Computer. Apple licensed its operating system to "clone makers" – who offered cheaper, faster version of products, which quickly destroyed profits at Apple. On returning to the company in 1997, Steve Jobs tore up the contracts, returning Apple to profitability.

1997: with Gil Amelio still in charge, but with Steve Jobs building allies on the board, Apple releases the $1,800 Power Macintosh 6500 series to succeed its slow-selling Performa line.

1998: the iMac, the computer that brought Apple back from the near-dead. Designed by Jonathan Ive and championed by Steve Jobs, it had a built-in monitor,

April 2002: Apple introduces the eMac, a desktop line designed specifically for education, featuring a 17-inch flat CRT and a 700 MHz PowerPC G4 processor. It is killed off in July 2006.

2000: Steve Jobs poses with the new Power Mac G4 Cube after his keynote address at the Macworld Conference. The Cube – echoing the NeXT computer of Jobs's previous company – turned out to be a rare flop. Designed to be silent and fanless, with no visible switches, it never quite captured its intended "prosumer" market due to lack of expandability and cost. Some of the 8in-cube machines developed cracks; the product was dropped in July 2001.

January 2001: Apple's first Titanium G4 PowerBook wowed the crowds when unveiled by Jobs at Macworld. It turned out to be a design classic, although some noted that its wireless reception was attenuated by the metal enclosure. The basic design of a metallic shell for the top-end "pro" laptops remains in use eight years later.

January 2002: The new iMac, unveiled at Macworld, was dubbed the "lampstand". Its 15-inch LCD flat screen was on an armature, with a 700 MHz or 800 MHz PowerPC G4 processor and SuperDrive for playing and burning CDs and DVDs. Rumours ahead of the unveiling had expected a flat-screen, all-in-one model; but Jobs said he had told Jonathan Ive, who had struggled with such a design, that each element should be "true to itself". The all-in-one design had to wait for slimmer DVD burners.

August 2004: the iMac goes flat. Unveiled by Phil Schiller in Paris, the idea of a flatscreen, slimline computer is finally realised.