BeBox Bezel
With thanks to the Digibarn Computer
Museum (DCM), we have a short audio
interview (2.75 Mb mp3) with Mark Brinkerhoff, the designer of the
distinctive BeBox bezel.
In the interview, Mark makes some interesting points about the powerful,
tower-like style of the BeBox and the different versions of the BeBox bezel.
Mark suggests that the single colour bezel (all dark-gray, including the face
plates) is likely to have been an earlier prototype bezel, which later evolved
to the light-gray bezel with blue face plates to match the case colour.
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| Mark Brinkerhoff, designer of the BeBox Bezel |
A very dusty BeBox from DCM with single colour bezel and face plates |
Interview Transcript
For those who unable to listen to the interview below is a full transcript
of the interview with Mark Brinkerhoff. I believe the interviewer is Bruce
Damer, the curator of the Digibarn Computer
Museum.
Bruce Damer (Digibarn): So Mark Brinkerhoff is here, who's the designer of the bezel for the BeBox.
Mark Brinkerhoff: Yep. I don't know the exact year. Quite a while ago. I worked
with Gassée and crew. They had a small building suite, up in Palo Alto,
I believe. And they had mostly software and wanted to do hardware as well.
BD: mmm hmm.
MB: So they created, I believe, a dual-processor box
BD: Yep, yep.
MB: And it was intended to be a very fast graphics machine.
BD: Mmm hmm.
MB: And so they wanted a bezel designed that had, ah, a look of power, as well as one that displayed both CPUs running. So if you look at the sample here, I'll show you.
BD: Yeah, let's go take a look at it. This is wonderful!
MB: Yeah, well, this is history.
BD: This is history.
MB: Yeah. It has a series of light-pipes on either side, near the tower like
elements. Those have a series of LEDs behind them, and as your CPUs ramp up in
usage, the LEDs climb and shrink on either side. You can see them here.
BD: Oh, goodness. Oh, goodness.
MB: That's what these are for. These are light-pipes. So there's two small LED
cards behind there, each one hooked to a separate CPU.
BD: Each one is hooked to a separate CPU ...
MB: I've got a camera.
BD: Here, stand by the ... stand by ... we'll get your picture. Ok. So, so
that's real! That's actually driven by the CPU.
MB: Yep. Right. And so one of the jokes, standing jokes we had at the time was
if you wanted your boss to think you were working really hard, you'd run a
program that would make both CPU LED banks run up and down very quickly. And
then he or she would think that you were very busy.
BD: That you were working ... So this whole bezel. So how ... so you had some
kind of output from the CPU to drive the light-pipes.
MB: Yeah, it was just more of a monitoring system.
BD: Right. What was it like working for Gasseacute;e?
MB: Ahh, he was very vision driven. He used emotional terms really well. He
wanted a system that would give an emotion of power. That's why this looks like
a tower, and has the tower shape component to it.
BD: Yes, it has a tower shape. Right.
MB: All the vertical components are from that. It's also highly modular. He was
a future thinker I believe. And each of these areas, mostly this one and this
one and this one, are all snap out features. So you can put more CDs and/or
accesories in here, and these snap out without any screws from the back side.
BD: Oh, gosh. Yeah.
MB: So you can put in anything you want. So, it was designed to be a very, very
powerful system.
BD: So, this system here, because it doesn't have a name-plate on it, and it
has these. Would this be an earlier model?
MB: Yeah, so what we have is one of the first production units, I haven't ... I
don't have the box, I have the bezel.
BD: Yeah.
MB: And it was two tone. It was more of this colour in the centre region, in
this area, and then it had darker inserts, and I believe, blue end caps. I can
send you a picture of it.
BD: I've got another one, another BeBox in the other room. It's very different,
but this one seemed like it was almost prototype.
MB: Yeah, typically prototypes are shot in single colour materials, which this
very well could be. And you test out things like snap fits for these, and you
tune them, so that they're tighter. So this one is loose, and this one is
tight. Same is true of these inserts.
BD: Ok, so this probably is a prototype.
MB: Yeah, very likely. It's probably an early first shot sample. In fact, they
probably went to show this to their investors once they finished it.
BD: Yeah.
MB: But that's really neat. It's a surprise to me to see that here.
BD: No, that's wonderful. Thank you.
Attribution
The images on this page and the content of this interview is © 1998-2006
Digibarn Computer Museum, (DCM) and made available under this Creative Commons
license. The BeBox Zone is grateful to the DCM for allowing us to republish
this important content.
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