
The Beige Box Fades to Black (2002) - tosh
http://www.nytimes.com/2002/04/18/technology/the-beige-box-fades-to-black.html
======
Animats
There was a cycle in consumer electronics. Beige, black, white, grey, and back
to beige again. This didn't happen by accident. It was managed by the Color
Association of the United States, which decides which colors are "in" for each
season.[1] They've been doing this since 1915.

The Color Association has much less clout than it used to, since the US lost
its apparel business. They once really did rule color, because their
"forecasts" were used by big fabric mills to decide what to make in quantity.

[1]
[http://www.colorassociation.com/pages/6-forecasts](http://www.colorassociation.com/pages/6-forecasts)

~~~
mc32
What happened to silver and brown? Lots of older electronics were made with
bakelite and aluminum or had some aluminum accents.

[I'm thinking about old reel-reel tape players, Sanyo, Philips, Zenith, Braun
transistor radios --interestingly I recall seeing some old typewriters which
had a weird grey-green hue]

~~~
Animats
Military equipment from WWII and the 1950s came in olive drab for field use,
and lighter versions of that grey-green showed up in civilian electronics.

~~~
mc32
Huh, that's an interesting observation --never would have come up with that
connection.

------
dzuc
From Gibson's 'All Tomorrow's Parties':

Looking past the display, she could see a lot of old hardware side by side on
shelves, most of it in that grubby beige plastic. Why had people, for the
first twenty years of computing, cased everything in that? Anything digital,
from that century, it was pretty much guaranteed to be that sad-ass
institutional beige, unless they'd wanted it to look more dramatic, more
cutting edge, in which case they'd opted for black. But mostly this old stuff
was folded in nameless shades of next-to-nothing, nondescript sort-of-tan.
[...] She pointed at the beige hardware. 'How come this old shit is always
that same color? His forehead creased. 'There are two theories. One is that it
was to help people in the workplace be more comfortable with radically new
technologies that would eventually result in the mutation or extinction of the
workplace. Hence the almost universal choice, by the manufacturers, of a shade
of plastic most often encountered in downscale condoms. He smirked at
Chevette. 'Yeah? What's two? 'That the people who were designing the stuff
were unconsciously terrified of their own product, and in order not to scare
themselves, kept it looking as unexciting as possible. Literally 'plain
vanilla, you follow me?

~~~
BenoitEssiambre
I think that look was supposed to be cutting edge back then:

Google Image: "citroen karin" (
[https://www.google.ca/search?biw=1288&bih=633&tbm=isch&sa=1&...](https://www.google.ca/search?biw=1288&bih=633&tbm=isch&sa=1&q=citroen+karin&oq=citroen+karin&gs_l=psy-
ab.3..0l4.72420.75208.0.75337.13.12.0.0.0.0.160.1145.7j4.11.0....0...1.1.64.psy-
ab..2.11.1142...0i67k1.0.mbGyIrZvkFQ) ) or "sttng bridge" (
[https://www.google.ca/search?biw=1288&bih=633&tbm=isch&sa=1&...](https://www.google.ca/search?biw=1288&bih=633&tbm=isch&sa=1&q=sttng+bridge&oq=sttng+bridge&gs_l=psy-
ab.3...31854.36657.0.36802.14.13.1.0.0.0.131.1278.9j4.13.0....0...1.1.64.psy-
ab..0.8.800...0j0i67k1j0i30k1j0i10i24k1j0i24k1.0.5ZETk7Fy0lg) )

~~~
s_kilk
Ah, I see it now. I guess it sort of looks like a hi-tech golden ceramic
material when it's presented right.

------
ChuckMcM
If you get a chance to go by a 'Vintage Computer Festival' (there are three
that happen in the US and one in Europe that I know of) and you get a good
look at machines pre-1981/1982 (intro of the IBM PC) and post, and then pre
(2004/2005)(intro of the ITX form factor) and post. You can see that early PCs
were trying to look like minicomputers, some with switches on the front, some
just with a reset button, and then the PC era where everything looked pretty
much like a PC in either a 'desktop' or a 'tower' case. And then the death of
the PC and the start of the 'application' computer that started to look more
like high end Hi-fi equipment rather than a computer.

~~~
tyingq
A fair amount of the 8 bit home computers looked more like typewriters than
anything else to me. The apple II, commodore VIC/64, Atari 400/800, etc.

~~~
ChuckMcM
Good point, or like computer "terminals" of the day screen and keyboard as
opposed to platen and keyboard.

------
cylinder714
Was the NeXT cube the first black PC? Here's a good look, for those of you who
have never seen one:
[http://www.johnmiranda.com/next.htm](http://www.johnmiranda.com/next.htm)

~~~
tyingq
GRiD made black PC's before the NeXT.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grid_Systems_Corporation](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grid_Systems_Corporation)

There was also the Amstrad CPC:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amstrad_CPC](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amstrad_CPC)

And the Sinclair ZX81:
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/ZX81](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/ZX81)

And the Memotech MTX:
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memotech_MTX](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Memotech_MTX)

PDP-11's were mostly black, but I suppose that doesn't count as a "PC".

~~~
walshemj
There was also the black apple ][ by Bell and Howell

------
smcl
Something I have wondered, are tastes kinda cyclical? New cool things
eventually fall out of favour and then have a resurgence decades or more later
on (think skinny jeans from the 70s reappearing in last few years, semi-ironic
appreciation of Journey and other 80s music and so on).

And if so does this will this style come back into fashion? When all the
laptops or PC hardware are sleek black or brushed aluminium will a nicely
executed beige finish look bold, different and interesting enough to take over
again?

As an example, Sony have a retro-style PS4 which is similar (but grey and not
beige) - compared to the normal black one it looks really nice to me

~~~
Theodores
It is ultimately technology and legislation driven rather than 'fashion'.

If a new pigment comes out that enables pure white or black or silver or any
other colour at a cheaper, better price then that sets the fashion. If that
new pigment later turns out to be a fire hazard or toxic on some way then it
goes, for some other colours to be used and therefore 'the new fashion'.

If you look at aluminium finishes, the smooth, polished look fell out of
favour just around the time that a variant on the shotblasting process became
cheaper. So aluminium became less shiny.

There are many other factors but a surprising amount of what dictates fashion
is a new industrial process or chemical discovery.

------
amiga-workbench
Sadly not matte black, piano black plastics on consumer electronics are
revolting fingerprint magnets.

------
mrfusion
What about avacado green? That's what color my appliances are in my cottage.

~~~
gonzo
Not:

Harvest Gold?

Coppertone?

------
zumu
I honestly think a beige computer would garner a cult following if released
today. Lots of the younger generation are into surreal 90s throwbacks.

~~~
amiga-workbench
Corsair had an april fools a few years back with a beige 900D case, the thing
is a lot of people actually wanted it.

------
graycat
Warning, big, bitter rant. Given the OP, it's long past time for this rant:

I deeply, profoundly, bitterly hate and despise black desktop PC cases. I
prefer beige, white, bare metal, or nearly anything else.

I need to assemble a new desktop PC from parts, and if I have to get a black
case, then I will paint it white or beige, remove the black paint and paint it
beige or white, or some such. For the paint quality, I don't care: I'll put up
with blobs of paint, runs, drips, a really bad paint job, maybe some dead
insects stuck in the paint, etc., ANYTHING but black. I don't much care what
the thing looks like, except I don't want black.

Black is about the worst possible color for a desktop PC case.

Why? Style, fashion, emotion? Nope. Instead, rock solid, crucial
functionality, practicality, and utility.

For the needed equipment for my business, in particular, my first server for
my startup, any effort to emphasize style, etc. and ignore utility, etc. is
really offensive, infuriating, dysfunctional, outrageous.

Makers of black desktop PC cases, shut up, sit down, and listen up: Can I
order a case totally unpainted? I'll pay extra for unpainted. Will pay still
more for beige or white. For your black case, I HATE your product.

Why do I hate black PC cases? Simple. Dirt simple. Really simple: I have to
build the PC and then maintain that PC. To do that I need to be able to SEE
the parts. But with a black case, it's just super tough to see the parts.
Being able to see the parts is just CRUCIAL. With a black PC, to work on it,
commonly I will need 200-400 W of incandescent light, which heats up the work
area and gets in the way of the work, just to SEE. Then commonly I bump into
one of the lights and break the filament of the bulb. Bummer.

E.g., go to Web sites of companies that sell desktop PC cases and look at
their pictures of their cases. Sure, for the black cases, about all you can
see are big, black blobs with essentially all details hidden. Especially for
the insides, when shopping, building, or maintaining, I need to see clearly.

Is any water torture severe enough punishment for the people painting desktop
PC cases black?

Again, offer an option of a case with no paint at all. Or, for the best
option, sure, return to a beige case.

And, one more, for the industrial designers that try to make the cases look
like something from _Star Wars_ , with swoops, sweeps, other dramatic
nonsense, to heck with it. Instead, the case is a mechanical tool. I no more
want the emotional droppings of industrial designers on my desktop PC case --
any such is patronizing -- than I want them on my set of metric socket
wrenches, a sledge hammer, a circle saw, etc. Keep the artistic industrial
designers far away from the desktop PC case I need for my next computer, a
server for my startup. Or just borrow case design themes from, say,
Supermicro.

If I want art, then I'll select my own, thank you. For a PC case, I want just
a tool, like a socket wrench, and not some wacko effort at style, fashion, or
art.

For the bad art, I'll upchuck but put up with it. For black, I won't put up
with it, will shop (I have, for hours) for beige and otherwise, if I have to
accept black, will remove the paint, repaint it, or paint over it.

This is a rant, but long needed to be said, too long, and especially needed
now given the OP.

One more: I don't want my keyboard black either. In year 2000, I ordered three
beige keyboards from Gateway. At this point, one of the three still works
well, and for that I've had to use epoxy to repair the broken bearing for the
wire _stabilizer_ of the space bar. Why keep the old beige keyboards? Sure,
easy: I want to be able to see the keys; I do know _touch typing_ but only for
keys a-z ; for most of the rest, I have to look so want to be able to see.

/rant

~~~
_JamesA_
Caselabs[1] offers cases in black, gunmetal and a special run of white. I have
also seen special runs of unpainted cases available.

The Merlin line is currently available with a two-tone option with black,
gunmetal or white exterior and black, gunmetal, white or red internals.

[1]: [http://www.caselabs-store.com/pc-cases/](http://www.caselabs-
store.com/pc-cases/)

~~~
graycat
THANKS! I'll look. You did much better shopping than I did.

