Hack Your iBook: Put Clarus The Dogcow In Your Apple Logo

by , 7:00 AM EDT, May 29th, 2001

We got a note from Observer Mike Margolis about a fantastic physical hack he made to his new iBook. This is sure to make Apple remarkably tense, and void a few warranties in the process, but it is one of the coolest things we have seen in a while. Mr. Margolis has found a way to add Clarus the Dogcow inside the beautiful Apple logo on the outside of his iBook so that when it is lit up, you can see Clarus in all of her Dogcow glory. From Mr. Margolis:

A week and a half ago I hacked my brand new dual-USB iBook to put Clarus the Dogcow in the glowing apple on back. After everyone at WWDC fell in love with it, I decided to put it on the Web for others to enjoy. I was thinking perhaps your readers would like it too.

And from the Clarus iBook Web page.

I was sitting in the front row at WWDC and I saw Steve Jobs take a peek at my new iBook when he was taking a swig of water on the sidelines and had a perplexed look on his face and later when he looked back he smiled. I didn't believe it at first, but 2 other people sitting in the front row near me later confirmed it - yep, Steve Jobs himself smiled at my iBook :-) I'm proud of my custom iBook, and now that WWDC is over, I think I'm going to put a blue transparency in to create a nice bright blue glowing apple instead of the standard white one. Maybe a pumpkin for October, or other colors/graphics for other occasions, who knows ;-)

Please note that the black look to the iBook is due to lighting conditions, that really is a white iBook. There are many more pictures, as well as step-by-step instructions on how to do this yourself. Please note that doing this to your own iBook is very likely to void your warranty faster than you can say "I hope they won't notice."

To see the images and read more of Mike's tale, head over to the Clarus iBook Web page. He has also included links to more information on Clarus, dogcattle, and other related issues at his site; you should definitely head over and check it out. In the meanwhile, thanks to Mike Margolis for putting up his Web page, setting up the pics, and sharing it all with us.

Clarus iBook Web Page