GeoPort

What is GeoPort?
GeoPort is a type of proprietary serial port made by Apple computers but is now obselete. Developed for video and voice applications, it provided an interface between a telephone line or modem and a personal computer, and was last used in the early 1990s.

GeoPort's features included improved telephone and fax service when used with Apple Telecom 3.0 and 2Mbps bandwidth.It was suitable for video conferencing, but was mainly used with analog phones that had adequate line speed / bandwidth could not support.

The GeoPort could be found on m-68K-based machines and earlier pre-USB Power Macintosh models. GeoPort technology is similar to the standard serial interface, but has a faster data transfer rate. This technology has largely been replaced by modern technology and support that is now available through USB.

The GeoPort was designed as an additional DMA channel (Direct Memory Access) for internal sound hardware such as modems and fax machines. While the earliest versions weren't fast enough to power communication devices, later versions of the AV series were more than capable of handling the processing speed. In this series, the GeoPort was located directly on the logic board as part of the system architecture. It was developed to take the load off the CPU's audio, video and graphics procedures and make it run faster.

In 1998 Apple Inc. introduced the iMac, which featured a software modem based on GeoPort technology. Soon after, the GeoPort was removed and replaced with a 56K modem.