MacWorld Magazine gave the 9500 a positive review, concluding that it is "not the second-generation Power Mac for the rest of us — it's too pricey .... but it is an excellent foundation for a high-end graphics workstation — for color publishing or media production.

The 9500 was replaced by the Power Macintosh 9600 which had minimal technical changes, but provided a new case and faster processor speeds.

[3] Infoworld's Anita Epler noted that "Because most multimedia developers don't use the onboard video found on previous Mac models, Apple wisely economized by simply leaving it out.

"[4] The 9500 is also the first computer from Apple to support 168-pin DIMM memory modules, and the 512 KB of on-board 128-bit-wide cache utilizes copy-back instead of write-through, offering faster speeds than prior Macintosh models,[3] as well as the ability to install single modules (although matched pairs are recommended for best performance[5]).

Included as standard with all models are 16 MB RAM, 1 GB HDD, and AppleCD 600i 4x CD-ROM.