More Macs on the auction block

gleam sent us this wired article which talks about more macs on the block an Apple II with serial number 2, and an early apple I. They also comment about the earlier auctioned Apple which Woz confirmed is not really the first Apple.

Old Macs

[Mai Longdong]

Maybe I can unload mine before the price drops....if I can find it in the closet under all the socks and crap.

Verification

[JPelorat]

You'd think the yobbos at La Salle could have done a tiny bit more checking into the origins of the Mac they sold - like asking the guy who built it. Ah well... what's a few facts in the face of $40K?

They're not Macs

[toni]

Try to remember that they're not Macs, they're Apple I's and II's. The Mac came in 84 and was based on Motorola 68000 while the Apple II's were based on 6502. I can't remember off the top of my head what the I was using as a processor.

(Happy owner of an IIGS and a whole crapload of programming manuals, including the real gem "Programming the 6502" from Sybex, printed '78.. also got bunches of SCSI cards, turbo card, Z80 card and whatnot..)

Timex Sinclair 1000 for sale!!!!!!!!!

[fr0g]

for only 20,000!!!! wow what a deal and I tell you what. I will throw in the old tape recorder I used for storage.

Re:They're not Macs

[toni]

Doh, ok so there was a Mac for sale too, now that I actually read the article.. blah blah, anyway they're too modern to bother with anyway :=)

Retrocomputing

[Ixy]

Put it up on eBay and see how much it gets. Not even a mint condition Altair goes for that kind of price.

Now the Atari Portfolio, there's a real piece of retro-geekishness.

Smart Move

[PhoneMonkey]

Smart moves by Apple, this will generate interest in Mac, and give them free exposure. I may have to donate my Apple ][ for this.

I'd donate one of my Macs, but they are all aquariums now (great Christmas gifts for my geek friends!)

Re:They're not Macs

[UncleRoger]

If I remember correctly, the Apple I was usually set up with a 6502, but could also handle a 6800. Check your schematics.

URL

[j c s]

I noticed that URL had "slashdot" in it:

http://www.wired.com/news/news/slashdot/technolo gy/story/20410.html

Is this something Wired created for slashdot posts to protect itself from the /. effect?

Apple I?

[Freon]

At our high school we were digging through our computer graveyard and found this old Apple computer that was apparently manufactured in conjunction with Bell & Howell. It looks exactly like an Apple II, but has no markings that designate its model number or anything. Anyone heard of these things, or have any info at all about it? I'm curious to know its history.

Re:They're not Macs

[ciurana]

I can't remember off the top of my head what the I was using as a processor.

If memory doesn't fail, it used a MosTech 6502 because The Two Steves didn't like the 8080 and they couldn't afford at 6800. The 6502 is somewhat similar to the 6800, and that was part of the reasoning behind it.

E

Re:Verification

[UncleRoger]

Rumour has it that this Apple I (and the "GLM" and the "prototype" Lisa) belong to a guy named Computer Jones [computerjones.com]. If so, I wouldn't even claim it was a real Apple I, let alone the first without checking with Wozniak first.

I also don't care for the spamming LaSalle did to computer collectors [sinasohn.com] to promote this. (I certainly didn't need their multi-meg attachments.)

But hey, there's not a lot I wouldn't do for $40k.

Re:Apple I?

[IntlHarvester]

Bell and Howell resold Apples in a black case. They were fairly common back in the day. It probably just a standard Apple ][+, not an Apple I or anything fancy.
--

Re:Smart Move

[UncleRoger]

Smart moves by Apple, this will generate interest in Mac, and give them free exposure. I may have to donate my Apple ][ for this.

Except that Apple Corp. has absolutely nothing to do with this. The computers are all being sold by private individuals. (Jef Raskin and (possibly) Computer Jones.)

If it were Apple, a smarter move would have been to donate them. (Which they have done in the past.)

Re:URL

[cwj123]

Since http://www.wired.com/news/technology/story/20410.h tml goes to the same place, I think the /slashdot/ is just to track where the hits are from.

Re:Apple I?

[ZorinLynxie]

Bell & Howell built a bunch of Apple II plus equivalents. They were black, and the covers bolted down. (The regular Apple II's used snap on covers, so kids in classrooms could open them up, which was not good, generally)

They even had a matching set of black Disk ][ drives.

It's just an Apple II, nothing special about it software wise; just a spiffy black case.

Buing a G3...

[Anonymous Coward]

I love how he says he'll use part of the six figure proceeds to buy a G3. :} The're not THAT expensive any more!

hitchhiker

wow!

[Josh Picker]

the other day, i saw an Apple II at the thrift store, although it was probably serial number 2305820548268KCW#ER#@3, so it was probably a good thing that i didn't spend $10 on it. 'Lord knows i need more crap.

$10! pff

[delmoi]

Here in at ISU they have a "computer sale" every wensday, they sell the stuff that they would be throwing away *extremely* cheap. I got an appleII+ (I wanted a gs though) for $50, and a funky looking dumb terminal for a qarter.. this isn't really relevant to anything... but whatever
_
"Subtle mind control? Why do all these HTML buttons say 'Submit' ?"

Snap-on covers

[tangent]

(The regular Apple II's used snap on covers, so kids in classrooms could open them up, which was not good, generally)

Not good? Hell, it was invaluable! It made it practical to quickly open the case and pull the speaker wire so you could play games during BASIC class!

Re:Smart Move

[Klaruz]

I think people are missing the point of what's on sale here... It's not an old piece of hardware, it's the first of many peaces of hardware that affected what each of us do today. I don't care who you are, what you do. Apple affected EVERYBODY's life on the planet. They were the first to develop a computer for the peons that was actually feasable. I don't care if Xerox developed the gui first, it was the first apples that gave apple the chance to take Xerox's stuff and develop it into the mac. If it wasn't for that, gates wouldn't have stole the mac os. X would not exist, you'd probobly be staring at a dumb term hooked to a time share through your ulra fast 2400 bps link playing adventure XIIV.

The computers that started our lifes today are on sale, not old hardware. I thank apple for having the guts to do what nobody else would, change history.

As i sit here looking at X11R6 inspired by the mac os running WM which is inspired by next which was developed by steve jobs who was inspired by his mac and was inspired for that by the Xerox system and got to see the Xerox system all because him and Woz decided to build a computer in their garage. I can think of my mother the school teacher sitting at her house happily clicking away in claris works making the computer do what she wants, and not even know it. Even though she's not a computer person, she was touched by what apple did.

It all started with those first few computers.

Original Apple I Breadboard

[hanway]

In the Wired article, Woz says he may have the original Apple I breadboard! Now there's a unique piece of history -- that should go to the Smithsonian. I doubt that any single comparable prototype exists for an Altair because they were motherboard systems. Even if you could find an original Altair CPU breadboard, you'd need the rest of the system, and I doubt that all of it still exists, or even that it ever existed as a single prototype. Most likely some boards were designed and produced before others, so there would be no single prototype system. (The one pictured on Radio Electronics was a mockup, I believe.)

Re:Original Apple I Breadboard

[TheHornedOne]

Woz is a freakin' god.. you go to his site and read all his stuff and he's just so Zen. And so modest even though he's quite matter of fact about the fact that he pretty much did the Apple I all by his lonesome.
Geez, if all super-geeks were like him we wouldn't be in the nasty pickle, computing wise, we're in now (monopoly on the desktop, good ideas stomped into the dirt in the name of standardization, etc)