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posted by Fnord666 on Wednesday October 10 2018, @02:31AM   Printer-friendly
from the shiny-old-apple dept.

Pristine Apple I Sells at Auction for a Jaw-Dropping Price

If you think Apple products are overpriced now, wait until they’re 50 years old.

This original Apple I recently sold at auction for $375,000, making it one of the most expensive 6502-based computers in history. Given that only something like 60 or 70 of the machines were ever made, most built by hand by [Jobs] and [Wozniak], it’s understandable how collectors fought for the right to run the price up from the minimum starting bid of $50,000. And this one was particularly collectible. According to the prospectus, this machine had few owners, the most recent of whom stated that he attended a meeting of the legendary Homebrew Computer Club to see what all the fuss was. He bought it second-hand from a coworker for $300, fiddled with it a bit, and stashed it in a closet. A few years later, after the Apple ][ became a huge phenomenon, he tried to sell the machine to [Woz] for $10,000. [Woz] didn’t bite, and as a result, the owner realized a 125,000% return on his original investment, before inflation.

The machine was restored before hitting the auction block, although details of what was done were not shared. But it couldn’t have been much since none of the previous owners had even used the prototyping area that was so thoughtfully provided on the top edge of the board. It was sold with period-correct peripherals including a somewhat janky black-and-white security monitor, an original cassette tape interface, and a homebrew power supply. Sadly, there’s no word who bought the machine – it was an anonymous purchase.

Submitted via IRC for Bytram


Original Submission

 
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  • (Score: 2) by VLM on Wednesday October 10 2018, @11:48AM (2 children)

    by VLM (445) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday October 10 2018, @11:48AM (#746907)

    making it one of the most expensive 6502-based computers in history

    I was going to make a smart ass remark about some rando embedded 6502 in avionics making a 747 or a B-2 the most expensive 6502-based computer in history, but culturally 6502 belonged to the minimalist 80s home computer era, and those folks didn't mix with the "real processor, but real small" like the motorola offerings, or the "we own the embedded world for decades, but you can use in your home computer if you want" zilog/intel crowd.

    As per some google searches and memory, I don't think a 6502 was ever embedded in anything significant. Nobody liked them for anything but $99 home computers, although nostalgia is strong so old people still talk about them (I was personally more a Z-80 / motorola guy in the 80s with a nod to DEC stuff)

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  • (Score: 2) by shortscreen on Wednesday October 10 2018, @07:01PM

    by shortscreen (2252) on Wednesday October 10 2018, @07:01PM (#747086) Journal

    Nintendo used a customized version of a 6502. Probably more NES units were sold than all 6502-based home computers combined.

  • (Score: 2) by All Your Lawn Are Belong To Us on Wednesday October 10 2018, @08:21PM

    by All Your Lawn Are Belong To Us (6553) on Wednesday October 10 2018, @08:21PM (#747118) Journal
    --
    This sig for rent.