Vintage Apple II Love

So here’s a bit of history.

My very first interaction with a home computer was with an Apple II way back in 1979.

 

One day I visited my friend’s Paul’s house in North East Minneapolis and was astonished by something that looked out of a science fiction film, an original out of the box Apple II computer complete with a floppy disk drive and some games. Forthose of you who don’t know, Apple II was the first real Apple product, and was designed by Steve Wozniak, who co-founded Apple with his friend Steve Jobs in 1976. The computer ended up being a success because it could be used by the average everyday Joe that didn’t have an abundance of tech geek experience. Unfortunately, it was very expensive and not very obtainable for families such as mine.

Once I put eyes on the Apple II I became instantly hooked and became an Apple fan. I was only seven years old so the only chance for computing or playing games was at my friend Paul’s house. I remember it not being easy to get to his house. His house was a very old farm house but it happened to have a basement and that’s where all the magic happened. A workshop full of computer boards, cards, tech equipment and an Apple II with a Sanyo monitor was all right before my eyes. Paul’s father was one of those computer engineering guys, Steve Wozniak talk about often in various interviews, who tinkered with computers as a hobby. Paul and I ended up playing games for many hours over the next several months and I couldn’t get enough of the Apple II. His dad even played a few with us and taught me a thing or two about computers. Unfortunately, Paul ended up moving to another state and we ended up losing touch. Back in those days you didn’t have the internet or an iPhone to keep in touch like today. It was at that moment that my Apple II adventures with my friend ended and I never seen Paul again.

It wasn’t until a couple of years later that my grade school was lucky enough to get two Apple II computers. I was then able to create several programs on and play Oregon Trail and Breakout in between class breaks. I later ended up being the one moving districts and that was the end of my Apple experience at that time in my life.

Many years passed…

I joined the military in San Diego and later bought an early CompaQ computer in the early 1990’s. I bought this computer because I just got married and the Navy didn’t pay me that well. Apple was still expensive and something out of reach for me and my first wife. I continued through many generation of computers and I finally ended up with a Mac desktop in early 2020. This older Mac was given to me by my current wife’s dad who has recently passed away. I finally had an Apple computer of my own and I wouldn’t ever buy any other computer ever again. Today I rely on a 16” Mac laptop powered by Apple’s M1 chips, accompanied by iPads (I’m writing now on a 9.7” iPad Pro). I also have a little computer I carry with me everywhere called the iPhone. Imagine that, a computer in your pocket.

The Apple II, shown in the picture above, is something I’ve wanted since the good times in 1979 with my friend Paul.

After all these years…

I found a good condition, working Apple II computer A2S1 Rev 07 (1979).  It has a Disk II Interface Card 650-X104, ROM 600- Card, Mouse Interface 670-0030 Card, AII Parallel Interface 670-0021 Card, Apple 5.25 Drive Controller 655-0101-D Card, and a very rare 16K 16Kb Pocket Rocket by Applied Engineering which brings the RAM up to 64Kb for this computer.  The computer powers up and boots DOS property from the Disk II controller card. It even has an Sanyo monitor. All the tools I ever wanted. Oh, I even purchased a Disk II floppy drive signed by Woz himself.

I’m excited that I now finally own the computer that got me interested in Apple.

“Think Different….”