5 ms·

System Description: The Apple II (1977) [pdf]

24 points by ychw 11y ago

taphangum 11y ago
I wonder if Jobs wrote the copy on the Ad. It's brilliant.
- jhallenworld 11y ago
  How about this one? http://www.vintagecomputing.com/wp-content/images/retroscan/apple_adam_nude_large.jpg http://www.vintagecomputing.com/wp-content/images/retroscan/...
CamperBob2 11y ago
The Apple-II cassette interface is simple, fast, and I think most reliable. The data transfer rate averages over 180 bytes per second, and the recording scheme is compatible with the interface used with the Apple- I. Note that this is almost as fast as the floppy disk drive on the Commodore 64. This is why people remember Woz but not the anonymous engineer(s) behind the 1541 disk drive.
- jhallenworld 11y ago
  To be fair, the C64 slowness was due to a mistake: http://www.lemon64.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=52439&sid=660bd9bc1f311f2aa17f8504670ff8dd http://www.lemon64.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=52439&sid=660bd...
  - CamperBob2 11y ago
    Interesting! That's a great post. I knew they were using an IEEE-488 derived bus, but I wasn't aware of all the dirty laundry. Woz's disk OS actually left a lot of low-hanging fruit on the tree as well, but at least the hardware wasn't burdened with so many legacy bottlenecks.
- 505 11y ago
  Wow, I used the 1541 for backups in one job. I never timed it, but I'm not surprised at your report.
aswanson 11y ago
This computer beats the one I programmed in high school. 12 years after this ad ran.
abecedarius 11y ago
Anyone have a Breakout in, say, Javascript that's as short and clear as the example in Basic?
jdsampayo 11y ago
woman on the kitchen 70's cliché propaganda
505 11y ago
Great to see this again. The description at the time of the video hardware is important. My first computer, purchased around four years later, also had a 6502 and memory mapped video. Unlike the Apple, it did absolutely nothing to interleave the video memory access - if the CPU accessed the video RAM, there would be a momentary black horizontal line on the screen. Many of the Apple II's competitors were the same.

24 points by ychw 11y ago

taphangum 11y ago

I wonder if Jobs wrote the copy on the Ad. It's brilliant.

jhallenworld 11y ago
How about this one? http://www.vintagecomputing.com/wp-content/images/retroscan/apple_adam_nude_large.jpg http://www.vintagecomputing.com/wp-content/images/retroscan/...

CamperBob2 11y ago

The Apple-II cassette interface is simple, fast, and I think most reliable. The data transfer rate averages over 180 bytes per second, and the recording scheme is compatible with the interface used with the Apple- I. Note that this is almost as fast as the floppy disk drive on the Commodore 64. This is why people remember Woz but not the anonymous engineer(s) behind the 1541 disk drive.

jhallenworld 11y ago
To be fair, the C64 slowness was due to a mistake: http://www.lemon64.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=52439&sid=660bd9bc1f311f2aa17f8504670ff8dd http://www.lemon64.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=52439&sid=660bd...
- CamperBob2 11y ago
  Interesting! That's a great post. I knew they were using an IEEE-488 derived bus, but I wasn't aware of all the dirty laundry. Woz's disk OS actually left a lot of low-hanging fruit on the tree as well, but at least the hardware wasn't burdened with so many legacy bottlenecks.
505 11y ago
Wow, I used the 1541 for backups in one job. I never timed it, but I'm not surprised at your report.

aswanson 11y ago

This computer beats the one I programmed in high school. 12 years after this ad ran.

abecedarius 11y ago

Anyone have a Breakout in, say, Javascript that's as short and clear as the example in Basic?

jdsampayo 11y ago

woman on the kitchen 70's cliché propaganda

505 11y ago

Great to see this again. The description at the time of the video hardware is important. My first computer, purchased around four years later, also had a 6502 and memory mapped video. Unlike the Apple, it did absolutely nothing to interleave the video memory access - if the CPU accessed the video RAM, there would be a momentary black horizontal line on the screen. Many of the Apple II's competitors were the same.