30 years ago was just the beginning
A new banner on Apple Computer's main page states that the first 30 years were just the beginning. "Welcome to 2007," it tells us. We at TUAW like to look backwards as well as forwards. Here's a nostalgic peek back to 1976, to the Apple-1. (Click the advertisement image to enlarge.)
It's been a long trip indeed from the Apple-1, which was priced at an easy-to-remember $666.66. Compare and contrast today's widescreen displays with the support (not monitor, just support) for 24 line x 40 character per line video output. The motherboard shipped with 4 Kbytes of RAM, and you could put up to 8 KB of RAM on that baby, not to mention its support for FAST 1 Kilobaud cassette tape storage (really, just about everything was an optional extra). And Apple Basic was FREE! Oh, and did I mention that you had to build the kit yourself? More than "some assembly" required.
It's hard to believe that my iPod and Mac Mini come from the same company as the Apple-1, separated by only thirty years.
