Apple-1 prototype hand-soldered by Woz up for auction, bids expected to reach $500k
(2022/07/27)
- Reference: 1658921407
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2022/07/27/apple1_prototype_handsoldered_by_woz/
- Source link:
Got several hundred thousand dollars burning a hole in your pocket? Why waste it investing in further education, or paying off debts, when you can spend it on an original "Apple Computer A" prototype, right, Jobs fans?
[1]
Pic via [2]RR Auction
This specific piece of hardware is expected to bring in a cool half a million, being the board the Steves (Wozniak and Jobs) used to demo the Apple-1 to Paul Terrell, leading Terell to give them their first big purchase order for fifty Apple-1s in 1976. The Byte Shop owner paid them $500 per unit, cash on delivery, and sold them for $666.66 apiece.
Woz alone designed the hardware, circuit boards, and the operating system for the computer, first demonstrated at a meeting of Palo Alto's Homebrew Computer Club (Terrell and Jobs were also members) in July of the same year. As the listing points out: "Without Jobs, Woz had no market — he had already given away the Apple-1 design to members of the Homebrew Computer Club, and had little interest in exploiting it for profit." But Jobs, as history tells us, did.
And so the path to a [3]$2.453 trillion market cap company began...
The sale, which is currently live, is being run by the Boston-based RR Auction, with [4]the latest bid at the time of writing at $278,005. The auction closes on August 18. The auction house previously sold an Apple-1 for [5]$375k in September 2018 and also sold Wozniak's original Apple II prototype schematics and programming instructions for a whopping [6]$630,272 .
[7]NFT or not to NFT: Steve Jobs' first job application auction shows physically unique beats cryptographically unique
[8]Former ad exec sticks Steve Jobs' 1973 job application in a scanner for physical-versus-digital NFT auction
[9]And you thought that $999 Mac stand was dear: Steve Wozniak's Apple II doodles fetch $630,272 at auction
[10]Auctioneer puts Space Shuttle CPUs under the hammer
The board – as the pictures on the auction house's site [11]show – is rather worse for wear, with a missing piece split off from the power supply area above D12 down through the bottom right hand side of the board.
The auctioneers assume the other bit was thrown away (it spent several years in the holy garage of [12]Jobs' childhood home before being gifted by Jobs to its current owner), but say the board may be "reimagined" – supplying Terrell's photographs of the complete board in action back in the day so collectors can view them side by side.
[13]
"Computer A" looks a little different from the production Apple Computer 1, the prototype has three orange Sprague Atom capacitors, rather than "Big Blue" capacitors found on the production version, say the auctioneers. It also features Woz's "three-handed" (two hands and a mouth really) soldering technique: with Wozniak holding the solder between his teeth (yikes! – at 3:10 in this [14]video if you want to see this in action). Apparently the method creates "bubbles" at the soldered connections – though if you ask us, it might just be caused by being a bit over-generous with the solder.
[15]
The listing doesn't name the owner, but reiterates Computer A was given personally by Jobs to the seller. Whoever it is, they're not feeling that sentimental about it, which is fair enough since it's worth around $500,000 (or so its auctioneers estimate). Which is more than the [16]dusty old kit some of us have lying around. ®
Get our [17]Tech Resources
[1] https://regmedia.co.uk/2022/07/27/apple_computer_a_rr_auctions.jpg
[2] https://www.rrauction.com/auctions/lot-detail/345735106445006-steve-jobs-39-s-apple-1-computer-prototype/
[3] https://www.google.com/finance/quote/APC:ETR?sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwj6herO5Jj5AhVQt6QKHWe6CagQ3ecFegQIJBAa
[4] https://www.rrauction.com/auctions/lot-detail/345735106445006-steve-jobs-39-s-apple-1-computer-prototype/?cat=0
[5] https://www.rrauction.com/auctions/lot-detail/339161705363027
[6] https://www.theregister.com/2020/12/21/steve_wozniak_notes_auction/
[7] https://www.theregister.com/2021/07/29/steve_jobs_nft_auction_race/
[8] https://www.theregister.com/2021/07/21/steve_jobs_application_nft_auction/
[9] https://www.theregister.com/2020/12/21/steve_wozniak_notes_auction/
[10] https://www.theregister.com/2022/04/14/space_shuttle_computer_auction/
[11] https://www.rrauction.com/auctions/lot-detail/345735106445006-steve-jobs-39-s-apple-1-computer-prototype/?cat=0
[12] https://www.theregister.com/2013/09/23/steve_jobs_boyhood_home_may_become_protected_historical_shrine/
[13] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_offbeat/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2YuFhI8Zj8UHt-6bb@DFo5AAAANc&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0
[14] https://youtu.be/pJif4i9NRdI?t=188
[15] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_offbeat/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44YuFhI8Zj8UHt-6bb@DFo5AAAANc&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[16] https://www.theregister.com/2013/02/01/ventblockers_3/
[17] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
[1]
Pic via [2]RR Auction
This specific piece of hardware is expected to bring in a cool half a million, being the board the Steves (Wozniak and Jobs) used to demo the Apple-1 to Paul Terrell, leading Terell to give them their first big purchase order for fifty Apple-1s in 1976. The Byte Shop owner paid them $500 per unit, cash on delivery, and sold them for $666.66 apiece.
Woz alone designed the hardware, circuit boards, and the operating system for the computer, first demonstrated at a meeting of Palo Alto's Homebrew Computer Club (Terrell and Jobs were also members) in July of the same year. As the listing points out: "Without Jobs, Woz had no market — he had already given away the Apple-1 design to members of the Homebrew Computer Club, and had little interest in exploiting it for profit." But Jobs, as history tells us, did.
And so the path to a [3]$2.453 trillion market cap company began...
The sale, which is currently live, is being run by the Boston-based RR Auction, with [4]the latest bid at the time of writing at $278,005. The auction closes on August 18. The auction house previously sold an Apple-1 for [5]$375k in September 2018 and also sold Wozniak's original Apple II prototype schematics and programming instructions for a whopping [6]$630,272 .
[7]NFT or not to NFT: Steve Jobs' first job application auction shows physically unique beats cryptographically unique
[8]Former ad exec sticks Steve Jobs' 1973 job application in a scanner for physical-versus-digital NFT auction
[9]And you thought that $999 Mac stand was dear: Steve Wozniak's Apple II doodles fetch $630,272 at auction
[10]Auctioneer puts Space Shuttle CPUs under the hammer
The board – as the pictures on the auction house's site [11]show – is rather worse for wear, with a missing piece split off from the power supply area above D12 down through the bottom right hand side of the board.
The auctioneers assume the other bit was thrown away (it spent several years in the holy garage of [12]Jobs' childhood home before being gifted by Jobs to its current owner), but say the board may be "reimagined" – supplying Terrell's photographs of the complete board in action back in the day so collectors can view them side by side.
[13]
"Computer A" looks a little different from the production Apple Computer 1, the prototype has three orange Sprague Atom capacitors, rather than "Big Blue" capacitors found on the production version, say the auctioneers. It also features Woz's "three-handed" (two hands and a mouth really) soldering technique: with Wozniak holding the solder between his teeth (yikes! – at 3:10 in this [14]video if you want to see this in action). Apparently the method creates "bubbles" at the soldered connections – though if you ask us, it might just be caused by being a bit over-generous with the solder.
[15]
The listing doesn't name the owner, but reiterates Computer A was given personally by Jobs to the seller. Whoever it is, they're not feeling that sentimental about it, which is fair enough since it's worth around $500,000 (or so its auctioneers estimate). Which is more than the [16]dusty old kit some of us have lying around. ®
Get our [17]Tech Resources
[1] https://regmedia.co.uk/2022/07/27/apple_computer_a_rr_auctions.jpg
[2] https://www.rrauction.com/auctions/lot-detail/345735106445006-steve-jobs-39-s-apple-1-computer-prototype/
[3] https://www.google.com/finance/quote/APC:ETR?sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwj6herO5Jj5AhVQt6QKHWe6CagQ3ecFegQIJBAa
[4] https://www.rrauction.com/auctions/lot-detail/345735106445006-steve-jobs-39-s-apple-1-computer-prototype/?cat=0
[5] https://www.rrauction.com/auctions/lot-detail/339161705363027
[6] https://www.theregister.com/2020/12/21/steve_wozniak_notes_auction/
[7] https://www.theregister.com/2021/07/29/steve_jobs_nft_auction_race/
[8] https://www.theregister.com/2021/07/21/steve_jobs_application_nft_auction/
[9] https://www.theregister.com/2020/12/21/steve_wozniak_notes_auction/
[10] https://www.theregister.com/2022/04/14/space_shuttle_computer_auction/
[11] https://www.rrauction.com/auctions/lot-detail/345735106445006-steve-jobs-39-s-apple-1-computer-prototype/?cat=0
[12] https://www.theregister.com/2013/09/23/steve_jobs_boyhood_home_may_become_protected_historical_shrine/
[13] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_offbeat/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2YuFhI8Zj8UHt-6bb@DFo5AAAANc&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0
[14] https://youtu.be/pJif4i9NRdI?t=188
[15] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_offbeat/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44YuFhI8Zj8UHt-6bb@DFo5AAAANc&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[16] https://www.theregister.com/2013/02/01/ventblockers_3/
[17] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
J.G.Harston
Didn't he have enough fingers? I easily manage soldering with iron in one hand, solder in the other, and holding something else with the fingers that aren't holding the solder.
I am the despair of the antique auction trade
Neil Barnes
If it don't work, I don't care who built it, I don't want it.
Fetishising non-functional technology will only lead to tears.
I did discover recently a group dedicated to making exact replicas of early apples, with long and involved discussions about chip date-codes and the proper amount of crinkle in the solder-resist... so obviously I am a minority.
Re: I am the despair of the antique auction trade
Dan 55
Alternatively you may be interested in a novelty clock made out of a case and a motherboard from a working computer (which is now not working)?
NFT
original_rwg
Makes an NFT look like it has some value.
Re: NFT
Anonymous Coward
Just as with NFTs and physical art, it's not about the value to the individual, it's about speculation and tax avoidance.
Open source?
Snake
Interesting: Woz was essentially making the Apple 1 designs completely open source.
To which Jobs took it closed source to make a [very] handsome profit (together).
So we celebrate the collapse of open source with vast sums of money for a token of this, plus celebrate it by granting Apple billions upon billions of dollars.
...
Eh, it's a living.
Why the heck is a broken remnant like this worth that much?? Sure it's history, but is it REALLY 500k USD interesting
Also: "three-handed" (two hands and a mouth really) soldering technique: with Wozniak holding the solder between his teeth" -> Yummy, lead poisoning.