I had a wonderfully tricked out Apple II as a kid:<p>• Videx enhancer providing lowercase capability.<p>• Apple II Plus ROMs providing Microsoft basic. The original II Integer Basic ROMs were in an Apple language card in slot 7 with a toggle switch to activate the original ROMs.<p>• 64K RAM, the extra 16K provided by a Microsoft language card in slot 0.<p>• Epson MX 100 via serial card in slot 1.<p>• Novation Applecat in slot 2.<p>• Videx 80 column card in slot 3.<p>• Microsoft CP/M card in slot 4, because Wordstar.<p>• Disk ][ card in slot 6, attached to a pair of Disk ][ drives, modified with an external toggle switch to enable/disable writes, because hole punch argggh.<p>• Video output to both an Apple Monitor /// green screen and to Sony 13" Trinitron TV.
Loved my Apple ][+ -- best computer ever because it was expandable and simple.<p>I bought the computer itself from a summer job I had, and dad bought the Disk ][ drive and the cheap B&W TV we used as a monitor. Later on I added an 80-column card and a RAM upgrade to take it to a bank-switched 64k.<p>There were hard drives for sale at the time - Corvus sold a 5mb unit for $4900. Way out of my price range, and how could you <i>ever</i> fill that much space up? :)
I learned to program (BASIC, of course) on an Apple IIe. I was in elementary school. One of my classmates' moms was a professional computer programmer, and came in to teach us all to program. I can't imagine how different my life might be now if she hadn't done that, and if the Apple hadn't been such an easy and fun platform to play with.
My first computer was an Apple IIe with the DuoDisk drive, supplemented soon afterward with a then-blazing-fast 1200 bps modem. The Apple-branded one that hung, kinda bizarrely, from the wall. Add an Apple mouse (I recall the hardware took up a whole slot), a Super Serial Card, an Apple 80 column memory expansion card, and it was a dream computer.<p>That is, at least until the Woz-edition Apple IIgs came along a few years later!<p>Like someone else in this discussion, I don't know how my life would have turned out if it weren't for the Apple IIe/IIgs. I likely wouldn't have learned how to program, wouldn't have been exposed to those early glimmerings of hacker culture, wouldn't have gone into technology journalism, and wouldn't have left technology journalism to found <a href="http://recent.io/" rel="nofollow">http://recent.io/</a>. On the downside, unlearning the bad habits of Applesoft BASIC is a life's work! :)
The first computer I ever got to see and touch in person was an Apple IIe. My buddy in the Air Force got it, and let me play on it. Wonderful li'l machine. First time I stayed up all night playing a game, text of course.
I was so lucky. My dad used to work at Apple in the 80s so we pretty much got every model since the Apple ][+ at home.<p>Can't remember this too well but I think I started with a ][+ with 2 floppy drives, a Silentype (thermal!) printer and Monitor ///, paddles, joystick, Apple's Graphical Tablet.<p>And tons and tons of software. Everybody copied. There was no internet, so there was a lot of borrowing and copying of floppy disks.<p>Learned to program in Basic, 6502, Logo. A little bit with UCSD Pascal. I was a kid and more interested in Captain Goodnight, Karateka and all the wonderful text adventures that I could barely understand in English.<p>Good times. Maybe time to fire up an emulator and see how much I remember.
It was a nice machine, although I never saw one live.<p>In Portugal, the ZX Spectrum and Commodore 64, followed by their successors ruled the home market.
I still have a 1987 Apple //c, with its original packaging and accessories: carrying bag, 9" green monitor, additional Disk II drive, mouse, MouseDesk software and manual, joystick, RGB TV adapter... And of course the original cardboard box, which was already very Apple-looking (white, with fancy, large text and nice, elegant pictures).