I'm a bit of an oddball with Apple stuff in that I find clones and the like to be just as interesting sometimes as the original deal. I particularly like stories like this:
http://www.vintagecomputing.com/index.php/archives/116
That remind me of my own tinkering back in the day. I've rescued a few, including a Linden Series One and a Franklin Ace 1200 -- I'm wondering if there are other 'interesting' machines or kits out there anyone can recall that are noteworthy and worth saving/collecting?
The "Pineapple II" clone is a computer that I have always wanted. I just have an obsession with it lol.
Here are a few links that may interest you: (All Apple clones & kits)
http://www.applelogic.org/files/ABChires.JPG
http://www.applelogic.org/TheCLONES.html
I'll have to find a picture of the Pineapple clone.
Here's the Pineapple!
http://www.homecomputer.de/images/wanted/usa/Pineapple.jpg
talking about weird clones, I've been dying to get my hands on one of these:
http://www.museo8bits.com/wiki/images/e/ef/1032750523565_apple_laser_IIc_01.jpg
The Milmar //c!
Is a piece of crap, but well worth it.
Javster
lol the //c's keyboard looks cool!
That is really neat! It almost has a kind of fake prototype feel to it.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/360767206361?ssPageName=STRK:MEWNX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1439.l2649
This was one of the ones I bought recently -- really liked the clean look. The motherboard has a pleasing blue color to it too.
Just a little info about the Milmar Laser //c: this was the Brazilian clone (ripoff?) of the //c, blatantly copied the original shell. The motherboard was a II+ clone, just as the keyboard. It had connections for the old Apple II drives, Apple II ports, and had no internal drive. 64k RAM.
More photos:
https://plus.google.com/photos/105095448273722999225/albums/5831427393705305505?banner=pwa
I love the "prototype" feel just like Falter mention. I have seen it in brazilian boards for sale, but the price is close to $500 dollars. Bummer.
Cheers, Javster
That is the absolute coolest story about "Zeke"
I had a clone for a short period of time, well my family did, before my sister moved to the original Mac with 128k and I got a IIc.
We had a weird one. The clone was called an Albert. I wish I could find one. It was in a separate metal case with a detached keyboard and had built-in A/D converters and a bunch more stuff. My sister wanted it for some science stuff because of all the extras and my dad bought it. Must have been around 1983. If I recall he got it from J&R music world, but I'm not 100% sure about that. He did say it was fun bringing it home to Long Island on the subway and then the railroad with boxes of the machine, disk drives and monitor all at once. It's funny when I think of my dad, this story is one of my fond memories because he surprised us with it even though we had a couple of computers already in the house.
Anyway as I said. Love to find one....
Cheers,
Corey
Tony has a write-up of the Albert on resetvector
The Albert computer
and a photo gallery here:
Albert Computers, Inc.
There was an Albert computer that showed up on eBay sometime in the last year or two, which is how I first heard of it, but I no longer remember when or how much it sold for. Maybe another one will surface.
Yep that's it.
We had the whole setup including the tablet, battery backup, headset for voice control and the dual drives. It actually just used a normal apple II OS disk and loaded AppleSoft as if it was an apple II without AppleSoft Roms. No special Albert specific disk needed.
Cheers,
Corey
my 'latest' acquired Apple II clone
pearcom
pearcom advert
pearcom II advert
Wow that's a lot of card slots, 14. Nice pictures. I selected forward on your pic and looked at your ITT clone. Nice. The keyboard looks exactly like an early bell and Howell Apple II keyboard with the black and the raised power key indicator.
Cheers,
Corey
Grabbed this on Ebay. It's an Orange+2 (I believe). Dual CPU -- one for running Apple software and a Z80a for running other software. I couldn't resist, it seemed rather unique.
http://www.vintagecomputing.com/wp-content/images/retroscan/orangeplustwo_large.jpg
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Rare-Vintage-Unknown-Computer-With-5-25-Floppy-Drive-Apple-II-Clone-Working-/161157538368?_trksid=p2047675.l2557&ssPageName=STRK%3AMEWNX%3AIT&nma=true&si=SV9UIz8vSq9GV1eXHjBiRB2L%252FdU%253D&orig_cvip=true&rt=nc
there are a few other no name clones that have plethora of integrated peripherals.
That's the ][ version -- they had a //e clone.