Uncle Bernie's favorite Apple-1 clone (in wooden enclosure)

Over the past five years, I have built more than a dozen Apple-1, mostly driven by the need to verify the validity of my "Tips & Tricks" pdf for builders of my kits, and proof for the viability of these kits themselves.

Despite I sold off a few to "thin the herd", the peak number was around 16 specimen, now down to 14.

But there is one particular build which I like most, and it's a "keeper":

UncleBernie's Apple-1_small.jpg

The curved lid and the bottom are made from Perspex (aka Plexiglass) so each side of the motherboard can be examined. Alas, I had to remove the lid for this photo to avoid the glare. But in natural light, with human eyes, the glare from the Perspex is no issue. Only in still photos, glare manifests itself as a nuisance. Seems that the human eye can unsee what the camera sees. A professional photo studio could avoid glare, too, but even for professional photographers  it's tricky.

This Apple-1 clone was built on a Newton non-NTI PCB using machined contact IC sockets, and is populated with ICs which mostly have "correct" Y1976 date codes. Although I do have a set of original Stancor transformers, I decided to power it with a modified "Mean Well" switchmode power supply, just to keep everything running cooler and to avoid fans.

The keyboard is a "YAAK" keyboard which I designed for this purpose. IMHO, use of old Apple II keyboards is not a good choice for such a build (which was quite expensive due to the Y1976 ICs and the custom enclosure). If I spend a lot of money on such a thing, I don't want an old and unreliable keyboard in it.

More info on the wooden enclosure:

The wooden enclosure was custom built for me according to my specs by an Applefritter member who lives in Montana / USA. He is a true craftsman with a well equipped woodworking workshop and he listens and is very flexible (you could even specify Koa wood or other exotic woods, but may need to wait for these materials to arrive).

This enclosure was not cheap but it's worth every penny. It's true eye candy ;-)    . . . every guest in my house so far was totally stunned that a "vintage" computer can look like this.

I even did a Jedi mind trick telling them it's a real Apple-1 I bought for half a million dollars, and those in the know started to look at the date codes and were speechless. Of course, being a honest guy, I then told them it's a hoax. But this little experiment proves how far the art of making "fake" Apple-1 "originals" has progressed. I duly compensated my "victims" of this hoax by serving them a good dinner (I'm a good cook) with some excellent French wine and Champagne from my cellar. And we had a good laugh at the hoax. (Several high quality builds based on my IC kits are on display in computer museums worldwide, pretending to be an original).

Difficult to photograph !

Sorry that the photo above does not do this masterpiece of woodworking any justice. I don't have a professional photo studio and I use a Y1998 Toshiba PDR-M4 digital still camera (I have three of them). I'm not going to invest in a good mirror reflex digital camera because I know that I won't get any reasonable use out of it ... the dirty little secret about professional quality still photography is not the camera and lenses price, but the 10 x amount spent on the studio and the lighting systems. A few good "daylight" floodlights can cost more than the camera - each. And you need several of them to avoid shadows. Even professional movie productions rent their lighting equipment because it's so heinously expensive to own.

My philosophy is to either do it cheap, or, if I can't do it on the cheap, I do it with the best equipment money can buy. Anything in the middle typically turned out to be not good enough but still too expensive for what I can get as results for the extra expenses.

This conundrum always has been the dilemma for those who want professional quality results from anything. This rule even extends to lab instrumentation. Or to musical instruments. Or whatever.

The cheap solutions are one extreme but still might satisfy given the "bang for your buck".

The top notch solutions will always satisfy if the operator has the skill set.

But everything in between always is a compromise - so renting top notch equipment may be the better solution towards best results. But renting equipment needs a business case not found in our hobby.

Want more photos ?

So, sorry, you can't get better photos from me. But if you want more photos of the same poor quality, showing details, just comment, and ask for them. I will take them and post them when I have the time to do this. Maybe this inspires some Apple-1 builders to put their builds into similar wooden enclosures.

Comments invited !

- Uncle Bernie