Apple 1 sells for $212,267

KitGuru reported last week that one of the first Apple computers ever built was being auctioned and many will be surprised to hear that it sold for a wallet sapping $212,267.

The Apple 1 was sold for $666.66 when it first shipped in 1976 and it came with a preassembled motherboard, a massive selling point in the days of hobbyist computer kits. 200 of them were built and shipped and only 50 survive today. The $666.66 asking price might sound evil, but it was choosen simply to create a 33 percent markup on the $500 wholesale price.

Italian magnate Marco Boglione won the auction. “It's a very nice representative example,” says Sellam Ismail, of Livermore, who founded the Vintage Computer Festival. “It's probably one of the most complete, and in good condition, that I've ever come across.”

The computer comes with 8 kilobytes of memory and a cassette interface for storage, which many people here might remember if they owned a Spectrum or Commodore system when they were kids.

For the same price Marco could have bought 425 iPads, however as he now owns a piece of computer history I doubt it matters to him.

KitGuru says: Did Marco get a bargain?

Become a Patron!