An extremely rare Apple-1 computer, first produced in the 1970s, was recently auctioned off for a whopping $500,000.
The Apple-1 purchased at auction for half a million dollars is one of only six made with a Koa wood case. Only 200 Apple-1s were made in all, with 175 of them selling for the uncanny price of $666.66, which Apple cofounder Steve Wozniak devised in his head to pay respect to his love of repeating numbers. To add to the scarcity, Paul Terrell, owner of ByteShop in Mountain View, California, purchased 50 of them.
The antique Apple computer sold at auction includes a Datanetics keyboard, an Apple-1 power supply, a Panasonic monitor, and all of the original items that came with the computer, such as a programming manual.
According to the auction listing by John Moran Auctioneers, this Apple-1 computer was originally purchased for an unknown price by an electronics professor at Chaffey College.
Later, the professor sold the Apple-1 to one of his students for $650, which seems ridiculously low for an Apple product. However, $650 in 1977 is equivalent to $2,966.71 in 2021.
Prior to the auction, Corey Cohen, an Apple-1 expert, told the Los Angeles Times why the historic computer was causing such a stir. “This is something of a holy grail for enthusiasts of antique electronics and computer technology… That makes it really exciting for a lot of folks.”
The Apple-1’s popularity recently skyrocketed after an eBay listing for another authentic wood case model received 12 watchers in 24 hours, but this time the Apple-1 is listed for $1.5 million. Even though that model costs a million dollars more, it has over 2,300 watchers on eBay, indicating that enthusiasts are still very interested.
This isn’t the first time an Apple-1 has been auctioned off for an astronomical sum; in 2014, an Apple-1 motherboard with a keyboard and power supply for more than $900,000, although it didn’t come fully completed.