One of the great things about the retrocomputing hobby is that once your friends and family learn about your (admittedly slightly odd) habit, you will probably end up inheriting most or all of their computer stuff over the years. While it can also be a bit of a curse – no, Aunt May, I’m still not interested in that 486 that’s been mouldering in your closet for the past decade – if you advertise properly, you can end up with some neat stuff in your collection. This has definitely been the case for me, as donations from family, friends and friends of friends have padded out my storage space nicely.
Take, for instance, this set of three Apple /// systems, recently given to me for free, on the condition that their owner never sees them again. They’re all in pretty bad shape – none of them power up, keys are missing and they’re generally filthy – but I love a challenge. Now I know what I’ll be doing with whatever spare time the wife gives me over the next few days (or weeks, if they’re really bad). My intention is to cannibalize the three into a single, working unit.
So let’s get started, shall we? Here’s some pictures of the initial donation. Along with the CPUs, I was also given a milk crate full of external Apple /// floppy drives, an AppleColor Composite Monitor IIe and, strangely, a Microsoft Premium SoftCard //e. While the Z80 card won’t work in the ///, it should fit nicely in one of my needy IIe systems.
* There are more images, but apparently, WordPress limits the number you can insert in any given post. Anyway, stay tuned…
A Trio of ///'s
Yes, that's bird feces on the keys
Internal case corrosion
A milk crate of external floppy drives
This Apple /// has not aged well.
