Volume I
Before the Mac
Apple's professional ambitions before the Macintosh — two bold machines that tried to define personal computing and failed, yet gave birth to everything that followed.
The Failed Professional
The Narrative
Apple's first attempt at a serious business machine became a cautionary tale about engineering by committee. The Apple III arrived in 1980 promising to conquer the corporate world — and nearly killed the company instead.
Osorne One
Osborne • 1981
Released the same year as the Apple III, the Osborne 1 was the world's first commercially successful portable computer. At 24 pounds, "portable" was optimistic — but it proved the market existed.
Apple III
RareApple • 1980
Apple's first attempt at a serious business machine — and a cautionary tale about what happens when a CEO overrules the engineers. Over 14,000 were recalled at launch to fix chips that literally popped out of their sockets. Steve Wozniak's original design was deemed 'too cheap.' The result nearly killed the company.
Disk III
RareApple • 1980
Apple's proprietary floppy for the III. Used a novel single-sided format that was incompatible with the Apple II drives already in the field — customers couldn't easily migrate, and software vendors had to choose a side.
Apple Monitor III
Apple • 1980
The dedicated display for the Apple III, released alongside it in 1980. Designed specifically for the III's text-heavy business use case with a green phosphor screen optimized for long viewing sessions.
The Mother of the Macintosh
The Lisa cost $9,995 in 1983. It sold fewer than 10,000 units. And yet every interaction model you use on a computer today traces back to this machine — the first commercial PC with a real graphical interface.
Apple Lisa 2/10
Very RareApple • 1983
The Lisa cost $9,995 in 1983 — over $30,000 today. It was the first commercial personal computer with a true graphical interface. Apple sold fewer than 10,000. This machine was dead when acquired in 2023; two years of work later, it runs perfectly. Recapped PSU and video board, restored keyboard, 32GB ESProfile emulator.
Apple ProFile Drive
RareApple • 1982
The ProFile was Apple's first hard disk — 5 megabytes for $3,499. It connected via a parallel interface Apple invented specifically for the Lisa. Storage was so exotic in 1982 that the manual had a chapter explaining what a hard disk was.