Need some info on "Darth Vader" Apple

[rocketusa@delphi.com]

Hi. I picked up my first-ever Bell & Howell black Apple and am very
proud of it and probably annoyed my wife like crazy tonight, as it came
in today, and she was watching Temptation Island and I preferred to toy
with the computer than the scatily-clad chicks on TV.

Anyway, I got this one "as-is" off ebay as the seller took a lousy
picture, had no clue what it was and mislisted it. So I happened upon
it for under $50 and the seller lives in the same state, so postage was
really low.

The thing looks fantastic -- probably in the top five percent of Bell &
Howells, as these were in schools and kids usually beat on them. And it
works great, it seems!

It was a pain to get open, as a big screw with a star-shaped
indentation (thank god I had that little attachment to my socket screw
driver that I thought I'd never use) was holding the lid on. This was
to keep kids out, as the Bell & Howell Apple was the Cupertino
company's big break, giving them a headway into schools where Apple
would rule until about the time they dumped the II line in the
early '90s (I'm still mad). A weird thing: Once I got the lid off it
wouldn't power up until I screwed the screw back in. It must've somehow
been related to the power supply.

So the Darth Vader Apple was booting up okay, but wasn't working with
the black disk drive all that well. I pulled out a card called Apple
Rom Card (which had a big red switch on it that didn't seem to do much)
and rebooted and Donkey Kong started up in full grandeur from the
drive. The inside was the cleanest I've seen of any plug-n-play Apple,
as this may not have been opened since 1979 -- it was like being the
first to open King Tut's tomb.

There are some big aesthetic differences between this and the regular
II plus's I've had, besides the black color -- that I love so much more
than that puke green old Apples sometimes turn into. The keyboard is
already modified to type lower case. There's a strange couple of ports
that run along the right-hand side titled Game Paddles, but they have
strange female connectors that resemble the IIc printer port. Along the
back of the unit on this one is a whole doo-dad that takes up all of
the back panel. There are three input RCA type jacks, three volume
controls, headphone and earphone holes, two fiber-optic-looking video
output jacks, two power buttons and three outlets to plug in other
computers, printers, etc.

While Donkey Kong SEEMED to play fine, I have no way to confirm it as I
couldn't find anything in the house that resembles the video output
plugs. It wouldn't hook to a TV cable, videogame plug, AV cord or RCA
jack.

Because of the condition of the computer, I'm assuming it wasn't used
by kids but rather a teacher and he/she hooked it up to a big monitor
of some sort for the whole class to see. I will take pictures soon and
make a little webpage. If you're interested in seeing them, send me an
e-mail. If anyone has any input on the above please let me know --
especially about finding a way to attach a monitor.

While I'd love to keep it, chances are I'll probably have fun with it
for awhile then ship it to some guy in Japan willing to pay $400-500
plus postage. That's the too sad reality of being a vintage computer
rescuer. ... That's the heartless reseller that ebay has made me ...
Eight, Five, two years ago people thought I was nuts for picking up all
this old equipment and ... now ... well, now they still think so ...

Darren
http://bouncepass.com






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