Re: Apple II info please...

[spec@vax2.concordia.ca (Mitchell Spector)]

In article "Clockmeister" <gerryvdb@tnet.com.au> writes...

>Here's my list of the most innovative home computers of the past, feel free
>to place where you feel the Apple II should be on my list...
> 
>1. Amiga --- First home computer to offer multimedia and true multitasking,
>ease of use, resource efficiency.
>2. Mac --- First GUI for home computers (or was it ?),  ease of use,
>quality.

    Well the Apple Lisa (a full year before the Mac 128) was the first
home computer to offer a GUI, though it was strongly the influence
that led to the creation of the Macintosh (the Mac 128 was basically a 
scaled down and more affordable version of the $10,000 Lisa).

>3. Commodore 64 --- Largest selling home computer ever (22 million +),
>software availability.
>4. Atari ST --- MIDI interface as standard.
> 
>Also ran... TRS-80, ZX Spectrum, BBC, Vic20, PET, C128, Acorn, MSX and
>others...
> 
>This is ofcourse my own personal opinion only and I think all computers
>ever made had something to offer (except maybe the Microbee :-).

    I would add the Apple II in that list, it being the computer that
started the whole home computer industry. It was also the first one to
offer color and high resolution graphics when it came out in the 70's.

    The Apple IIGS was the first machine to introduce professional
high-quality sound and music synthesis to personal computers. Each
one shipped with an Ensoniq DOC 5503 chip, with 32 oscillators and
64K of dedicated sound RAM. To the best of my knowledge, it was the
first personal computer to offer wavetable synthesis. 

    The GS was also the first computer to use the Apple GUI in color 
(though not the first color GUI necessarily) and the Apple Desktop 
Bus. It was also unique in that they shrunk most of the Apple IIe 
computer down to a single chip (the Mega II) to give make the IIGS 
fully backward compatible with previous Apple II machines (the Atari 
ST and Amiga were not compatible with the last generation of machines).

Mitchell Spector
spec@vax2.concordia.ca