Re: What`s an Apple II

[jlafitte@calvin.stemnet.nf.ca (Joseph Lafitte)]

 >Newsgroups: comp.sys.apple2
p >Path: 
p >coranto.ucs.mun.ca!nstn.ns.ca!fonorola!torn!nntp.cs.ubc.ca!newsxfer.itd
p >edu!gatech!swrinde!ihnp4.ucsd.edu!munnari.oz.au!bunyip.cc.uq.oz.au!harb
p >c.monash.edu.au!bruce.cs.monash.edu.au!labtam!philip
p >From: philip@labtam.oz.au (Philip Stephens)
p >Subject: Re: What's an Apple II
p >Message-ID: <1994May30.021100.23028@labtam.labtam.oz.au>
p >Sender: philip@labtam.labtam.oz.au (Philip Stephens)
p >Reply-To: philip@labtam.oz.au
p >Organization: Labtam Australia Pty. Ltd.
p >References: <aad1001-280594160746@131.111.200.1>
p >Date: Mon, 30 May 1994 02:11:00 GMT
p >Lines: 53

p >Alan Donovan writes:

>Could somebody please tell me what is the difference between an Apple 
>and other Apples (Macs, PowerMacs, Performas)?

p >  *Heh Heh*  It's funny, but I never thought it possible that someone
p >might not know what an Apple II is.  No offense meant to Alan, of cours

p >  Okay, a brief history lesson.  The Apple II was the computer that mad
p >Apple Inc. famous.  It bears no resemblance to a Macintosh in any shape
p >or form, and predated the first Macintosh by several years.  It was, as
p >I understand it, one of the first really popular personal computers.  I
p >is primitive by today's standards, but it was pretty impressive for it'
p >day.
p >  Apple Inc. created a number of different Apple II models over the yea
p >the Apple II+, Apple //e (e for "enhanced"), the Apple //c (c for "comp
p >Apple //c+, and most recently the Apple //GS (gs for "graphics and soun
p >Until a few months ago the Apple //e and Apple //GS were still in
p >production, but Apple Inc. finally decided to concentrate on the Macint
p >range instead.

p >  All Apple II's, excepting the Apple //GS, are 8-bit machines; the
p >Apple //GS is an 8/16-bit machine.  Out of the box they didn't offer mu
p >in the way of graphics and sound, and didn't run all that fast compared
p >to today's machines, but they had two big strengths:

p >  1. There was heaps of high-quality software available for them.
p >  2. They had 8 expansion slots for all manner of peripheral cards:
p >     printer cards, modem cards, sound cards, floppy drive cards,
p >     hard drive cards, RAM cards...to name just a few.

p >  None of the Apple II's, excepting the Apple //GS again, had a
p >Macintosh-like windows interface.  A version of BASIC called Applesoft
p >was built-in, but not much else.  The original disk operating system (D
p >was pretty primitive and could only handle 5.25" floppy disks formatted
p >to a whopping 140K!  ProDOS came later and could handle 3.5" floppys an
p >hard drives.  The Apple //GS started off with ProDOS 16 then migrated
p >to GS/OS.

p >  The Apple //GS is rather special in that it's kinda like a cross betw
p >an Apple II and a Macintosh, in that it runs all Apple II software, but
p >also has a Macintosh-like windows interface and toolbox in ROM.  But
p >internally it is nothing like a Macintosh, and most Apple //GS users
p >probably wouldn't want it to be compared to one :-)




p >-- 
p >=========== Philip Stephens, Systems Programmer, Labtam Australia =====
p >====== Owned by Motor (Mo for short), the power-purrer from Down Under 
p >=== DS (B+S)t Y 2 X L  W C+++ I T+++ A+ E H+++ S+ V+ F Q+ P++ B+ PA+ PL
p >"Many views yield the truth.  Therefore, be not alone." -- Viggies' Pri


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