My Apple II Story: (the first 2 weeks)

[Sean Downs <s.downs77@gmail.com>]

	The story so far. It’s been 12 days since i’ve acquired my first Apple II. It’s been about three weeks since i’ve been interested in them. I’m missing one piece to connect it all together, and it’s gonna be at least 14 days until I can get it. All for the sake of writing, but it’s really for the distraction from doing. My Apple II story begins with other old crap, and the knowledge boredom that led me to the new old technology i’ll play with for what seems like, dare I say the word, Forever? (i’m referencing the song)
	I’m a an 80’s born, Southern Californian man. My loves are storytelling, computers, and basketball. I’ve made money to support myself with those loves too, the latter being the exception. I’ve used most every computer out there (school, friends, stores) with genuine experience with OS’ since 1992 (OS/2, Win 3.1 and up, System 7 & up, linux mandrake 7 only). I’ve mostly owned windows stuff, then I made the switch to Apple when they made the switch to Intel. They make a great computer and in 2006, making movies was my life plan. A Mac Pro was the only smart move to make. OS X was fast and reliable, and the computer Apple built was phenomenal. So,  I bought a Mac SE/30 about a year later and loved it. I used it as a writing computer. I loved the way it felt, the keyboard, the screen, the hum of the whole machine; it was a great feeling all around. Then it died. No one in San Diego knew who could help fix it, let alone fix it themselves. The internet being a too expensive option, I abandoned it. Now, I’m back. And this time around, I went even further.
	The Apple II just seemed to fit why I want an old computer. The main reason is I want a computer just for writing, that feels right. I used the Apple II in elementary school and was interested to look into them. Did an hour of read about two hours of video and boom. Computer Chronicles was what made my mind up. Within that hour, I found the listing on eBay that became my first Apple IIe (also, the first sign of reckless impatience). The bid was over on the 24th of May and I received it on the 31st. Inside the IIe, it came with a Super Serial Card, the 655-0101 disk controller, and the Apple 80 Col/64k Memory Expansion Card. Also it came with a Game Joystick. I hooked it up to my dell flatscreen with a composite input, and sure enough it turn on and I could load NORAD from the Apple II Game server (audio jack). Now I could get the peripherals.
	I bought a duodisk for 25 dollars. I had no 5.25 floppies, but I knew I would be getting some. Having tons of 3.5 floppies, I went onto the apple II wiki, read that with a SuperDrive controller you could attach the A9M0106 3.5 floppy (here’s where my impatience impacts me negatively), so I was excited, because now I could just get that and not have to worry about 5.25. So I purchased a working one for 18 dollars, received it, then found out the SuperDrive controller is different from the Super Serial Card, they weren’t the same thing. And with 5 or 10 minutes of reading, I found that out for certain. Weee. Fun mistake, not too big, but not too bright either. So, I picked up some 360k floppies, and am now stuck on finding the 19 to 25 pin. (Update, just waiting to get paid and I can get one, estimated time 2 to 3 weeks). Once I can confirm the DuoDisk I have work with the floppies, I can connect my Macbook Pro to the audio jack and bootstrap Dos 3.3 and Appleworks to disk.
	From there i’m not sure where to go. All I want as of right now is just to be able to open Appleworks and write to a document that can save to another disk. That goal is kind of blocking my vision for what else i could potentially do with the machine.. I’ve heard of NIC cards and people wanting to develop new software to connect to Google Apps. I’m really excited to get to know the community. When I found this newsgroup still active and thriving, it felt cool and i got the feeling i’m going to be coming for quite some time. I want to hear your stories too. If you have websites or blogs or just want to post to this forum, i’ll be reading and can’t wait to meet the lot of you in the coming months.
	Thanks for your help and support so far,
Sean Downs