Re: WTB: Apple II clones

[Patrick Schaefer <patrick.schaefer@topmail.de>]

Ernest schrieb:
> 
> I'm interested in Apple II clones, and I'll pay resonable prices for unusual
> systems.

There is one: 
http://cgi.ebay.de/aw-cgi/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=1228637848

Apple II clones like this were very common in Europe - in the 80s 60% of
the "Apples" in use were clones.  You could buy such a machine for 1/3
of the price you had to pay for a real ][plus or IIe.

Two kinds of mainboards were imported from Taiwan: a 48k board, similar
to Apple ][ Rev.7 non-RFI, and a 64k board which used 4164 RAM chips and
had a built-in language card and Z80 Softcard.

There mainboards were mounted in different cases (Apple-style, XT-style,
19" rackmount etc.) by nearly a million garage hardware dealers and
everybody wrote his own label on it: "Orange II", Birne II", "Computer"
"SCA-II", "Telstar", "LASAR" etc. Mine was a "MEWA-64".


Only a few Apple clones are really interesting. The Laser 128, the
Bell&Howell ][plus. These are rather common in the US, but were never
sold in Europe. 
The BASIS-108 was a great machine, 256k, Z80, 80col and a few ports were
built-in, and still five slots available! These guys did more
bankswitching than the Apple //cplus designers believed to be possible.
IBS made heavy-duty Apple clones. The Space-84 (?) mainboard was
functionally compatible to the ][plus, but used VME-style sockets
instead of the shaky pcb slots. Other machines were designed for 19"
rackmount operation with a passive backplane. A complete ][ system with
a few additional features in a 3"x4"x6" box!


Patrick