Cashing In On Antique Computers

mwillems writes: "The Economist posts this story this week about how old computer hardware can be worth money. At the Vintage Computer Festival East, a lot of old hardware was seen, swapped and admired. An industry is emerging, it seems: an Apple One apparently fetched $25,000 at auction. Time to dust off my Ohio Scientific OSI Challenger 4-p!" These festivals sounds like a lot of fun -- can anyone offer some first-hand reports from the Boston one? Hmm. The local thriftstore has a working Mac IIci for $1.98 -- maybe I should put it on eBay as a collectable.

Comments

Old keyboards

[Mike Schiraldi]

I'd pay big bucks for an old IBM AT keyboard in good condition.. I still have my IBM PC XT's keyboard even though it unfortunately won't work with modern computers (though the very next generation IBM made, the aforementioned AT keyboard, is very similar and does work with modern machines)

You know these things:

• good solid click when you type
  
• the ` key next to the ' key
  
• the \ key on the left, mirroring the / key
  
• the * key near the ., so it was easy to type stuff like "*.txt"
  
• Ctrl on the left, Caps Lock way the fuck out of the way where you could never accidentally hit it
  
• Esc next to 1
  
• Function keys on the left
  
• Only one set of arrow keys
  
• A gigantic spacebar that goes all the way from Alt (which is where Left Ctrl is on modern keyboards) to Caps Lock (which is where Right Ctrl is nowadays)
  
• Oh, that wonderful solid click when you type. I have to mention it again.
  

Re:Old keyboards

[Mike Schiraldi]

Wait.. You think the lower left corner is great for Ctrl, since you can hold it down easily, but it's an awkward place for Meta?

Re:Old keyboards

[Mike Schiraldi]

Funny you should mention that .. in lieu of an old IBM keyboard, i use a Gateway Anykey. One of the ones that actually has a right Ctrl (the newer ones don't; they decided that a second windows button was more important than right ctrl) but not one of the really old ones, where you could just press Program Macro instead of Ctrl-Program Macro.

Re:Old keyboards

[Mike Schiraldi]

I appreciate that a lot of people have been replying by email and pointing me to places like this, but these are much later models. Note the function keys on top, ESC floating by itself in the corner, backslash up on top, two sets of arrow keys, caps lock on the left, and backtick far from fronttick.

If only the Happy Hacking people would take notice of how great the old layout was.. Maybe i should send them my XT keyboard.

Re:Old keyboards

[spudnic]

Heh, my keyboard isn't one of the originals, but it is pretty old and I just love the way it feels. It's still got a "WordPerfect for IBM Personal Computers" keyboard template stuck to the top of it.

I like my neighbors to hear me when I type!

Re:Old keyboards

[Ed Avis]

I'd pay big bucks for an old IBM AT keyboard in good condition.. I still have my IBM PC XT's keyboard even though it unfortunately won't work with modern computers (though the very next generation IBM made, the aforementioned AT keyboard, is very similar and does work with modern machines)

I believe that although the connector (5-pin DIN) looks similar, the electronics are completely different. It's a real pity that nobody makes XT-to-AT convertors (or if they did once get made, that they're no longer available).

You know these things:
good solid click when you type

Well lots of keyboards will give you a solid click, for example the various IBM PS/2 keyboards. which are what I use most of the time. The difference with the XT is the _metallic_, ringing echo you get after hitting each key... it sounds almost like a futuristic typewriter :-).

the ` key next to the ' key

Strange... I have a couple of XT keyboards here which have no backtick character at all. Oh, I know why, they're the UK version (livre sign on Shift-3). BTW the ` and ' are not symmetric characters in modern character sets, so it's arguably a misfeature to make them look like they are (unless you use TeX a lot). I don't know whether the PC-XT had them as left and right quote characters or as backtick and upright quote.

the \ key on the left, mirroring the / key

My PS/2 keyboards and clone keyboards still have this. Again this must be due to the British keyboard layout, which I believe is a variant on the general 'International' PS/2 layout. (At first I was annoyed that adding one currency symbol to the keyboard should cause several other things to move about randomly, but there are some redeeming features like the bigger Enter key. I wonder whether the 'US International' keyboard layout has these things. The Acorn Archimedes keyboard is an example of how to include a pound sign without screwing about with the location of other keys.)

the * key near the ., so it was easy to type stuff like "*.txt"

Again, my XT keyboard doesn't have this; * is on Shift-8 just as on modern keyboards.

Ctrl on the left, Caps Lock way the fuck out of the way where you could never accidentally hit it

Actually, for Emacs use I think I probably prefer Ctrl in the corner, so you can hold it down with your little finger and tap out X C, X S, or whatever. Holding down the key to the left of A feels more awkward.

Esc next to 1

Of course what's really needed is *zero* next to one...

A gigantic spacebar that goes all the way from Alt (which is where Left Ctrl is on modern keyboards)

Again, this is a bit awkward for use as a Meta key in Emacs. But I agree, the big spacebar is cool.

Re:Old keyboards

[mjflory]

Look around for a Northgate keyboard... I think they were made by the same folks who made the IBMs, and they have the same feel, plus extensive programmability in some models. They had a female PS/2 port on the keyboard and a cable that went to an AT connector. Just substitute a male-male PS/2 cable (the kind used with multiple-PC KVM switch boxes) and hook it up to your new PC. I forget just where all the keys are, but they did have models with the F-keys on the left. They are invaluable for anyone still using WordPerfect for DOS. (YES, it's still in use.) Our lab heads, a husband-and-wife team, still use their twin Northgates with XyWrite II!

is there a place...

[Kwantus]

... to get a paper-tape reader/punch without going broke? The what I can find is about $500 and I can't afford that just now. (I have a few TeX files I want to put on a long-life medium.)

I'm still too sentimental to my C64 to sell it :)

Re:is there a place...

[dario_moreno]

I suppose you have a printer...just print those files with a large Courier font, in case everything goes wrong, you can always OCR them with on my opinion the same reliability as paper tape readers from the fifties. Darn cheap and durable backup for, say, less than 100 kb

Virtual Antiques

[sstaton]

The oddest thing about collectible computers is how many are emulated on existing platforms. This, in effect, makes ancient computers more readily accessable by the average person than any other kind of antique (other than the words/images from ancient books). The box shouldn't matter; Apple II emulators are a darnsight easier to use than the physical machine.

But, there is something special about booting an Apple II+ when it was the one of few personal computers you could actually handle in 1980. I had an OSI C2-4P, and access to HP 67 and Apple II/II+. I'd love to reaquaint myself with these old slugs. It'd be fun to have a glass extension on my home where I keep them on display but away from my scrappy teenage son and his clever, trickster friend Ferris. I'd hate for anyone to actually turn them on and burn them out ...

Show me the money!

[bryan1945]

I got an original Mac from work, it was buried way back in the corner of a closet. Only problem is that the CRT is burnt out. I wonder if this could be worth any money in the future?

I'm guessing that my 286 clone won't be getting any money any time soon, though. Bummer.

Re:Show me the money!

[hqm]

The CRT usually stopped working because a big capacitor in the drive circuit on the board blew out, you can often just replace this.

I have a barrel of RDRAM, soon to be a collectible

[Mustang Matt]

Get yours while it's hot!

Collectible?

[sakusha]

I have to laugh when I hear people saving Mac SEs and Stinkpads, thinking they'll become collectible. Not a chance in the world. These were mass produced by the hundreds of thousands, and have zero chance of becoming collectible. Scarcity means value, and these machines are too plentiful to be worth anything even as salvage.
On the other hand, I own a Sol-20, which is a true collectible. Now I just wish I could find a buyer, since it is supposedly now worth around $1000-1500.

Re:Collectible?

[spudnic]

So if someone manages to hang onto a Mac SE for say, 125 years, you don't think that some museum would be interested?

Everything will have value to someone if you keep it long enough (except maybe food ;).

Let's not forget CARDIAC

[ebh]

Bell Labs' CARDboard Illustrative Aid to Computing, where you got to be the CPU and the program counter was a bug. I used one for the first time in the late 60's or so, and I still have it.

Antiques of the future.

[Kris_J]

I just rescued an injured Goldstar 3DO from a swap-meet today. (The problem is the cable that connects to the CD drive/tray -- it isn't there at all, I'm looking for a replacement.) I bought a Sega Saturn a couple of weeks back. There are a bunch of decent little decks of the same vintage that suffered more from bad marketing and a depressed market than from any technical problems. These devices that quickly sank without a trace in a saturated market are the vintage computers of 2020. And they're fun to collect and repair now.

sorry, not collectible

[jchristopher]

The local thriftstore has a working Mac IIci for $1.98 -- maybe I should put it on eBay as a collectable.

Seeing as eBay already has a shitload of IIci's for $9.99 (with 0 bids!), I wouldn't exactly call a IIci 'collectible'. They made FAR too many of these for them to ever be of any value due to scarcity.

Buying and Selling...

[Mike1024]

Hey,

The local thriftstore has a working Mac IIci for $1.98 -- maybe I should put it on eBay as a collectable.

Ebay has a Sinclair ZX Spectrum or two for £2.99... maybe I should buy one and put it on ebay as a collectable.

Hold on, there's something wrong with this plan...

Michael

I've been collecting for a number of years now

[Simon Brooke]

There are an aweful lot of machines which were produced for quite short periods or in quite small numbers in the seventies and eighties; many of them were of interesting or influential design. I started actually hunting for specific machines to add to my collection about five years ago. Some of my machines have been tracked down through contacts, some have been donated by friends, one or two have come through interested antique dealers. But the majority now come through eBay.

I believe these old machines are important parts of our history. They are certainly rare and there aren't going to be any more produced, so they may well be good investments. But if we, as geeks, don't conserve our own history no-one else is going to.

Oh, first post, by the way.

Woz

[blair1q]

A few months ago, one of the local Silly Valley school districts (Los Altos, iirc) Yahoo-auctioned off a working Apple I, signed by Steve Wozniak, complete with a picture of the Woz signing it.

It went for $350.

I didn't buy it.

--Blair
"D'oh!"

Re:Woz

[RumbaFlex]

Would it have gone for $400 if it hadn't been signed?

Re:Woz

[driehuis]

I still have an original MacPlus at home. I still feel it is So Cool to have all those signatures cast inside the casing that I just couldn't get myself to ditching the thing.

It's been years since I opened the thing, but I remember going through them with friends and trying to make out the individual signatures.

Really, anyone who has not seen Waynes World should not be taking part in this discussions.

Oddly valuable items....

[HamNRye]

I have long been a collector of old computer equipment. Not in the as a hobby thing, it just seems to keep piling up. I was selling alot of it on e-bay and found this:

Old (I mean pre 1975) monitors are at a premium. Many of these exhibits have working machines, but no terminals or monitors. (Note: This means you'll get up to 1,000 or so for verrrrrry rare ones.)(Yeah, it ain't much, but it ain't a kick in the teeth either.)

Anyone still got an Altair?? Some of the old Commodores? Nostalgia carries a premium.

Oddly enough on a side note, I sold 8 PDP7's, with terminals and keyboards (To the tune of 48 working sets) and only got 300$ And noone even wanted the old Sun INP. (SunOS 3.5 not good enough?) Heck, that thing even has an Apple I model processor from Motorolla.

I have also had good luck with front bezels and name plates in good condition, power supplies, etc...

Finally, the expansion boards. There things sold for 5K and up initially, and will still go for that if you're paitent. Post a web page with all of the names and model numbers and a contact addy. Someone will search the net and hit your page and buy that board. I have sold video boards for 8K, comm and memory boards have gone for as high as 12K.

I find that the old washing machine hard drives aren't worth the shipping, so strip em and sell off the parts. Same for most other large equipment.

Now, would anyone like to place a bid on 25 IBM 8585 models?? Featuring a 386/25 processor and a full 4MB of Ram... I think they'd make great doorstops. (Unless you already have an Apple IIci)

~Hammy

Re:Oddly valuable items....

[leereyno]

Apple I processor from Motorola?

The Apple I used a MOS 6502, just like the Apple II/II+/III and early IIe's and IIc's did. Later IIe's and IIc's used the 65c02 and the IIgs used the 65816.

The chip that you're actually thinking of is the Motorola 68000, which was used in many different systems including the early macs, Amigas, Atari ST's, etc. etc. as well as the Sun box you've got.

The 6502 was indirectly derived from the architecture of the Motorola 6800 (note 2 zero's, not three) whereas the 68000 was inspired by DEC's VAX architecture.

Re:Oddly valuable items....

[RainbowSix]

Finally, the expansion boards. There things sold for 5K and up initially, and will still go for that if you're paitent. Post a web page with all of the names and model numbers and a contact addy. Someone will search the net and hit your page and buy that board. I have sold video boards for 8K, comm and memory boards have gone for as high as 12K.

WHAT! HOLY SHIT! I've been breaking these things with baseball bats!!

Apple Never Changes

[Anonymous Coward]

an Apple One apparently fetched $25,000 at auction

See, twenty million years after it's introduction and it's still OVERPRICED UNDERPOWERED JUNK.

AMD FOREVER!!

Re:Apple Never Changes

[leereyno]

You're thinking of the computers that Steve Jobs takes credit for creating, the Macs. You are right, they are overpriced and underpowered. I wouldn't call them junk, because most are well made from an engineering standpoint (hardware that is).

The Apple II series on the other hand, were wonderful computers. I've still got the II+ that I got way back in 1978. It's in my closet, wrapped up in plastic, but it still works. The II's were great because they were an open architecture (unlike the macintoy) and anyone could create accessories and cards for them. I remember back in the late 80's my high school had a IIe with a SCSI hard drive and CDROM, not bad for a design originally created back when Starsky and Hutch was still on the air. It didn't have internet access, but who did in 1987?

In many ways the modern PC is an example of what can happen to a unimpressive platform that has enough money thrown at it. The original PC was no better than the Apple II. The first "five slot" pc shipped with 16 to 64k of memory, no hard drive,a mono text only video card (no bitmapped graphics), and a cassette interface of all things, the floppy drive for it held 160k and was an option. By the time the "eight slot" XT had come out a couple of years later floppies were standard, the motherboard could hold up to 640k, 4/16 color CGA graphics was available, a ten meg hard drive was a common option, and the floppies would do 360k. The platform continued to grow and expand from there because it was popular and IBM kept trying to improve their "branded" PC to keep up with the cloners.

So don't forget that your Athlon/PIII/P4 can trace its roots all the way back to a metal box with an 4.77Mhz 8088 processor and 16k of memory, which itself was influenced in no small way by the open architecture of the Apple II. The PC was a radical departure for IBM, up until then everything had been closed and proprietary and done in house as much as possible. With the PC they used off the shelf parts and created an open and viabrant design that hit the ground running, just like the Apple II did.

Lee

Thank You Slashdot

[SecretAsianMan]

With the Slashdot Effect you've now brought upon the classic computer market, the market will soon be gone thanks to everyone selling and no one buying. Thank you Slashdot.

I know we aren't supposed to post "me too", but...

[unitron]

I didn't see the weird stories, just the default home page, it wouldn't let me log in, wouldn't let me change the view on this story down to negative one. Did a google on Anne Tomlinson, to see what other sites might be discussing Slashdot problems and when I went to check non-cached geekazoid, got a page saying they're being DoS'ed.

Collecting Macs

[Brian Kendig]

I've got a collection of old Apple hardware -- prototypes of the Mac Plus and Mac II, an Apple II+ with Apple Computer Inc. asset tags on it, some Newtons, various Quadras, Macs with asset tags on them from Kaleida and Netscape (all obtained legally), et cetera. Most of what I have was donated for free by people who wanted to clear out garage space. I've cleaned it up, restored it to like-new condition, and put the operating system it shipped with back onto its hard disk.

If anyone out there is in the Orlando, Florida area, and you've got any old Mac stuff to get rid of or if you know of anyplace that's getting rid of old Apple equipment for cheap or free, please drop me a line! (The BEST place I've found for this sort of collecting is Weird Stuff, www.weirdstuff.com, but that's in Sunnyvale California.)

There was a wonderful coffee-table book published a few years ago titled 'AppleDesign: The Work of the Apple Industrial Design Group' which goes great with my collection; it really shows off the design talent behind these old computers.

These aint old computers...

[Lumpy]

Sorry, but I was messing around and making robots with my KIM-1 way before Apples came around. you could do more, you actually could interface the thing, and it spawned more creativity than any apple did in that time. Granted, the Apple was not sold as a hobbyiest computer (it was apple's nightmate to have people tinkering under the hood, while the KIM-1 told you how in the manual.) Sorry, if you want vintage home computers, you have to go farther back than apple.

Re:These aint old computers...

[DuranDuran]

Sorry, but I was messing around and making robots with my KIM-1 way before Apples came around.

You were lucky to have a KIM-1! When I were a lad, if we wanted to 'compute' something we had to use a boonch of stones sorted into piles. Lose one and all your calculations go to hell! No manual! No interface! Oh sure, it weren't a hobby computer, but it were a hobby computer to us!

But you try telling the young people of today that, and they won't believe you.

Re:VIntage Computer Festival East

[Tackhead]

> At the VCF east, I picked up a Radio Shack Model 100 for $40, including case and manual, a bunch of old Creative Computing Issues for $1, and an obscure Psygnosis game for the Amiga called "ORK", shrinkwrapped, for $10.

Yeah, in addition to drooling over the exhibits and expensive/rare stuff, I picked up some pretty cool stuff at VCF 4.0 last year. Lots of old software, hardware, and parts.

(Yes, this is another shameless plug for VCF 5.0, September 15-16th, in San Jose. Why wait until after it's over to read about it on Slashdot? ;) VCF East was the first time the VCF crew put on a show for the East Coast crowd, and it should grow over the next few years.

Meanwhile, for the Silicon Valley crowd, VCF 5.0 is also under the same roof as CA Extreme, a weekend of all the 80s arcade machines and prototypes you could imagine. Serious dr00l.

Home Computer Museum - Russian Home Computers

[Markmarkmark]

Ok, I'll admit that I collect old computers. I've even got a little site documenting my collection of 'home computers' (you remember, the little all-in-one console-style machines that hooked to a TV). I like these machines because they represent the original path 'home' computers were on before the incipient 'beige-dom' of PCs overwhelmed the market. These little guys were sold in department stores (you know, like furniture) and some featured quaint pictures on their packaging of housewives entering recipes into them (for storage on audio cassettes). Hmmm, those were the days.

Sure there are lots of common ones like the C64 and Ataris but there were dozens of different kinds of fascinating machines from less known manufacturers all around the world. What's cool is that many of them were so unique in terms of shape, design, peripherals and OS. I even have a couple of little home computers from Russia. While I have about 70 different machines now, there are lots that I don't yet have and have only heard of. I know there were many unique models made and sold in South America and Arabic countries in the eighties. I have one machine designed and built in Yugoslavia in the early '80's called the Pecom 64. It's based on an RCA 1802 processor.

You can see my collection at: www.homecomputermuseum.com. Stop by and drop me a line if you also collect these kinds of machines.

--- Mark

Old Computers

[humblecoder]

Actually, I've got a (small) collection of old computers. I do it mostly for the nostalgia factor. Most of the machines I have are things that I used to play around with when I was growing up during the 80's. I even got a working Atari 2600 with a whole slew of games. Playing Pitfall on that old thing brings back lots of fond memories!!

I wouldn't be surprised if the market for old tech toys takes off in a couple years. It seems like everything from my youth, from those metal lunch boxes to Star Wars action figures, is collectable nowadays. If I had only saved some of my junk...

If you are interested in buying old computers, don't bother with eBay. I found that most of the stuff on there is overpriced. You get the best deals from thrift stores, flea markets, Salvation Amry, etc. Also, being able to repair stuff really comes in handy. If you have a little bit of knowledge, you can turn a non-working computer into a working one without much effort.

Paper IS long term!

[mwillems]

I used to install telephone switches in the 80s, in the Libyan desert. These were loaded in 30 minutes using paper tape. I know what "pathcing" really means: the platic pastch tape you stick over incorrect holes or over breaks.

Point being, these things no doubt still run. Papertape is very durable in adverse conditions. Like deserts with sand storms and 120 F temperatures.

Erasing HD? Re:The more modern ones, though...

[joneshenry]

The only thing keeping me from donating an old HP 6170S is that I don't know what to do about erasing the HD. I'm using Sami Tolvanen's Eraser, a GPLed utility, but I'm still a little nervous. Of course there is the option of simply destroying the HD, but this particular monstrosity has a very flaky BIOS that somehow makes it extremely difficult to install new HDs.

only $25,000?

[GC]

Only a handful (yes, a handful) of Apple I's were ever made.

All of them had a motherboard made out of balsa - (yes balsawood!).

$25,000 - that is a very low price, considering the rarity of the object.

It would take Steve Wozinak twenty five seconds to sign all the produced models of the Apple I, so the fact that it was signed is pretty much neither here nor there.

Didn't want people tinkering around???

[leereyno]

Didn't want people tinkering around under the hood? Exsqueeze me? The original II and II+ shipped with shchematics and a complete dump of the roms. The case top popped right off and lets not forget the 8 expansion slots that Woz demanded the machine have.

It wasn't until the Mac came out that Apple took on the attitude that it didn't want you messing around inside the machine. You can thank old Steve Jobs for that nonsense.

Lee

I bet I can sell this.

[Mr_Icon]

I have a Russian PDP-11 clone called BK-0010-01. I got it in 1988 and it was one of the few consumer-level household microcomputers available in USSR. I learned my programming skills on that baby and my first computer language was therefore a beasty called "Focal". BK had a horking 32K RAM (16k video) and an LSI-11 processor (clone).

Still in working condition. :) I'd put it on e-bay, but I don't have it at hand -- it's over the ocean at my parents' house. Wonder how much cash "exotic hardware collectors" would give me for this...

What about Digi-Comp?

[dpilot]

Now THERE'S an old personal computer. I used to want one as a kid, back when I couldn't scrape up the $6.00 for one, and my parents thought that anything like that made of plastic and rubber bands wasn't worth getting for their son.

Re:What about Digi-Comp?

[cr0sh]

I actually saw one of these go up for sale on Ebay - the amazing thing was it was in "perfect" condition - the parts weren't even out of the plastic wrap. Let's just say it went for a bit more than $6.00...

On a side note - I have both of the "wired" computer Radio Shack used to sell in the day (you know, with the spring clips). One was just a wired computer, which when you flipped the switches, basically caused logic to light up lights under these plastic "window" things for answers. The other one you wired together, and programmed in assembler (using a hex keypad, with a single digit hex display and 8 leds - woohoo!). It apparently used some simple (4 bit?) microcontroller as the base CPU...

Re:Mac IIci

[ksheff]

The IIfx is supported by linux but not by NetBSD.

Re:Assertion Failed: Yuo!=Fagot

[No Tears In The End]

I remember a couple of years ago the guys at l0pht set up an Apple ][ web server, just because they could.

Hobbyists do many things more for the joy of doing it than for the practical application.

Piston heads often will spend FAR more time and money on a car to customize or restore it than they could ever make off of selling it when finished.

Gun Collectors will sometimes spend twice as much on a gun and the parts to customize it than that gun will ever be worth.

Geeks will do things the long, and hard way with the computer(s) only because they want to be able to say that "I did this". Even if it would have been cheaper, easier and faster to just buy it that way.

What's the big deal? If it makes you happy, go for it.