Apple III Mainly Neat Stuff --> Apple II and Apple III --> Apple III
Apple III Just a few pictures and words about my Apple III system -- probably the least loved computer that Apple have ever made. I can't even find any consistent manufacturing dates for it...
The hardware is a development from the original Apple II series, retaining the 8 bit 6502 processor but speeding it up a bit. Unlike the Apple II or original IBM PC where you bought a computer and had to buy a floppy drive, disk controller card, 80 column card, serial card and parallel card to make it useful, the Apple III had all of the basic functionality built-in. The Apple III was essentially a system for the business user and Apple expected that users would invest in a Profile hard disk. Take a deep breath before you scroll down to look at the prices.
Significant features included:
The full specification is available from Apple Tech Info Library Article ID 6950.
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May 1982 UK prices: |
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Basic Apple III plus (monochrome) Monitor III |
£2,545 |
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Second floppy drive |
£385 |
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5Mb Profile hard disk |
£2,256 |
The
Profile drive was designed for Apple's business oriented systems --
the Apple III and the Lisa -- although it will also work with the
Apple II. The Apple II and III require adapter cards which are quite
difficult to obtain; the Lisa has a built-in Profile interface and
can access more than one Profile if it is fitted with the parallel
expansion card.
Click on the thumbnail image (left) to see what is inside the
drive case.
The
Apple III also had a new disk operating system, SOS, which officially
stood for Sophisticated Operating System. Click on the thumbnail of
the disk set (left) to view the larger image.
Note the supplementary disks for Apple II Emulation and for Business Basic. Variations in Basic and different Apple operating systems between the Apple II and III complicated the porting of programs. Apple II Emulation was limited and many programs, particularly games, would not run in this mode. This gave birth to add-in cards from Titan Technologies to provide more complete Apple II+ and IIe emulation.
The reverse of the SOS disk jacket has a neat profile view of the
Apple III base unit.
For basic office tasks, the Apple III is actually quite a nice computer to use. I don't have a great deal of Apple III software but Three EZ Pieces -- an integrated package with word processor, spreadsheet and database -- is pretty handy. This package was developed into AppleWorks for the Apple II family and many enthusiasts continue to write add-ons for it. The AppleWorks name lives on with new iMacs being supplied with an integrated package of that name (formerly Claris Works).
The Washington Apple Pi group maintains a library of software and support resources for the Apple III at http://www.wap.org/. UK readers with any spare Apple III hardware or software are encouraged to get in touch with me.
Copyright information: If you wish to use any images on these pages, please contact the author, Phil Beesley on beesley@mandrake.demon.co.uk.