Apple-1 ‘Celebration’ Motherboard Auction Hits $505K

An Apple-1 motherboard that is claimed to be one of the first ever produced is up for auction on CharityBuzz. Bidding for the board, said to be valued at $1 million, is at $505,000 at the time of this article.

AppleInsider:

The “Celebration” Apple-1 board previewed in July comes with the most complete documentation yet seen for the board, marketing materials, a period-correct power supply, an original cassette interface board, and early Apple Basic cassettes signed by early Apple employee and coder Daniel Kottke.

Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak says he believes that no other boards of this type were ever sold to the general public. While the board could likely be powered up successfully, appraiser Corey Cohen recommends against it in order to maintain the original configuration of the 40-year old antique.

Cohen says he believes the board is a prototype or experimental board, with higher quality components than later boards.

The “Celebration” Apple-1 is extremely rare not only because of the scarcity of Apple-1 computers, but according to Steve Wozniak, co-founder of Apple Computer, no known PCB boards of this type were ever sold to the public. At this time, this is the only known Apple-1 to show the signs of starting out as a blank original-run board and not part of the two known production runs, so this board appears to be unique from all other known Apple-1 boards.

It is believed that the original owner was an unnamed early employee of Apple. The first non- Apple owner acquired the motherboard in 1977, and the current owner took possession of the board on the year 2000 for a price of $18,000.

“Celebration” Apple-1 Items Included in Set

• Apple-1 Computer, copyright dated 1976 [15.5″ X 9″], from the first of the two runs of printed circuit boards
• 4K Byte RAM Expansion Memory (total of 8K)
• Cassette Interface Daughter Board [4″ X 2″]
• BASIC Program Cassette Tape [4″ X 2.5″]
• Star Trek and Blackjack Program Cassette Tape [4″ X 2.5″]
• All original manuals and fliers including:
  • Original Operation Manual with Schematics dated 3-10-76 and Warranty [8.5″ X 11″]
  • Original Preliminary Apple BASIC User’s Manual, dated October 1976 [8.5″ X 11″]
  • Original Cassette Interface Manual [8.5″ X 5.5″]
  • Original two-sided promotional flier on glossy magazine style paper introducing the Apple-1 Computer, described as, “…the first low cost microcomputer system…” [8.5″ X 11″]
  • Schematics on Archival Paper (These are the same as schematics as what appear in the Apple-1 Manual, but on white non-yellowed archival paper. They have been lightly folded, but otherwise are in pristine condition):
    • Processor Section schematic on archival paper, non-yellowed [17″ X 11″]
    • Terminal Section schematic on archival paper, non-yellowed [17″ X 11″]
    • Cassette Interface Section schematic on archival paper, non-yellowed Original Cassette Interface [17″ X 11″]
• Sales receipt from previous owner to current owner
• Notarized condition summary report for “Celebration” Apple-1 board by Corey Cohen (31 page written and photo authentication documentation of the system)
• Video record of Corey performing the authentication and evaluation of the “Celebration” Apple-1
• Professional detailed images of the “Celebration” Apple-1

The auction ends on August 25, with a minimum of 10% of the proceeds going to charity.