[citation][nom]scannall[/nom]The C-64 really wasn't better. You couldn't add anything to it, where the Apple ][ had 7 expansion slots. The 1541 floppy drive on the Commodore was atrocious, and really expensive. At 2 floppy drives the Commodore lost its price advantage. Adding ram was easy on the Apple, not possible on the Commodore. Applied Engineering had very nice accelerator cards for the Apple. Nothing for Commodore. The Commodore wasn't horrible or anything. But it wasn't near as good, as was reflected in the price.[/citation] LOL!! You are funny! Couldn't add anything to it? I guess that is like todays notebook computers with only 3 USB ports... no way to ADD anything to those things as well.
Let's do some CORRECTIONS.
Yes, the apple IIe had 7 expansion slots... as the computer didn't have ANYTHING else! On the back, the ONLY thing it included was a horrible video out (monochrome in Europe), Audio in/out jacks for a TAPE drive, a joystick port and a power switch. Nothing ELSE! Either your Apple II had 3 slot openings to hang out ribbon cables or you had the 12 pop-out covers which a much cleaner design for ports and shit.
C=64 / C=128 included:
- 2 DB9 joystick ports:
- Expansion Port : for either games or a memory expander (rarely needed) or other things.
- User Port : for Modems usually or other RS232 requirements. Including 80Col display output.
- Cassette Port : For connecting to a tape drive, reliable than others. Also for Real Time Clock add-on.
- RGB Port : For 40 col display output with sound (Wow, a single cable for sound and video)
- Serial Port : For Floppy drives and printers through a daisy chain setup.
- RF Port : for connecting to the TV.
-- (C= 128 only) a 9-pin Video port for 80col display.
Even today, people are able to communicate to a C= 8bit computer with a USB cable from a PC.
AppleIIe:
(Ports stated above).... so you would need to add a card for:
1) - for SOUND output. Yes, the APPLEII had a speaker that made a few BEEPS, crappy for games or music.
2) - RGB color output
3) - 80COL output (optional)
4) - Floppy controller (you could buy drives without the controller... but that would be useless)
5) - modem
6) - Parallel card (for printers)
7) - RS-232 (for external modems and other devices)
8) - Mouse card
So for the BASE $1200 AppleII, you would still need to spend $$ to add the ability to use floppy drives or add a printer. The "color" output from the built-in connector was barely what someone would call color. For the C=64, it easily blew the Apple II away.
Lets talk about drive prices... As you said, the 1541 drives were expensive.
But in 1980, the Apple II drive with a controller (up to two drives supported per card) was $600. But that was a bit before my time... as I was a kid. So when I bought my 1541 clone drive, I paid $200 for it... but I found some incompatibilities with games and later bought the 1571 drive for $280 (1986 spring). At that time, the Apple Disk IIc Drive sold for $300 (Still a single-sided drive - that would plug directly into the AppleIIc or into the IIe with a controller card). SO WHERE do you get this expensive price from? Also you should consider that the C= 1541~1571 drives had their own power supplies and CPUs (6502)... so they could actually operate Independently from the computer.
AppleII drives = 114~140K
C= 1541 = 160K / 1571 = 320K * the 1571 drive was a LOT faster than the 1541 and more than twice the storage capacity... could read CP/M disks.
Okay, lets talk about 1985 pricing.
C-128 + two 1571 drives = $960 (included C=64 mode, CP/M mode, C=128 mode with 2Mhz CPU)
AppleIIc + 2nd Apple IIc drive = $1620 (1Mhz 128k)
While the IIc was far better than the IIe, it didn't need the slots because those features were built in, but emulated for compatibility as software would still LOOK for card 3 for example. Oh yeah, the Apple II slots were specific to function. You couldn't just put a card ANYWHERE. Some slots were for the video, others the RS232 or the PAR, etc. Since add-on cards were not needed, the IIc was easily cheaper than the IIe.
But in the end, the IIc was still just an AppleII with the same 1970s video and BEEP BEEP audio in a very sexy modern 1980s case and keyboard.
PS: Accelerator cards were made for the C64 & 128 for some reason as well... overall, not useful to any 8 bit computer. The fastest for the C64 was a 20mhz CPU that supported up to 16mb of RAM.
Check out what this guy did to a 1985/6 C=128: Modded and stuck it into a tower case, fully loaded.
http://www.amiga.org/forums/blog.php?b=177
Note: This C128 does have an IDE port on it, but is using a 4GB CF-Card instead. (Hell, thats far more than the 150MB HDs I have in my Amiga3000) - that link is from 2010.
PS2: By all means, the AppleII *IS* an important piece of computer history... it was out-dated by 1980 by Commodore and Atari 8bit computers which were cheaper. Keep in mind, inside every AppleII computer is the heartbeat of a Commodore CPU (CMOS 6502).