Remember the Mac 128K prototype with the 5.25-inch ‘Twiggy’ drive? Our own Adam Rosen showed you the prototype in detail several months ago, and a model has now surfaced on eBay. The cost to own this piece of Apple history? $100,000. What’s even more interesting about this item is the seller. Looks like Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak might be cleaning out his closet.
Production Mac models used 3.5-inch 400k floppy disk drives, a format Apple largely introduced to the world. This pre-production system used the proprietary Apple Twiggy 5.25-inch disk format, which was notoriously unreliable and eventually shelved in the Lisa 2 in favor of 3.5-inch disks. No shipping Macs were ever released using 5.25-inch internal disk drives.
He says he has the only completed Twiggy drive machine in existence, and considering his history with Apple, he’s probably right. He says, “The computer and keyboard are authentic and original, dated 1982-83.” Plenty of pictures are attached to the posting, including a copy of the patent for the Mac’s housing shell. Like all 128K and 512K Macs, the original Macintosh team’s signatures are emblazoned on the inside mold of the computer’s shell.
Bidding starts at $99,995.00. It will be interesting to see how quickly this thing gets snatched up. We’ve reached out to Woz for comment.
Update: After further investigation, this eBay seller appears to be Woz, but there’s a chance it could be a faker. The location of the seller says Canada, and Woz did attend school in Canada for a time, but we’re waiting to hear back from the seller and/or Woz. Hang tight.
Update 2: Whoever the seller is, looks like he has quite the closet to clean out.
Update 3: No Woz here, folks. Move along.
[Story developing… check back for updates]
