Someone please explain to me why this listing is so high? http://www.ebay.com/itm/Apple-Lisa-1-0-Twiggy-Drive-Pair-/122383386508?hash=item1c7e9e478c:g:v0IAAOSwhlZYu2f5
I have seen the whole machine go for $30k but 18k so far for some nonworking Twiggy's. Anyway, I read some were that 11,000 of them were produced. I know a lot of them were recalled. But out of 11,000, I'm guessing there are a lot more examples of the computer, then have already surfaced. For example, how many of the Apple 1's survived? How many of the ventless Apple II's survived? If a similar percentage of the Apple 1's survived, then they would not be that rare. So, why do these drives command such a high price. The auction still has 6 days ago. If that's the case, we need to put together a search party and find the lot they buried years ago.
I've always thought it's due to a few things:
1. In terms of graphical capabilities, the Lisa was groundbreaking. The birth of the desktop metaphor (to the public) which still looks very similar to modern computers, I think, makes the Lisa seem intimately familiar to many.
2. The Lisa name and original design has gotten a lot of hype recently, especially due to the death of Steve Jobs and all the books/movies on him afterwards.
3. Twiggy drives are the only pieces of hardware that can read Twiggy disks, and no clones exist. For archivists especially with information on Twiggies, this is all they've got to transfer information off the disks.
4. The Lisa was a failure, and the Twiggies were largely responsible for this. With a company as big as Apple, people are naturally drawn to see where they messed up along the way to greatness. Couple this with the (increasing) rarity of Lisa 1 hardware, and the price goes up.
5. The similarity of the Lisa 2 and 1, especially the fact the former can be downgraded into the latter, contributes as well. "Building" a Lisa 1 out of a 2 is a longshot, but I imagine some people think they might be able to turn a profit doing so.
All in all, just speculation. Just wanted to weigh in on the issue :mac:
- fri0701
My opinion is the fact that these are 5.25 inch Drives
might be why he is asking so much. The Front Bezel
that he has for auction also has the slots for
5.25 inch Drives.
Just a guess.
Steven
Because some people have too much money, and not enough sense. I sincerely hope these end up in the hands of the aforementioned archivists and not someone that store them in a basement for the next 10 years while they appreciate in value. Ugh.
That's definitely the hope. I know the Computer History Museum in Mountain View fairly recently acquired a Lisa 1 for digitization purposes, and they've been doing some great work with it. It's a shame that can't be said for many of these computers, which as you mentioned end up being bought by some person who just puts it away waiting for it to increase in value.
It will be interesting to see how much the non-working drives end at. I could understand a little more the Apple Lisa 1 that came with all the original box's, which sold for around $15,000 a few years back. But this sale is for two nonworking drives. I don't get it.
Highly likely. It's just more junk that is appreciated by an extremely narrow subset of the population. Unlikely.
All the really important and meaningful works have already been copied or "preserved."
A narrow subset indeed. None of this means anything to 99% or more of the population of the world.
I wonder if the dirt and dust are original too? Ha!
And in 5 years from now a SINGLE drive will go for what two of them go for today.