December 25, 1977: Steve Wozniak spends the vacations constructing a prototype of the Disk II, the Apple II’s revolutionary floppy disk drive.
“I labored all day, all night time, via Christmas and New Yr’s making an attempt to get it completed,” Wozniak would later recall in his autobiography, iWoz. “[Early Apple employee] Randy Wiggington, who was truly attending Homestead Excessive, the varsity Steve and I had graduated from, helped me quite a bit on that undertaking.”
Wiggington takes December 25 off. Woz doesn’t.
Disk II: The top to an important yr for Steve Wozniak
1977 was an important yr for Woz, most likely the artistic spotlight of his profession. It began out with Apple formally incorporating as Apple Laptop Co. in January, with Wozniak and Steve Jobs listed as co-founders.
With enterprise funding behind them, Apple went on to debut the Apple II at April’s West Coast Laptop Faire, the San Francisco Bay Space’s first-ever private pc conference. The pc went on sale two months later in June, priced at $1,298 for a base unit — the equal of practically $6,600 in 2023.
The Apple II proved successful, bringing in $770,000 in income throughout its first yr. Nevertheless, the Disk II’s unbelievable significance can’t be overstated. It addressed the issue of lack of storage on the pc. It additionally offered a greater means for customers to retailer and entry packages and knowledge than the sluggish cassette tapes used on the time.
The floppy disk was nonetheless a comparatively new expertise. Invented within the early Seventies by IBM, the unique 8-inch floppies had been shrunk down to five 1/4 inches by Shugart Associates in 1976.
A decent deadline for constructing a floppy drive for the Apple II pc
Apple’s first investor (and eventual second CEO) Mike Markkula really useful that Wozniak construct a disk drive for the Apple II. He stated the accent would make the pc extra compelling to prospects. Markkula figured folks wished authentic causes to purchase an Apple II, slightly than simply the enjoyment of proudly owning a pc.
Woz wound up working over Christmas to complete the disk drive. Each he and Apple wished it prepared for the Client Electronics Present in January. Whereas Woz labored on the {hardware}, Wiggington helped develop the required software program to get the Disk II up and working.
Ultimately, the pair hit their tight deadline, and the drive went on sale the next June. The Disk II turned obscenely worthwhile for Apple. Its parts value simply $140, however the drive offered for $595. Even at that worth, it got here in as probably the most reasonably priced floppy disk drive offered by a pc firm.
Thanks partly to the Disk II, Apple introduced in $7.9 million in 1978, and a large $49 million the yr after that. Now, that’s a Christmas nicely spent!
Completely happy holidays, everybody!
