The computer, in working order and all the more rare because it has an exotic wood case, was estimated between $ 400,000 and $ 600,000 by the John Moran house, which organized the auction in Monrovia, near Los Angeles. .
An Apple-1 like this was sold for more than $ 900,000 in 2014 by the house of Bonhams.
The company founded by Steve Wozniak and Steve Jobs only built a total of 200 Apple-1s, all hand-assembled at Jobs, most of which sold at the time for $ 666.66.
According to expert Corey Cohen, interviewed by the Los Angeles Times newspaper, 60 Apple-1s have been identified to date but only 20 of them are still working.
The model is all the more original as it has an exotic wood case, the koa, native to the Hawaiian Islands.
There are only six known examples of Apple-1 with koa housing, according to the catalog of the house of John Moran.
In 1976, the Apple-1s were among the first models of personal computers already assembled (with the components already soldered on the motherboard in particular) but they were often sold without a case or keyboard.
The copy on sale Tuesday was bought at the time by a professor at Chaffey College.
He resold it in 1977 to one of his students, who has kept it to this day.
© 2021 AFP