Apple IIC Plus

The Apple IIc+ occupies an odd spot in history. It represents the final iteration of the Apple II, and a slightly modernized twist on the portable Apple IIc (while shedding some of the portability that came with having an external power supply that could be replaced with a battery pack), increasing the clock speed and swapping out the 5.25″ floppy for a 3.5″. I’m not sure who the market was for this machine, since the Mac was well entrenched by this point (it even shares a naming convention with the Mac Plus, released the previous year). I guess it was kind of a swan song to the fans.

Cosmetically, I think its the most beautiful of the Apple IIs — already in a sleek design, the matching keyboard made the whole thing look more cohesive. Having a more accessible floppy disk format (and the fact that it could boot from either the internal drive or an external one) is nice when doing a restoration, but was probably frustrating for users at the time since most Apple II software came in the older format. The clock speed is a similar trade-off: yes its faster, but so much faster that lots of games don’t work properly.

I bought this unit from a Goodwill auction, missing the “2” key and the Apple logo. Apple Rescue of Denver had a 2 key from a standard Apple IIc that was a little off-color, but physically fit; they did not have the Apple logo. Everything worked when it arrived, and it was in excellent physical condition. It needed only a short, heavily diluted retro-bright bath, and some cleaning between the keys.

I re-capped the internal power supply, and cleaned the floppy drive. I got to play with MouseDesk on this unit, using a Floppy Emu and a mouse from my Mac Plus, but otherwise, could find no long term use case. The sale price will put me ahead, after parts, fees and shipping — but only on this one project. The surplus will immediately be applied to my NextStation restoration effort… those parts are expensive!

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