The Apple II was Apple’s first mainstream computer. It was relatively-capable compared to contemporary computers, but it wasn’t very cheap.
kagis
www.apple2history.org/…/the-competition-part-2/
Regarding the early systems that I profiled: First of all, each of these other systems were distinct from the original Apple II primarily because they were targeted at a lower price point than the Apple II. The Apple II with 4K sold for nearly $1300; that is about twice the cost of the two competitors that were released the same year (the TRS-80 and the PET). The same applies to the systems released over the next five years as I outlined above; they sold for a low of $299 (VIC-20) and a high of $999 (Atari 800). This was a disadvantage to those who wanted an Apple, but may have legitimized it as a more serious computer.
$1,300 would be $6,747.56 in 2204 dollars.
The Lisa was considerably more expensive:
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_Lisa
Introductory price: US$9,995 (equivalent to $30,600 in 2023)
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macintosh_128K
The Mac 128k (the first Mac model) wasn’t too cheap either:
Introductory price: US$2,495 (equivalent to $7,300 in 2023)
chaosCruiser@futurology.today 3 weeks ago
Apple was in serious financial trouble, and pivoted to manufacturing premium products instead. Apparently this shift in strategy worked, since the company is still here.
ZILtoid1991@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
And unfortunately, that shift affected all other manufacturers through copying.
A lot if entry-level or mid-range product are now trying to emulate the look and feel of high-end products at best, and outright disappeared at worst and replaced with other “lifestyle” products. My bluetooth keyboard has silver-painted plastic to make it look like it was made out of aluminium, and ironically is more durable than Apple’s own offerings at the fraction of the price.
A lot of entry-level and mid-range home audio stuff was mostly replaced with Bluetooth speakers, or with soundbars. I’ve never heard a Bluetooth speaker sound as good as non-wireless offerings, all of them sounded horribly artificial, with an EQ that couldn’t be turned off, but would be enough for convincing regular people into it “having bass”. Soundbars, while being way above your average TV speakers, cannot really replace discrete speaker setups, but are better at not upsetting housewives with severe cablephobia.
chaosCruiser@futurology.today 3 weeks ago
Speaking is copying, soon after the iMac became popular, everyone was making iThis and iThat products. That was just hilarious!
then_three_more@lemmy.world 3 weeks ago
$3,000,000,000,000 understatement.