Reborn Tech Maniac

Chapter 188 The Apple III Was Cast Away
Seeing Tang Huan leave, Robert thought he was discouraged and retreated, so he smiled complacently, "According to the current sales momentum of Apple III, Woz's Apple II can be retired in six months."

If Tang Huan heard this ignorant assertion, he would have to spit on the other party's face.

Don't look at the original Apple II of Woz, but it has been sold until the 1990s in the previous life, and in the few years before the MAC was successfully developed and introduced to the market, Apple's main source of income depended on the Apple II. This is a tree A veritable evergreen tree, its gold-absorbing ability can be described as a steady stream.

Robert's arrogance will undoubtedly deepen the contradiction between Woz's Apple II project team and other departments.

……

Tang Huan, who was carefree on the surface, left Apple while thinking about the cause of the current situation in his heart.

This should be because I used cheating to obtain [-]% of Apple's shares abruptly, and squeezed into Apple's board of directors, and planted the seeds of dissatisfaction in the hearts of some shareholders who thought they were losing money, so So I want to take advantage of this opportunity and plan to put him together.

Originally, with the rapid growth of Zheru, the actual value seemed to exceed Apple's performance, these barriers would naturally disappear, but changes in the current situation will always disturb the sensitive nerves of businessmen.

Zheru gave out 20.00% of the shares in exchange, of which Markkula, Jobs, and Woz each held 11.00%, and the remaining [-]% fell into the name of Apple. This ingenious connection immediately made Tang Huan There is a vague detachment at Apple.

Judging from the current perspective, the three founders of Apple clearly benefited from this transaction.And Apple’s interests in Zheru have been divided, not to mention, even the right to speak has been dispersed. If Apple currently has a complete 20.00% of the right to speak in Zheru, that would be a wonderful thing.

After the three founders of Apple made personal gains, they even formed a group with Tang Huan on Apple's side, making other people have no right to speak at all.

And with the chaos and disorder exposed by Apple, some shareholders are worried and want to make changes, but the premise is to change Apple's existing power structure.

Under such an intricate relationship, Tang Huan undoubtedly became the best breakthrough.

After returning to Zheru, Tang Huan had already sorted out the problems. He went directly to the Apple [-]rd generation software development project team that had withdrawn from Apple a long time ago. Check with the technicians.

As a result, he found that all the third-generation Apple machines used for debugging programs had their main cases opened, exposing the circuit boards inside to the air. The scene was so chaotic.

"Aren't you afraid of electronic radiation? It's so exaggerated. You should know that what you develop is software, not hardware." Tang Huan laughed and joked about these subordinates who had been thrown by him as abandoned children at Apple to deal with the situation.

"We found that the heat dissipation of these computers is too poor, and often the program crashes after more than half of the running, so we have to do it." These employees began to complain, and even worried, "Will users buy such a product? No way."

"That's Apple's business, we don't need to worry about it." Tang Huanyun replied calmly, and then asked, "Which part of the project are you working on?"

"Now there are only functional modules that are compatible with the data files of the second-generation Apple." The person in charge brought the development log, "Then enter the next development cycle and add new functions."

It seems that if you don't think about it, you can't be a tool. If you don't torture, you can't be a talent. These people's work is progressing well, and Tang Huan looks at it differently.

"Stop the work you are currently doing. I have other arrangements." Tang Huan ordered casually, returned the development log to the other party, and glanced at the computer on the desk that an employee bought. Magazine, on the cover is the Apple III.

He was a little moved in his heart, and he didn't know how the professional media commented on the Apple III, so after asking who it belonged to, he picked it up and looked at it, only to find that it was full of contempt.

The 8MHz 2A Apple III, which uses the 6502-bit CPU produced by SynerTek, the second supplier of MOS Technology, was designed for commercial use and became the successor model of the Apple II.

The underlying system software of the Apple III includes an improved operating system, the Sophisticated Operating System (SOS), which provides a directory-level file system and supports the characteristics of simulating the 48 KB Apple II+, as well as the new BASIC compiler Apple Business BASIC. UCSD Pascal is provided for more powerful programming.

Other features include: 80-column uppercase and lowercase letters display support, nine-square number keys, real-time date clock support, 6-bit DAC digital-to-analog conversion audio, and 16-color image display capabilities.

In terms of peripherals, the Apple III has a built-in 140 KB 5.25-inch floppy drive and supports up to three external floppy drives.

One of the most important performance indicators, the memory capacity, is 128 KB, which can be supported to 256 KB through bank switching technology, and even 512 KB with the help of special technical means.

Practically speaking, the Apple III was an excellent 8-bit microcomputer.

But don't forget that Apple is now the leader in the personal computer industry. Its new products will naturally be carefully studied by technology enthusiasts and even competitors in the same industry. The only end was the same as the situation on the desk next to Tang Huan. They were cut into pieces and wanted to make slices to study. Maybe the advantages and disadvantages of Apple III, these people have a more sober and deeper understanding than Apple itself.

This is also true. While the Apple III was thoroughly criticized in magazines, the various opinions were also well-founded and completely defensible. In Tang Huan's view, there are so many smart people in the world, and all the comments were to the point. It's amazing. For example, the three major hardware problems of the Apple III were pointed out one by one.

For example, the most obvious point is that the Apple III does not have a cooling fan. This is of course a design that Jobs required in order to pursue quietness. It can support so many functions of the Apple III. The complexity of the circuit can be imagined, and the large amount of heat generated during its work. It is impossible to pass it through the heat sink at all. The editor of the magazine even joked that it is possible to spread eggs on the metal chassis of the Apple III.

Under the influence of this problem, because Jobs strictly limited the size of the main chassis, the immature 'fine line' wiring technology adopted by the Apple III's circuit board also began to expose its shortcomings.Since the gaps between the lines are quite narrow.When various chips are "squeezed" on the circuit board and soldered in large quantities, the solder will drip between the circuits that should not be connected, causing serious short circuits in the high temperature environment generated by continuous operation.

In addition, in order to support new functions, APPLE III uses a real-time clock chip manufactured by National Semiconductor Corporation of the United States, but it has repeated problems on some computers. Although it is not a common phenomenon, it has been sprayed more severely.

When Tang Huan saw this, he secretly admired it. The media here in the United States is indeed professional enough, almost hitting the Apple III's vitals every time.

Compared with these hardware defects, the magazine complained that the Apple III's claimed compatibility with the Apple II functions was not actually achieved, and instead seemed less glaring.

Sometimes the power of the media can be terrifying.

In the original time and space, compared with the previous version XP, Microsoft's operating system Vista has made a lot of improvements, but it is too greedy, not to mention high requirements on hardware resources, and frequent problems, the result was sung by the media Decline, and finally ended in embarrassment.

But in fact, the later versions of the operating system Windows7 and Windows8 are not based on Vista, and users also enjoy the various conveniences brought by Windows7.

It is estimated that Apple is still blindly optimistic. I hope Robert will take it easy and don't move too fast.

In the previous life, about 14000 of these defective Apple IIIs were sold, and finally Apple had to replace them for free.

In 1983, when the Apple III Plus, an improved model that fixed all the defects, was launched, the planned "Please allow me to introduce myself again" activity could not restore the decline of the notorious Apple III, and the 16-bit IBM PC at that time As well as the popularity of compatible machines, the Apple III has lost the need for existence, and was soon stopped by Apple and ended miserably.

Robert, you can jump up and down now, the more Apple IIIs you sell, the more troubled Apple will be, and the more you, and your shareholders, will lose your reputation and lose your voice, and eventually It had to rely on my brother's software and Woz's Apple II to save the market and decorate the stock market.

Thinking of this, Tang Huan couldn't help smiling slightly, and the engineer who bought the magazine saw his boss and technology idol happily flipping through it, so he was also happy, and asked: "Boss, the Apple III mentioned in the magazine How serious is the problem?"

"I guess we will see the outcome next month." Tang Huan smiled playfully, "That's why I asked you to stop for a while. I don't want your excellent labor results to be wasted."

Receiving Tang Huan's face-to-face affirmation and praise, these hard-working engineers suddenly felt full of motivation.

(End of this chapter)