Apple // Dream

I owned an Apple //e for many years, beginning in 1983. Does anyone remember that it could be enhanced?

The story you are about to read is fictional. Any similarity of characters to real persons, living or dead is purely coincidental.

A man went into the public library. In one of the rooms was what looked like an Apple IIe. No one was in the room. He turned on the switch. The screen said "Apple //e", not "Apple ][", a clear signal to all the world that this was an enhanced Apple. He reached into his briefcase, took out a newly initialized diskette, put it in the drive and typed the following entries, each one followed by the return key.

CALL -151

C007:00 C008:00 C00A:00

1000:00 N 1001<1000.10FFM

1100<C100.DFFFM

BSAVE CDROMCODE,A$1000,L$2000

1000<E000.FFFFM

BSAVE EFROMCODE,A$1000,L$2000

He took his diskette out of the drive, turned off the Apple, went home and put a 2764 EPROM which he had bought for $5 into his EPROM burner in slot 4. With the software that came with the EPROM burner, he typed BLOAD CDROMCODE followed by the return key, and he burned the code into the EPROM. Then he took another $5 EPROM and burned in the EFROMCODE. He turned off his Apple, installed a 65C02 in the socket which held the 6502, installed the CD EPROM in the socket which held the CDROM and installed the EF EPROM in the socket that held the EFROM. He was careful to have the notches on the new chips pointing to the keyboard. By the way, the 65C02 had cost him $5 also. When he turned on his Apple again the screen said, "Apple //e" just like the one in the library. He found, however, that he didn't have any mouse characters available because he hadn't copied the video ROM. "Next time I go to the library, I'll take my EPROM burner and my old video ROM chip.", thought he. "That way I can get a copy of the new video ROM chip on my disk. I'll burn that in to a $5 2732A EPROM.

Alas, there was a knock on the door. It was a policeman who arrested the man for copying the copyrighted ROMS from the Apple in the library. A trial was held. The prosecutor said there is a great big (C) on the ROM chips in the Apple in the library. Everyone knows that means you can't copy them legally. The man's lawyer told the jury that the man had never taken the cover off the Apple in the library, so how was he supposed to know there was a copyright notice on the chips? The jury let the man off. Send email to JCHURCH Go back to home page