ers, while Jobs spent his days picking up the finished boards from
the manufacturer and acquiring supplies. He spent his nights
helping Wozniak.
They hired their old friend Bill Fernandez to help them. He was
Apple’s first employee. Soon, Jobs’s sister, Patty, and Dan Kottke
were added to the company’s payroll. Paul and Clara Jobs helped,
too. The group worked round the clock. Patty, Fernandez, and
Kottke attached the components to the boards with Jobs’s help.
They were paid one dollar per board. Wozniak tested each com-
pleted board by plugging it into a television set and a keyboard. If
there was a problem, he corrected it. From the start, Jobs insisted
they use only the best components. While other hobby comput-
ers were using static memory chips that used a lot of power, he
was adamant that Apple utilize a new chip with dynamic RAM
(random access memory or the memory available on a computer).
It used up much less power than the old-fashioned chips. Other
hobbyists criticized Apple for using the chips, which were more
expensive than the static chips. But Jobs was right about their
value. Apple I was the first personal computer to use the chips,
which eventually became the industry standard. “Steve was push-
ing to use the right parts,” Wozniak explains. “We were lucky to
be on the right track. It was one of the luckiest technology steps
on the whole development.” 36
In addition to his other duties, Jobs went to dozens of electron-
ics stores trying to sell Apple I. With his typical determination, he
often would not leave until the manager agreed to stock at least
one machine. In this manner, he managed to sell 150 additional
computers, which he and Woz priced at $666.66. They had no
idea of the number’s Satanic connection (Satan is sometimes rep-
resented by the number 666), picking it because they liked the
repeating digits.
Improving Apple I
Apple I was very different from modern computers. It was
more a computer kit than a complete computer. It had no key-
board, case, or television monitor. Buyers had to supply these
“We Will Have a Company”
45