For his second personal computer Steve Wozniak produced an elegant and efficient circuit design with colour graphics (the first mass-market personal computer to do so). Although the Apple II launched without any compelling applications it was a design that, as Steve Jobs had hoped, would appeal to software writers and developers. The availability of Visicalc and the Apple II disk drive for the Apple II within months of its release helped propel sales through the late 1970s.

Steve Jobs hired Jerry Manock (1944 -) to design the computer’s housing. Manock had graduated from the Stanford Product Design Program and went to work for Hewlett-Packard (HP) where he was involved in the design of esoteric instruments for the microwave division. He left HP in 1972 and produced an electronic aid for the handicapped with Telesensory Systems before moving to Apple.

In 1977 cases for computers were rudimentary affairs cobbled together by owners from timber or made from blank metal cases supplied from electronics shop stock. Jobs was adamant that the Apple II case should be made of plastic because it would make the Apple II look more like a ‘finished’ mass-produced consumer product.

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