Hop aboard for a very quick look inside an old Apple IIc. Sure does look antique! Better off in a museum than on a shelf. My camera battery was about to go flat, so I thought I’d record the machine quickly while it was in pieces. I’ve never taken one of these apart before, and it’s quite a lovely little computer inside.

Unfortunately, this particular IIc isn’t behaving properly. It has a power problem that causes the machine to shut down, so I thought I’d inspect the power supply and see whether anything looked obviously damaged or shorted.

Apple introduced the IIc in 1984 as a compact version of the Apple II idea. Rather than relying on expansion slots like the IIe, Apple squeezed a surprising amount into the little case. It uses a 65C02 processor and shipped with 128 KB of RAM, while the disk controller, serial ports, mouse functionality and 80-column display support were integrated into the machine.

That explains why there’s considerably less empty space and card-cage chaos inside than I’m used to seeing in older computers. The motherboard itself is rather beautiful, with the chips lined up neatly in rows and plenty of labels printed on the PCB. Even the socketed components look tidy. Almost makes me feel bad about some of my other computers!

Naturally, I had a quick look at the capacitors while I was in there. This was during one of my capacitor-obsessed weekends, so I was checking everything that looked remotely electrolytic. Most seemed quite reasonable, although a particularly large red capacitor towards the back caught my attention. Nothing jumped out as obviously failed during this initial inspection.

The power supply is a separate internal module, and there’s also the built-in floppy drive, keyboard connector and various other connections around the board. It’s compact by 1984 standards and still gloriously beige by ours.

This is only a quick internal look rather than a full restoration. I’ll give the machine a clean, investigate the power fault and see whether I can get it turning on reliably again.

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