But, what Steve was doing with the Macintosh, pricewise in keeping things fairly
lean, looked like a great approach. So, instead of really attacking 1-2-3 just at the
DOS level, we decided we would focus on the graphical version and do the work on
Macintosh and Windows and sort of be a generation ahead if we were right about
graphical interface. So Microsoft worked very closely with the early Macintosh team.
We were their testing group. They had no testers. We helped shaped the features of
the machine. Initially, they had wanted to use the floppy disk of the Apple II, 143K
disk. That didn't look too good. Then they wanted to use a 5-1/4" floppy where there
were heads on both sides, so called "Twiggy Drive." And that didn't work too well.
Finally, at the last minute they, switched to this 3-1/2" drive. And that was a fairly
innovative thing. HP had been doing that a little earlier, but this was a milestone.
The project kept slipping. When Steve first came to us it was supposed to ship in
early '82 at $995 dollars. Well, it ended up shipping in January of 1984 at $2,495
dollars. Partly Scully had come in and convinced Steve that the demand would be
high and that they had to fund a lot of things. So the price edged up a little bit. Also,
Steve tried to convince everybody that this could be a 64K machine. And his
engineers were saying, "No way, that's too tight." And we said, "No, we can't do any
applications." He went up to 128K.
The model we are looking at here called the "Plus" actually came out about a year
after the Macintosh shipped. And they brought it from 128K up to 512K. That was
because the... only Microsoft and Apple succeeded to get applications in the 128K
machine. It was very, very difficult. The day the machine shipped we had our BASIC,
our Multiplan, and they had Write and Paint. Those were really only the important
applications for the machine for quite some time. A year later they beefed up to 512K
and got the laser printer, that's when we started coming out with Word, File, Chart,
and then later with the Excel product in 1985, which was a very important milestone
for this machine. It meant that it wasn't just for wimps, or sometimes they said, ”for
the rest of us”, but it was for anybody who wanted the most powerful machine that
had graphics interface.
The Mac, although today, is so clearly a grand success, but had a tough time in the
early days. The first year it sold to enthusiasts. The second year it actually sold a little
bit less. Steve Jobs left Apple under controversial circumstances. It really took until
1985 or so, with things like Excel, before it became solidly entrenched.
The Macintosh was a very, very important milestone. Not only because it established
Apple as a key player in helping to find new ideas in the personal computer, but also
because it ushered in graphical interface. It is hard to reconstruct, but people didn't
believe in graphical interface. And Apple bet their company on it, and that is why we
got so involved in building applications for the Macintosh early on. We thought they
were right. And we really bet our success on it as well. And today, all of the machines
work that way because it is so much more natural. But this was pushing the limit.