Applied Engineering, headquartered in

Carrollton, Texas Carrollton is a city in Dallas County, Texas, Dallas, Denton County, Texas, Denton, and Collin County, Texas, Collin counties in the U.S. state of Texas. As of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, its population was 133,434, making it the ...

, was a leading third-party hardware vendor for

Apple II Apple II ("apple Roman numerals, two", stylized as Apple ][) is a series of microcomputers manufactured by Apple Computer, Inc. from 1977 to 1993. The Apple II (original), original Apple II model, which gave the series its name, was designed ...

computers from the early 1980s until the mid-1990s.

History

{{original research, section, date=September 2018 In its day, Applied Engineering built a solid reputation among Apple II owners for their innovation, excellent build quality, and generous warranty support. AE was quick to fill in gaps in the market for Apple II add-on boards and expansion options, often developing products for the Apple II line that neither Apple Computer nor other third-party vendors offered. By the early 1990s, as Apple Inc., Apple Computer, Inc., began to withdraw support for the Apple II series and focus on the Mac (computer), Macintosh line, the market for Apple II hardware and software began to wane. Many Apple II users began to migrate to other platforms, such as the Macintosh and

IBM PC The IBM Personal Computer (model 5150, commonly known as the IBM PC) is the first microcomputer released in the List of IBM Personal Computer models, IBM PC model line and the basis for the IBM PC compatible ''de facto'' standard. Released on ...

-compatibles. In an attempt to capitalize on its well-known brand name among previous Apple II owners, Applied Engineering began to market products for the Macintosh and Commodore

Amiga Amiga is a family of personal computers produced by Commodore International, Commodore from 1985 until the company's bankruptcy in 1994, with production by others afterward. The original model is one of a number of mid-1980s computers with 16-b ...

lines. However, because of stiff competition in already active markets, and AE's late entries, Applied Engineering could not duplicate the success it had experienced with the Apple II. Around the same time, cost-cutting measures were implemented, such as shortening warranty periods, charging for technical support (via a 1-900 number) and a using inferior parts, turning off loyal and long-time customers. Eventually dwindling Apple II sales and a failure to shift into other markets caused Applied Engineering to go out of business by 1994.

Product offerings

Some of Applied Engineering's best-known products for the Apple II included: *RamWorks — memory expansion card for the

Apple IIe The Apple IIe (styled as Apple //e) is the third model in the Apple II series of personal computers produced by Apple Inc., Apple Computer. It was released in January 1983 as the successor to the Apple II Plus. The ''e'' in the name stands for ...

*TransWarp — CPU accelerator card for the

and Apple IIGS *Vulcan — internal

hard drive A hard disk drive (HDD), hard disk, hard drive, or fixed disk is an electro-mechanical data storage device that stores and retrieves digital data using magnetic storage with one or more rigid rapidly rotating hard disk drive platter, pla ...

*PC Transporter — NEC V30 (

Intel Intel Corporation is an American multinational corporation and technology company headquartered in Santa Clara, California, and Delaware General Corporation Law, incorporated in Delaware. Intel designs, manufactures, and sells computer compo ...

8086-compatible) card that allowed Apple IIs to run

MS-DOS MS-DOS ( ; acronym for Microsoft Disk Operating System, also known as Microsoft DOS) is an operating system for x86-based personal computers mostly developed by Microsoft. Collectively, MS-DOS, its rebranding as IBM PC DOS, and a few op ...

programs The TransWarp family of Apple II accelerators consisted of multiple products. The original TransWarp took over from the standard 1-MHz

6502 The MOS Technology 6502 (typically pronounced "sixty-five-oh-two" or "six-five-oh-two") William Mensch and the moderator both pronounce the 6502 microprocessor as ''"sixty-five-oh-two"''. is an 8-bit microprocessor that was designed by a small ...

or 65C02 used in the Apple IIe with a 3.6 MHz version of the 65C02 (which could also be run at 1.8 MHz, selectable through hardware) and turned on and off completely through software. The TransWarp was later followed by a TransWarp II and TransWarp III, the latter of which was announced but never actually went into production. With Apple Computer's release of the Apple IIGS, Applied Engineering followed with a TransWarp GS, which provided an accelerated version of the 65C816 processor on which the IIGS was based. Multi-function cards were a mainstay of AE's product offerings, of which the Serial Pro serial interface card was a typical example. Besides offering a standard

RS-232 In telecommunications, RS-232 or Recommended Standard 232 is a standard introduced in 1960 for serial communication transmission of data. It formally defines signals connecting between a ''DTE'' (''data terminal equipment'') such as a compu ...

serial port A serial port is a serial communication Interface (computing), interface through which information transfers in or out sequentially one bit at a time. This is in contrast to a parallel port, which communicates multiple bits simultaneously in Pa ...

, the card included a

ProDOS ProDOS is the name of two similar operating systems for the Apple II of personal computer. The original ProDOS, renamed ProDOS 8 in version 1.2, is the last official operating system usable by all 8-bit Apple II computers, and was distributed ...

-compatible

real-time clock A real-time clock (RTC) is an electronic device (most often in the form of an integrated circuit) that measures the passage of time. Although the term often refers to the devices in personal computers, server (computing), servers and embedded ...

, thus combining two cards into one and freeing up an extra slot. When used with a

dot-matrix printer Dot matrix printing, sometimes called impact matrix printing, is a computer printing process in which ink is applied to a surface using a relatively low-resolution dot matrix for layout. Dot matrix printers are a type of impact printer that p ...

, the Serial Pro offered several screen-dump print options, such as printing either of the two Apple II high-resolution pages alone, both in a single dump, or the first hi-res page rotated or inverted.

Partial product list

For all Apple IIs except IIc/IIc Plus

* Serial Pro — Apple II serial (RS-232) card * Parallel Pro — Apple II parallel (

IEEE 1284 IEEE 1284, also known as the Centronics port, is a standard that defines bi-directional parallel communications between computers and other devices. It was originally developed in the 1970s by Centronics before its IEEE standardization. Hi ...

) card * Buffer Pro — Buffer add-on for Parallel Pro * Vulcan — Internal

hard disk A hard disk drive (HDD), hard disk, hard drive, or fixed disk is an electro-mechanical data storage device that stores and retrieves digital data using magnetic storage with one or more rigid rapidly rotating hard disk drive platter, pla ...

and

disk controller A disk controller is a controller circuit that enables a CPU to communicate with a hard disk, floppy disk or other kind of disk drive. It also provides an interface between the disk drive and the bus connecting it to the rest of the system.{ ...

* Vulcan Gold — Internal hard disk * PC Transporter — NEC V30 (

8086 The 8086 (also called iAPX 86) is a 16-bit microprocessor chip designed by Intel between early 1976 and June 8, 1978, when it was released. The Intel 8088, released July 1, 1979, is a slightly modified chip with an external 8-bit data bus (allo ...

-compatible) IBM-PC co-processor card * Super Music Synthesizer — Apple II sound card *

Phasor In physics and engineering, a phasor (a portmanteau of phase vector) is a complex number representing a sinusoidal function whose amplitude and initial phase are time-invariant and whose angular frequency is fixed. It is related to a mor ...

— Apple II sound card * TimeMaster H. O. and TimeMaster II H. O. — Apple II real-time clock card * A/D + D/A Card — Analog/digital signal acquisition and industrial control card * I/O 32 Card —

32-bit In computer architecture, 32-bit computing refers to computer systems with a processor, memory, and other major system components that operate on data in a maximum of 32- bit units. Compared to smaller bit widths, 32-bit computers can perform la ...

TTL/

CMOS Complementary metal–oxide–semiconductor (CMOS, pronounced "sea-moss ", , ) is a type of MOSFET, metal–oxide–semiconductor field-effect transistor (MOSFET) semiconductor device fabrication, fabrication process that uses complementary an ...

digital I/O card * DataLink 1200/2400 — internal telephone

modem The Democratic Movement (, ; MoDem ) is a centre to centre-right political party in France, whose main ideological trends are liberalism and Christian democracy, and that is characterised by a strong pro-Europeanist stance. MoDem was establis ...

s * FastMath — Math co-processor card * Z-80 Plus —

CP/M CP/M, originally standing for Control Program/Monitor and later Control Program for Microcomputers, is a mass-market operating system created in 1974 for Intel 8080/Intel 8085, 85-based microcomputers by Gary Kildall of Digital Research, Dig ...

card

Apple II/II Plus Specific

* AE 16K Card — Reduced-chip substitute for Apple's 16 KB Language Card * ViewMaster 80 — Videx- and Videoterm-compatible 80-column card with lowercase and

light pen A light pen is a computer input device in the form of a light-sensitive wand used in conjunction with a computer's cathode-ray tube (CRT) display. It allows the user to point to displayed objects or draw on the screen in a similar way to a to ...

support

Apple IIe

* MemoryMaster — Early reduced-chip substitute for Apple's Extended 80-Column Card (80 columns + 64 KB RAM) * MemoryMaster IIe — replacement 80-column card with 64 KB—256 KB * RamWorks (a. k. a. RamWorks I, RamWorks Basic) — 80-column + memory expansion card with 256—1024 KB RAM * RamWorks II — 80-column + memory expansion card with 1+ MB RAM * RamWorks III — 80-column + memory expansion card with 1-3 MB RAM * RamKeeper — Battery backup option for RamWorks series (to use RAM as non-volatile

RAM disk A RAM drive (also called a RAM disk) is a block of random-access memory ( primary storage or volatile memory) that a computer's software is treating as if the memory were a disk drive (secondary storage). RAM drives provide high-performance te ...

) * ColorLink —

Daughterboard In computing, an expansion card (also called an expansion board, adapter card, peripheral card or accessory card) is a printed circuit board that can be inserted into an electrical connector, or expansion slot (also referred to as a bus sl ...

RGB The RGB color model is an additive color model in which the red, green, and blue primary colors of light are added together in various ways to reproduce a broad array of colors. The name of the model comes from the initials of the three ...

option for RamWorks series providing analog and IBM-compatible RGB output * Digital Prism — Daughterboard RGB option for RamWorks series providing IBM-compatible RGB output only * TransWarp, TransWarp II — Apple II accelerator card

Apple IIc/IIc Plus

* Z-RAM, Z-RAM Ultra, Z-RAM Ultra II, Z-RAM Ultra III — Memory expansion card * RAM Express, RAM Express II — Memory expansion card (the RAM Express is an Apple-branded IIc RAM card with Applied Engineering stickers applied to cover the Apple logo) * Z-80c — CP/M card

Apple IIGS

* TransWarp GS — Apple IIGS accelerator card * GS-RAM, GS-RAM Ultra, GS-RAM Plus — Apple IIGS memory expansion cards. The cards hold 1.5 MB, 4 MB, and 6 MB respectively. * RamKeeper — Battery backed RAM drive for the Apple IIGS * Sonic Blaster — Apple IIGS sound card * Audio Animator — Apple IIGS sound card with external audio mixer and

MIDI Musical Instrument Digital Interface (; MIDI) is an American-Japanese technical standard that describes a communication protocol, digital interface, and electrical connectors that connect a wide variety of electronic musical instruments, ...

I/O * Conserver — Integrated disk drive organizer,

surge protector A surge protector, spike suppressor, surge suppressor, surge diverter, surge protection device (SPD), transient voltage suppressor (TVS) or transient voltage surge suppressor (TVSS) is an appliance or device intended to protect Electronics, ele ...

, and cooling fan

Miscellaneous

* AE 1.6-MB Drive — 1.6 MB, 3.5-inch floppy drive for IIGS (Apple's 3.5-inch drives for the Apple II stopped at 800 KB; GS/OS driver needed for 1.6-MB utilization) * AE 1.44-MB Drive — 1.44 MB, 3.5-inch floppy drive for Commodore Amiga 500,

2000 2000 was designated as the International Year for the Culture of Peace and the World Mathematics, Mathematical Year. Popular culture holds the year 2000 as the first year of the 21st century and the 3rd millennium, because of a tende ...

beat Commodore's own high-density drive to market. Not compatible with the 1.76 MB Amiga Chinon high-density floppy. * AE 800-KB Drive — 800 KB, 3.5-inch floppy drive for IIe, IIc/ IIc Plus, and IIGS * TransWarp — 16 and 40 MHz accelerator boards for Macintosh SE

External links

ReactiveMicro.com
AE hardware supplier for TransWarp GS 32KB Cache Board, other TransWarp GS upgrades and GS RAM Plus PAL for ROM0/1 and ROM3 compatibility.
16Sector.com
Apple II Hardware supplier & Support site for AE Hardware / Software and other Apple II hardware.
The Apple2OnlineStore
Apple II+, IIe, IIc, IIc Plus & IIGS systems & accessories.
Applied Engineering Repository
Scans of company ads and catalogs, information about the company's history, and more. Apple II family Defunct engineering companies of the United States Companies based in Carrollton, Texas Defunct companies based in Texas Defunct computer hardware companies Defunct computer companies of the United States