Skip to content
◈ALB Atlas

Apple Lisa Dead

Apple Lisa
KindMachine
Introduced1983
Discontinued1986
StatusDead
ManufacturerApple
PlatformMotorola 68000

Apple's first GUI machine — $9,995, document-centric, multitasking. A commercial failure whose every idea shipped three years later in the Macintosh for a quarter of the price.

Created by Apple Computer

Lisa (January 1983) was Apple's first GUI machine — 68000, 1MB RAM, a document-centric desktop with cooperative multitasking and protected memory, years ahead of the Macintosh it was supposed to be an option alongside.

$9,995 killed it; Lisa 2 arrived with the Macintosh in 1984 and was renamed Macintosh XL in 1985. Everything it pioneered — documents before apps, protected memory — the Mac later proved at consumer price.