That’s the starting eBay bid for this motherboard. According to the original invoice included in the auction package — dated December 7, 1976 — he also was the one filling the sales forms. At least this one, which says Steven. Since it was only him and Woz at the time — and the latter was always busy creating beautiful electronics and calling the Pope — it’s pretty safe to say that this was indeed Apple’s current CEO and then CEO, CFO, CMO, COO and CLSDI. The original package has Steve Jobs’ parents as the return address:

It includes:

• The computer itself
• The original shipping box, with Steve Jobs’ parents’ house as a return address
• The original manual, with schematics to build your own Apple 1
• The tape interface card
• The manual for the tape interface
• A plain Scotch-brand cassette tape with a simply-typed label “BASIC” that came with the unit
• A letter, signed by Steven Jobs in 1976, explaining connecting a keyboard and monitor, as well as detailing when dealer applications would be available
• An original full-page glossy advertisement for Apple, included when the Apple 1 computer was shipped. (The ad is almost unrecognisable as an Apple ad due to its elaborate Isaac Newton logo. The artist who drew that logo was the third original partner in Apple Corp. His stake in Apple was bought out for a couple thousand dollars when the company started getting serious).
• Photographs of all prior owners of this unit.

The Apple I was the first Apple computer. The two Steves started to sell it on July 1976. The price then was $US666.66. At the time all computers needed to be assembled, but the Apple I was a motherboard — assembled by themselves at Jobs parents’ garage — was ready to connect to a keyboard, monitor and cassette player. [eBay via Tuaw]

Unfortunately, the guys at Maximum PC didn’t have any USB 3.0 devices to run the card through its paces. All we know is that Windows 7 boots fine once it’s installed, and it gets similar USB 2.0 transfer rates to other controllers out there.

That said, we all know that USB 3.0 is going to be blazing. As long as the card performs anywhere near as fast as we expect from USB 3.0, the fact that it’ll be out “soon” and won’t cost much is good enough for me. [Maximum PC via CrunchGear]

It has 10 USB 2.0 orifices too. Personally, I’d just wait for a full USB 3.0 board, where every port’s USB 3.0. Otherwise, you’re just gonna feel cramped and then dumb, when you have to buy another board. If you must have the 3.0 now this slab supports CrossFire and SLI with a pair of PCIe x 16 slots, a pair of Gigabit ethernet ports and eSATA. Of course, there’s no price or date for this thing yet, which makes it a little less exciting, perhaps. As exciting as gimped USB 3.0 motherboards can get, anyway. [Register]

Intel’s Ion also runs HD video pretty nicely, but Via’s really paying attention to media playback. Via’s EPIA-P710 motherboard, a Pico-ITX, is the first to pack the VX855 Media System Processor, which allows some of that 1080p HD output despite needing only a heatsink and not a fan. Look for this combo to start popping up in higher-end netbooks soon—a wimpy Atom just isn’t going to cut it anymore with this on the market. [Engadget]

Nope, though that last one was close. What you’re looking at is the Illuminato X Machina, a modular motherboard prototype. Each square cell has its own storage, processor and memory, allowing them to operating independently or as part of a networked cluster.

Instead of having an entire system crash if a component experiences a fatal error, failure of a single cell can still leave the rest of the system operational. It also has the potential to change computing by ushering in machines that draw very little power.

David Ackley, associate professor of computer science at the University of New Mexico, is one of the contributors to the project, as is Justin Huynh. You may remember them as the brains behind the peer-to-peer borrowing and lending Open Source Hardware Bank.

Hive mind mobos, open-source lending? Sounds like socialised medicine to me. (I kid). [Wired]

This looks straight out of an 80s movie about hotshot computer programmers that fell into a downward spiral involving drugs and violence. A movie that, regrettably, may not exist. [3rings via The Awesomer via BBG]

If our best guess is correct, all of those off-white stuctures on the board are “micro-porous ceramic” heat sinks. But not only do they dissipate heat from board components while looking ever so evil—the ceramic also improves the structure integrity of the board itself.

The only catch to performance clockers may be the inclusion of SO-DIMM slots—small form memory slots generally reserved for notebooks.

As of right now, the Marine Cool is a concept. But like their dual-screen laptop, if Asus actually brings this model to market, we’d all remember that the company is capable of creating a lot more than just netbooks. [Softpedia via Engadget]

According to Xbox Scene, the new 256MB chip will allow to install the entire new NXE dashboard without requiring the hard drive or any external flash memory unit. It will also allow you to store XLBA games, save gamesave information, or whatever you want. The rest of the motherboard layout stays the same, except for the RAM memory configuration, which changes from the previous version. [Xbox Scene]