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The 6502 is a processor, not a personal computer.

I don't think gdanko said it was.

The 6502 was a work of genius. It was created by a clutch of disgruntled engineers after quitting Motorola. It is a processor made by engineers, for engineers; without the corporate bullcrappen interfering, as it was at Motorola.

Anybody who has programmed with it, knows this. It is beautifully designed, logical- yet fun, free of over-workmanship.

The proof is simply that people still code for it today on Commodore 64's, pushing the chip that little bit further each time, even 32 years later.

Edited 2007-07-06 21:26

Unfortunately, as these things go, the title of 'mother' or 'father' of technology often goes not to the first to do it, but the first to foster it, promote it until it worked.

I am slightly biased here (the Woz has been a personal hero of mine since I was about 10), but I disagree. The shift from do it yourself kits to pre made boards was something that wouldn't have happened for quite awhile longer if it hadn't been for the Steves. And while the 6502 definitely played a part, it was the Woz's downright genius at computer design that let the Apple ship at the price it did. I really can't link to all the various bits of Woz lore I have read over the years, but he was doing things back then that noone had even begun to think of (like device drivers vs circuit board controllers).

I think it is important to distinguish between the original inventor of an item and the first one to make an item popular. Far too often, the original inventor gets little or no credit.

Here is a photo of the Xerox Alto which first appeared in 1973: http://toastytech.com/guis/altosystem.jpg
It sure looks like a PC to me. Maybe the box is a little bigger than typical, and the price might have been prohibitive. However, in light of the 1973 Alto, how can anyone maintain that Steve Wozniak/Jobs was the "inventor" of the computer that has a monitor, a keyboard and a box that sits under/on-top-of a desk?

In addition, the 1973 Alto used a GUI! -- Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak didn't offer a GUI until ten years later. And, incidentally, the Alto GUI had icons, a three-button mouse, floating, hierarchal menus (that were identical to drop-down menus except for their screen position), etc. Here are a couple of screenshots:
http://toastytech.com/guis/altorainbow.jpg
http://www.digibarn.com/collections/software/alto/alto-cedar-enviro...

I tend to favor the original inventor over the profiteers.

And while the 6502 definitely played a part, it was the Woz's downright genius at computer design that let the Apple ship at the price it did.

Re-read your history. If memory serves me, he PET shipped for about a third of the price of the Apple II and could be used out of the box. Where the Apple II gave you a blank stare unless you bought a disk drive etc etc. This isn't to say the Apple was a bad computer... it was not. However, the 1541 was a much better drive than Apple's offering. The 1541 was crippled in speed because of a stupid mistake that made it to the assembly line. Didn't someone cut the wrong trace or something? Anyway, if you had two 1541s copying a disk you could unplug them from the computer and the copy would continue unhindered because the 1541 actually had a CPU of its own.

Commodore brought affordable computers to the masses.. Apple did not. I am a Mac user to this day but their prices have never really been what I considered competitive.