1976 Apple Computer sells for $375,000

Think the iPad's price tag is steep? One famed Apple product, the original Apple I, sold for $374,500 on Friday.

Auction house Sotheby's sold a 1976 Apple I Computer -- which still works! -- in New York on Friday, after a bidding war broke out between two potential buyers.

The lucky winner? An anonymous telephone bidder.

That bidder's final price more than doubled the high estimate of $180,000, said Sotheby's, which hailed the Apple I as "the start of the personal computing revolution."

For $374,500, the buyer could have bought 750 entry-level iPads, more than 1,880 iPhones (with a two-year contract, of course) or around 650 shares of Apple.

Sotheby's touted the device's backstory in an email to press. Apple founders Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak built the Apple I Computer in 1976 and attracted the attention of Silicon Valley store chain Byte Shop.

Store owner Paul Terrell ordered 50 of the computers for $500 each, which the late Jobs and Wozniak put together in just 30 days.

Terrell sold them for $666.66 each, and the Apple duo made 150 more to sell to friends and other stores.

The Apple I was a marvel for its time, but it was quite different than today's computers, Sotheby's noted: The Apple I lacked a monitor, keyboard, power supply and case.