iPad Prototype Sells for $10,200 on Memorial Day Weekend

One big Apple fan bought a rare prototype of the first-generation iPad on eBay for $10,200 over the weekend.

The original iPad prototype was sold on Monday night, following a day-long bidding war between seven users. The device offers a clue of what Apple was originally considering for its iPad including two dock connectors, one for use in portrait mode, and another for use in landscape mode.

According to the item description listed on Ebay, both dock connectors work for charging the device and connecting it to a computer. The seller spoke with Wired.com under the guise of anonymity and said that he purchased the iPad prototype from a co-worker and did not know how the co-worker came to own the machine. The seller did mention in the same interview that the prototype came from an Apple lab in California and that when he bought the iPad prototype from his co-worker, it was broken. He made a few adjustments, but was unable to fix the touch screen, which works sporadically.

The prototype device, built around late 2009 or early 2010, runs Apple's testing software, dubbed SwitchBoard, along with a beta version of iOS 3.2. According to the listing however, the device is not fully functional, as Apple intentionally disables its test units when done with them.

Apple is notorious for impeding the sales of its prototypes and punishing the perpetrators. An eBay auction for a MacBook Pro with a 3G antenna was stopped by Apple, and the seller was forced to return the hardware to Apple. The iPhone 4 prototype that Gizmodo purchased in April 2010 led to criminal charges against Gizmodo editor Jason Chen. The charges were eventually dropped. In the summer of 2011, an iPhone prototype was lost in a San Francisco bar by an Apple employee. Eventually, Apple security was able to search a citizen's home under escort of the San Francisco Police Department.

However, the seller of the iPad told Wired.com that he had not yet been contacted by Apple. He did not provide any information on where he works or lives.

Despite aversion to having their antiques auctioned off by third parties, Apple does not hesitate from auctioning off its items at exorbitant rates. Last summer, the company put the kibosh on an eBay auction for a prototype MacBook that had been modified to include 3G connectivity and was selling for a cool $70,000. When the Apple-1, the first ever Apple machine, went up for auction at Christie's in London in 2010, a fan paid $213,600. Finally, at Sotheby's auction in New York, $1.59 million were paid for the three-page contract that established Apple Computer Co.

Next month, a 1974 memo from Steve Jobs' days at Atari will be auctioned off at Sotheby's.