Apple Lisa Gets a Modern FPGA Remake, Bringing Early GUI History Back for Retro Tech Fans

Apple Lisa gets a second life with modern hardware

Before the Macintosh became Apple’s “GUI computer” in everyone’s memory, there was the Apple Lisa. Launched in 1983, the Lisa was Apple’s early attempt at making a computer built around windows, mouse control and a more visual way of working. It was also brutally expensive: US$9,995 back then, which works out to nearly US$34,000 today — roughly RM160,000 depending on exchange rates. So yeah, not exactly something your average Malaysian household would have casually bought for the study room.

Now, enthusiast and YouTuber Alex Anderson-McLeod is working on a modern recreation called LisaFPGA, using an FPGA board to bring the 43-year-old machine back in a more usable form.

What makes LisaFPGA different?

Instead of trying to restore original Apple Lisa hardware, Alex’s design recreates the machine on a single modern board. The setup is built around an Artix 7-100T FPGA, with 2MB SRAM plus emulated storage for the hard drive and floppy system. It also includes serial, keyboard and mouse connections for people who want a more authentic setup.

But the real appeal is that this is not just a museum-piece clone. LisaFPGA adds the modern conveniences that make retro computing much less painful in 2026.

The board can output video through HDMI, with a scanline option for that old-school feel. Users can switch between its main display modes on the fly. It also supports USB keyboard and mouse input, so you do not need to hunt down original Lisa peripherals just to test the system.

There is also USB-C support through a built-in USB hub, allowing serial ports to be redirected without needing bulky adapters or DB25 connectors. For storage, floppy images can be loaded through SD card, a direct PC connection, or even an original floppy drive if you have one.

The old Lisa was slow — this one does not have to be

The original Lisa used a 5 MHz Motorola 68000 CPU and was famously not the fastest machine around, partly because of the software design choices of the era. LisaFPGA keeps that historical baseline, but also adds two overclocking multiplier options that can push the recreated machine up to an equivalent of 75 MHz. Better still, those speed modes can be changed with physical switches.

That is a very cool compromise. If you want the “real” slow Lisa feel, you can have it. If you just want to explore the software without waiting around like it is 1983, you can speed things up.

Why Malaysian and SEA tech fans should care

For most of us in Malaysia and Southeast Asia, machines like the Apple Lisa were never part of local computing history in a practical sense. They were too expensive, too niche, and mostly existed in tech magazines or later in YouTube documentaries. A proper Lisa today is also collector territory, with pricing and maintenance headaches that put it far outside casual hobby range.

That is why FPGA projects like this matter. They make early computing history more accessible without requiring a climate-controlled retro lab or a bank account full of spare cash. For local makers, computer science students, retro collectors and hardware nerds, LisaFPGA could become a hands-on way to understand where modern desktops came from — windows, mouse workflows, GUI design, storage quirks and all.

It is also a reminder that Apple did not invent the GUI or the mouse. Xerox’s PARC work played a major role, and the Xerox Star 8010 arrived earlier with GUI and mouse technology, though at an even crazier US$16,595 in 1981 — around US$60,000 today. The mouse itself goes back further, to Stanford Research Institute in 1963.

Still, the Lisa remains important because it helped push these ideas toward the mainstream, even if the product itself struggled. Its high price and limited software support made it a commercial failure, and Apple later dumped 2,700 unsold units in Logan, Utah as part of a tax write-off. Painful ending, bro.

Alex is currently showing version 2 of LisaFPGA, with version 3 planned with fixes. He also intends to open-source the project on GitHub once it is ready, and may even sell units in the future.

For retro tech fans, this is the good kind of nostalgia: not just looking at old hardware behind glass, but actually booting it, poking it and understanding why it mattered.

Source: Tom's Hardware