Re: Static
"Now a PDP 11 fully populated 32K board would have put you back $2K in 1978."
Heath H-11, LSI-11, Q-bus. In kit form. Came with the parts to make it 32K, was upgradable to 64K. Bought from a guy I met at the Homebrew Computer Club for just under list price ... it was still in the original, unopened box. He was selling off all his home computer kit, priorities changed with a new baby in the house.
I swapped that board and a well used, refurbed by me, PC11 for a 64K board a couple months later.