The Apple IIc (compact), introduced April 24, 1984 at the Apple II Forever event, was Apple's closed, carry-around Apple II. Same 8-bit family as the II+ and IIe, but no slots: built-in 5.25-inch drive, 128 KB RAM, 80-column text, serial ports, and a handle that doubled as a keyboard tilt. List price was $1,295. In the MicroBasement it sits next to the II+ and IIe as the appliance version of the same machine.
The IIc kept Steve Wozniak's Apple II architecture and used the CMOS 65C02. Industrial design was the first Apple II in the Snow White language (fog / off-white case). The "c" meant compact. Apple sold it as the machine you plugged in and used, not the machine you filled with cards.
Announced three months after the Macintosh, the IIc was Apple saying the II line was not finished. Dealers ordered tens of thousands the first day. Production ran until August 1988 for the original IIc; the IIc Plus (4 MHz 65C02, built-in 3.5-inch 800 KB drive, internal supply) followed in September 1988. The original IIc used an external brick supply and a single-sided 140 KB 5.25-inch drive in the case.
Most of what took cards on a IIe is soldered onto the IIc board:
Optional 9-inch green monitor sat on a stand over the case. A flat LCD panel existed; few were sold.
Same library as the IIe: ProDOS, DOS 3.3, Applesoft in ROM, VisiCalc, school titles, and the games. 80-column and 128 KB were standard, so double hi-res and ProDOS apps ran without buying an 80-column card. No slots meant no cheap Z80 CP/M card or hard-disk controller unless it hung off a serial or the disk port.
The IIc was the Apple II for people who did not want seven slots. Schools and homes that already knew the II could pick it up and go. It never replaced the IIe in labs that lived on interface cards, and it was overshadowed in the press by the Mac, but it sold in volume and kept the II line alive until the IIc Plus and IIGS. In the MicroBasement it is the closed box next to the open IIe: same 6502 family, different idea of what a personal computer should look like.