Steve Jobs once spent two weeks debating which washing machine to buy, a decision that turned into a dinner-table saga, illustrating the Apple co-founder's belief that every choice, no matter how mundane, deserved the same rigor he applied to the Macintosh and iPhone.

What Happened: Jobs told Wired in 1996 that "Americans make washers and dryers all wrong," praising European models that "wash them with about a quarter as much water" and leave clothes "much cleaner, much softer and they last a lot longer."

Night after night, he and his family weighed trade-offs. "Did we care most about getting our wash done in an hour versus an hour and a half? Or did we care about our clothes feeling really soft and lasting longer?" he recalled.

The conversations finally produced a winner — a German-made Miele set. "I got more thrill out of them than I have out of any piece of high tech in years," Jobs said.

Design historians argue that this blend of patience for deliberation and zero tolerance for mediocrity powered Apple's minimalist revolution. "It takes a lot of hard work to make something simple," Jobs once said of the company's hallmark aesthetic.

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