Jay Miner

Jay Miner (1990)

Signature of Jay Miner on a "Revision A" Amiga.

Jay "Glenn" Miner (born May 31, 1932 in Prescott , Arizona ; † June 20, 1994 in Mountain View , California ) was a chip designer and is considered, among other things, the father of the Amiga home computer .

Life

After graduating in electrical engineering from the University of California at Berkeley in 1958 , Miner worked for various companies, where he a. a. developed digital voltmeters and electronic calculators. In the mid-1970s, Miner joined Atari . There he was involved in the development of the VCS (Video Computer System). He later developed the central components of the Atari 400 and Atari 800 series (ANTIC and GTIA).

After Miner left Atari and developed chips for pacemakers in the meantime, he and others founded HiToro in 1982 , which was later renamed Amiga . The company developed joysticks and other hardware for computer and video games mainly for camouflage, but was secretly working on a new computer platform. While funders wanted a video game console , Miner's goal was to create a complete computer. Under Miner's leadership, the special chips (“ Custom Chips ”) were developed which gave the later Amiga computer unrivaled graphics and sound capabilities. Even after the Amiga was bought by Commodore International , Miner continued to work on "his" computer.

One of his closest co-workers was his little dog 'Mitchy', who was always with him and who was asked by his master about difficult decisions . The solution to which 'Mitchy' had shown his consent was then used. It is therefore not without good reason that he is immortalized as a developer - with a paw print - in the inprint of the devices.

In 1989, Miner left Commodore due to health problems and disagreements with management. In 1990 his sister's kidney had to be implanted. The last project he developed was a defibrillator . In 1994 Jay Miner died of kidney failure .

Web links

• Jay Miner Society