Burrell Carver Smith (born December 16, 1955) is an American engineer who, while working at

Apple Computer Apple Inc. is an American multinational technology company headquartered in Cupertino, California, United States. Apple is the largest technology company by revenue (totaling in 2021) and, as of June 2022, is the world's biggest company ...

, designed the motherboard (digital circuit board) for the original

Macintosh The Mac (known as Macintosh until 1999) is a family of personal computers designed and marketed by Apple Inc. Macs are known for their ease of use and minimalist designs, and are popular among students, creative professionals, and software en ...

. He was Apple employee #282, and was hired in February 1979, initially as an

Apple II The Apple II (stylized as ) is an 8-bit home computer and one of the world's first highly successful mass-produced microcomputer products. It was designed primarily by Steve Wozniak; Jerry Manock developed the design of Apple II's foam-mold ...

service technician. He also designed the motherboard for Apple's LaserWriter. Burrell was working in Apple's service department when he helped

Bill Atkinson Bill Atkinson (born March 17, 1951) is an American computer engineer and photographer. Atkinson worked at Apple Computer from 1978 to 1990. Atkinson was the principal designer and developer of the graphical user interface (GUI) of the Apple ...

add more memory to an Apple II computer in an innovative fashion. Bill recommended him to Jef Raskin, who was looking for a hardware engineer to help him with his newly formed

project. As a member of the design team, Burrell designed five different motherboards during the course of Macintosh development, all of which used techniques based on Programmable Array Logic (PAL) chips to achieve maximum functionality with a minimal chip count and cost. Burrell left the company before releasing Apple's "Turbo Mac" design platform, which included an internal hard drive and a further simplified chipset. He was later a co-founder of

Radius Inc. Radius Inc. was an American computer hardware firm founded in May 1986 by Burrell Smith, Mike Boich, Matt Carter, Alain Rossmann and joined by other members of the original Macintosh team like Andy Hertzfeld. The company specialized in Macintos ...

Macintosh 128k

Smith's signature is molded into the case of the Macintosh 128k computers.

Personal life

Smith is retired and lives in

Palo Alto Palo Alto (; Spanish for "tall stick") is a charter city in the northwestern corner of Santa Clara County, California, United States, in the San Francisco Bay Area, named after a coastal redwood tree known as El Palo Alto. The city was es ...

.Inside the Mac Revolution
- Wired - 16 December 2004 He reportedly had

bipolar disorder Bipolar disorder, previously known as manic depression, is a mental disorder characterized by periods of depression and periods of abnormally elevated mood that last from days to weeks each. If the elevated mood is severe or associated with ...

during the 1990s.

Steve Jobs Steven Paul Jobs (February 24, 1955 – October 5, 2011) was an American entrepreneur, industrial designer, media proprietor, and investor. He was the co-founder, chairman, and CEO of Apple; the chairman and majority shareholder of Pixar; ...

by Walter Isaacson, page 253. In 1993, he was accused of "breaking windows, throwing a firecracker and leaving letters at the house" of

; the case was dropped when he accepted treatment. Actor

Lenny Jacobson Lenny Jacobson (born June 11, 1974) is an American actor best known for his recurring role as Wayne Cobb in the Apple TV+ original science fiction space drama series '' For All Mankind.'' Life and career Born and raised in Holyoke, Massachuset ...

portrayed him in the 2013 film '' Jobs.''

References

External links

Revolution in the Valley
Andy Hertzfeld's book about the development of the Macintosh.
Folklore.org stories about Burrell Smith
stories of Smith's contributions written by other Macintosh team members Living people Apple Inc. employees 1955 births {{compu-bio-stub