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I've been wanting to get into hardware type projects (robots, gizmos, etc) for a while but I'm fairly ignorant of hardware. I'm a software developer by trade. I've seen books like "The Art of Electronics" and "Teach Yourself Electricity & Electronics". But what I really need is a book of project/tutorials, that upon completing them, I can honestly say I am very, very familiar with electronics.
Is there such a book?
Even the narrowly scoped books I found to usually be quite a bit less effective than they should be. Then again, the books I'm referring to where school books.
It would be quite a huge book. The topic area is more broad than you'd think, although not at all impenetrable. I don't know if any such comprehensive text exists. All of the books I used, I found to be quite poor and limited in scope compared to books in other fields. I think it's easy to see why. Frequently I'd just read everything I could scattered around the internet. Maybe you have a more narrow goal for what yo…
It would be quite a huge book. The topic area is more broad than you'd think, although not at all impenetrable. I don't know if any such comprehensive text exists. All of the books I used, I found to be quite poor and limited in scope compared to books in other fields. I think it's easy to see why. Frequently I'd just read everything I could scattered around the internet. Maybe you have a more narrow goal for what yo…
I am worried about breadth vs depth issues. It's probably why people get degrees in this. :) I'm sorry if I made it sound like I thought it was trivial. I'm not in any hurry, though; The Hardware Hacking books from O'Reilly are ok but not .. I dunno, "enough". The "Teach Yourself .." book is pretty dense...
I wish I could help more, but I still curse the books I learned from:)
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I am worried about breadth vs depth issues. It's probably why people get degrees in this. :) I'm sorry if I made it sound like I thought it was trivial. I'm not in any hurry, though; The Hardware Hacking books from O'Reilly are ok but not .. I dunno, "enough". The "Teach Yourself .." book is pretty dense...
That's a problem with most EE books, it's either extreme depth or broad and shallow. You have a good question. I'd like to see others' recommendations. I wish I could help more, but I still curse the books I learned from:)
I hope this is certainly possible to answer. Theoretically, if someone reads the right books and practices in the right way, along with hefty discipline and focus, one could say they would be very, very familiar with software and systems.
You might want to think about electronics on several level and topics:
- Board Level: Op Amps, Feedback Control Systems... etc.
- Chip Level IC design: Analog IC design, Bipolar/CMOS design... etc.
- Firmware: C, Assembly language...
...each of these topics are semester/year long courses on its own. I can recommend books in each topic, but have not seen a do-it-all, teach-it-all book.
as attack said, "the topic area is more broad than you'd think."
I don't have any good books in mind, but I think you need to know what you're really interested in learning about hardware. Define "very, very familiar with electronics." You might want to think about electronics on several level and topics: - Board Level: Op Amps, Feedback Control Systems... etc. - Chip Level IC design: Analog IC design, Bipolar/CMOS design... etc. - Firmware: C, Assembly language... ...each of thes…
I would buy a circuit kit, like the one for 12 year olds, and you can knock out those projects pretty quickly, but they usually come with schematics and pieces for 100 projects or so. RadioShack sells them, but when you want to buy more parts, don't go there, go to Jamco or Digikey.
Learning Chip Level IC means learning how to reduce binary functions, there are many 'tricks' to this, and from my CS classes, they didn't really care much about reducing, and the EEs always did much better when it came to binary logic then the CS students. Also Figure out transistors, the circuits kit will have some transistor projects, and do a good overview, but learn the math and (some) of the physics here, it will help you understand.
After that, find some books on microcontrollers and or microcomputers. Figure out how RAM and ROM work (not necessiarly the internals) and program some.
I've heard great things about the Arudino, but I've never used it. I started off on the PIC series, and then to Motorola 8bits and Coldfire 32Bits, both of the last two, you can program in C, so no real assembly is required.
I agree with yangyang2, as far as a do it all approach, you probably aren't going to find it..
http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/Electrical-Engineering-and-Compute...