and how many threads on this site where someone wants a one-time project and we start teaching them how to make PCBs when all they needed was the connections already afforded them on a $12 Arduino board. Oh, and they get an Arduino - they only have a few lines of code to write and it is done. Problem solved.

If we take your route to the solution, we end up 50 posts into the conversation with a discussion where the toner-transfer method is not working for them... Oh god!

Are you new here?

As far as getting 50 posts into a thread and having gone no where, that's a near daily thread operating procedure just to get many OPs to divulge the very basics of whatever 'top secret' plan they have concocted to do something simple because they either don't feel that revealing the important details of what it is they are working with and want to do with it up front matters or they think they need to add as much irrelevant complexity as possible to the design in just to avoid largely imagined 'what if's' and worse because they have a poor grasp of how what they are dealing with actually works.

I have no problem with using digital control and general processing where it's justified and necessary but for many simple analog based operations it's used as a crutch in attempts to overcome poor understandings of what should be very basic knowledge and understanding of how electronics circuitry and devices operate and work. Especially so when dealing with things like power handling circuits where all the code in the world won't make up for proper use and application of power switching devices and their related driver circuit configurations and down line load LCR characteristics.

That's where I am coming from. There are certain aspects of electronics that can't be handled and dealt with purely in code work just as there are others that are easier, simpler, and more reliably done with basic analog circuitry or such.

 

. @Aleph(0) As a 'material witness' to the institutionalized enfeeblement of your generation in this regard -- perhaps you'd like to comment here?

HP I don't know why you dragged me into this cuz you know my attitude is also just like you say! Arduino and like that can be ok for creating test environment for prototyping bigger ideas but designing around them and project books for them are like encouraging ppl to retreat to harmless non-challenging virtual safetyzone where critical thought is banned to mandate following of trends as if whole world is as tawdry, trashy and phony as FB!

So my generation aren't a bunch of like some ppl think _snowflakes and buttercups_ cuz it's small minority making us all look pathetic But that's the way it's headed and protecting their hands and heads from being _soiled_ by contact with reality is totally f##ked up! Anyhow I don't see any more value to this debate than with politics!

 

and how many threads on this site where someone wants a one-time project and we start teaching them how to make PCBs when all they needed was the connections already afforded them on a $12 Arduino board. Oh, and they get an Arduino - they only have a few lines of code to write and it is done. Problem solved.

If we take your route to the solution, we end up 50 posts into the conversation with a discussion where the toner-transfer method is not working for them... Oh god!

Gophert OMG! I say teaching ppl to be dot-to-dot following idiots just to make life easier on teachers is a horrible idea! So I say you are having a wry sense of humor or just a bad day!

 

I have no problem with using digital control and general processing where it's justified and necessary but for many simple analog based operations it's used as a crutch in attempts to overcome poor understandings of what should be very basic knowledge and understanding of how electronics circuitry and devices operate and work.

tcmtech You're absolutely right! Cuz it's the same stupidity that makes two ppl sitting next to each other in quiet place text each other instead of just talk! I'd say it's vast media conspiracy to create feeble-minded masses but they're not that smart

 

I'd say it's vast media conspiracy to create feeble-minded masses but they're not that smart

Actually, it's just advanced technology that enables (encourages?) people to be stupid.

Ultimately, the technocracy will rule the world.

Or, our robot masters.

 

Actually, it's just advanced technology that enables (encourages?) people to be stupid.

Ultimately, the technocracy will rule the world.

Or, our robot masters.

Joeyd999 to be serious I wouldn't be surprised cuz too many ppl are just creatures of convenience at any price

 

Gophert OMG! I say teaching ppl to be dot-to-dot following idiots just to make life easier on teachers is a horrible idea! So I say you are having a wry sense of humor or just a bad day!

It depends if the DIYer is building a wood project and wants a blinking LED vs wanting to become an engineer. This site is not intended to teach people to become engineers - and specifically not intended to FORCE every Tom, Dick or Harry with a train, woodworking, quiz-box, quiz show buzzer, remote gas tank level indicator, to become engineers. It is intended to help people solve problems and learn as much as they want along the way.

 

It depends if the DIYer is building a wood project and wants a blinking LED vs wanting to become an engineer. This site is not intended to teach people to become engineers - and specifically not intended to FORCE every Tom, Dick or Harry with a train, woodworking, quiz-box, quiz show buzzer, remote gas tank level indicator, to become engineers. It is intended to help people solve problems and learn as much as they want along the way.

Gophert I say treating ppl with presumption of intellect isn't forcing them to do anything! It's just being respectful! So anyone posting replies to questions has taken on moral role of teacher or consultant Cuz nobody is forcing anyone to reply either! Anyhow I say enabling ignorance or being shill isn't good tuition

 

tcmtech You're absolutely right! Cuz it's the same stupidity that makes two ppl sitting next to each other in quiet place text each other instead of just talk! I'd say it's vast media conspiracy to create feeble-minded masses but they're not that smart

Gophert I say treating ppl with presumption of intellect isn't forcing them to do anything! It's just being respectful! So anyone posting replies to questions has taken on moral role of teacher or consultant Cuz nobody is forcing anyone to reply either! Anyhow I say enabling ignorance or being shill isn't good tuition

Oh thank God!
Lately I've been starting to feel like assuming people could actually learn and accept old school rationalization, logic and reasoning and be challenged to think differently (well actually, think rationally and logically at all) and be expected to understand and see that there is more than just monodimensional, or at best, binary definitions/categorizations of everything where not catering to the lowest common intellectual denominator or just plain lazy stupid was some sort of new sin/antisocial code I was not informed of.

 

So my generation aren't a bunch of like some ppl think _snowflakes and buttercups_ cuz it's small minority making us all look pathetic But that's the way it's headed and protecting their hands and heads from being _soiled_ by contact with reality is totally f##ked up!

---Emphasis Added---

+∞!

Best regards
HP

 

and how many threads on this site where someone wants a one-time project and we start teaching them how to make PCBs

I daresay 'solder-padded' 'SURF' or 'PERF' boards suffice quite nicely where 'one-offs' are at issue

With genuine respect
HP

 

Most useful components:

Winner: 0.1 μF X7R ceramic capacitors. Sprinkle liberally throughout the circuit, one for each pair of power/ground pins on every IC.
Runner-up: 10 kΩ resistors.

Least useful components:

Big box of 2N404 germanium transistors. Kept it for over 20 years, finally realized I'm never going to use the darned things.

 

Big box of 2N404 germanium transistors. Kept it for over 20 years, finally realized I'm never going to use the darned things.

I have a friend that loves "geranium" transistors. I just gave him a 4 of a TR375 and a couple of 2N2138 --both in TO3 packages. They were pulled from a bad lab power supply and may be bad. I sure did _not_ need them.

 

Least useful components:

Big box of 2N404 germanium transistors. Kept it for over 20 years, finally realized I'm never going to use the darned things.

I have a friend that loves "geranium" transistors. I just gave him a 4 of a TR375 and a couple of 2N2138 --both in TO3 packages. They were pulled from a bad lab power supply and may be bad. I sure did _not_ need them.

What I hate most abt Ge semis is their thermal instability! Cuz I have a bunch of 800W dc to dc converters for old tube operated mobile xcvrs and they all use multiple paralleled Ge PNPs with to36 cases in pwr oscillator but with light loads psu output voltage creeps up when transistors warm up from 900v to like 1800v and 200% is way too much for loads So anyhow when I redesigned circuit just to retrofit with 2n6609s now thermal voltage drift is only 6%

Sry if this is boring

 

Sry if this is boring

Nah. We're easily amused here. Life is good.

You're certainly right about the weaknesses of germanium transistors. They had absurdly high collector-base leakage which got even more absurd when they got hot, and it took a fair bit of design effort to make sure they couldn't ever go into thermal runaway.

I used to have some YUUUUUGE germanium power transistors in those TO-36 "doorknob" cases. I don't recall the part number. Into the dumpster, all.

 

TO-36 "doorknob" cases.

Into the dumpster, all.

OBWo549 that's exactly what was in those dc to dc converters I just posted abt so I say you put them right where they belong!

 

i thought i would eventually forget OC13 yet i still recall the part number... one batch had clear gue inside, handy to make a photo transistor, other versions used white paste.

 

Hello,

@panic mode , I have used the OC71 for that purpose.

Bertus

 

While I can't say where they 'place' upon the useful/useless 'index' -- I'm bound to say that among the oddest devices I've encountered are the large RF power BJT's found in certain 60's - 70's Motorola VHF transceivers...
To wit: M9625 (Generic designation = 2N6097)

Said devices being Si, SOE-packaged RF power BJTs -- But of PNP polarity!?

Do I hear someone saying I must have been 'stoned'? -- Read it and weep

Seriously! If anyone cares to offer opinions/insight into Motorola's use of such devices - or, for that matter, how/why NPN devices came to dominate power amplifier applications - I'm sure many of us would be interested - I know I would!

Still... Dazed and confused
HP

 

Hello,

@Hypatia's Protege , those could have been used in the time that cars has the positive terminal on the chassis.
It might have been used in old militairy stuff.

Bertus