zippsinc
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Electronics books for beginners???
Hi there Can anyone recommend any Electronics books for beginners? There are so much out there that it's confusing. I'm really interested in learning this stuff and how it relates to music equipment (preamps, effects, A/D converters etc). I just enjoy learning really but this is a major gap in my knowledge. I would really need a text or combination of texts which start from the beginning explaining the very basics and more importantly how not to kill myself learning. Therefore, basic electricity principles would be a must too. My current level of maths is that I left school with Level 1 (highest) maths at UK Standard Grade level GCSE so I shouldn't be at too much of a disadvantage there I suspect - not for a begninner anyway. I did toy with the idea of getting Craig Anderton's book on 'electronic projects for musicians' but several reviews it received said that some of the stuff featured in it was now hard to come by. Any suggestions? Regards Zipps
post edited by zippsinc - 2009/02/25 14:21:22
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Doc_Hollingsworth
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RE: Electronics books for beginners???
2009/02/23 18:48:05
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It's true about Craig Anderton's book to some extent. But alot of the parts are still available. I learned alot about effects as they applied back when the book was published. But after a look at some of the modern gear it's better to know about the principles of operation rather than how they used to work.
You might check into Modern Recording techniques, 6th edition by David Miles Huber. It's a good starting point. As for basic electronics, There are a number of books that go through the basic theories and laws as it relates to electronics, DC current and AC current. I can't pick one off the top of my head as I went through most of that at university. In today's electronic world everything is miniaturized and operates with some sort of DSP.
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zippsinc
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RE: Electronics books for beginners???
2009/02/24 14:28:47
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Thanks Doc
Appreciate your input.
Will look into the Modern Recording techniques book you suggested and will research some more into basic electronics books available.
Regards
Zipps
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Guitarhacker
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RE: Electronics books for beginners???
2009/02/24 15:22:43
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National Radio Institute, and Cleveland Institute of Electronics ( I think) still offer courses, some are reasonably priced for beginners in the electronics field.
You can find some books online..... radio shack sells books, also if you have any tech schools close by, they may offer some courses.
As far as the math.... basic ohms law and it's related formulas are quite simple, as you get into frequency formulas and capacitance/ inductance..... well... it gets interesting. Some trig and algebra will help. I suggest getting a decent scientific calculator. It makes the arithmetic simple...and accurate too.
Understanding electronics...at least how current flows and what is happening inside when you twist a knob is good stuff. I've been through some tech school classes and also took classes with NRI & CIE. Good stuff there from all the sources.
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zippsinc
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RE: Electronics books for beginners???
2009/02/24 15:37:28
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Cheers Herb Will look into everything you suggested.  My local tech doesn't offer electronics sadly. Just bought a book which assumes no knowledge of electronics and goes ever-so sightly beyond high school level. Probably a good place for me to start for now. I now realise I should have at least taken physics when I was younger. Getting A grades in chemistry and biology have not come in handy one bit, interesting stuff though if you count the chemistry degree I started on but never completed. Too busy thinking about girls and loud rock music me thinks. hee hee  Thanks again. Zipps
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Fog
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RE: Electronics books for beginners???
2009/02/24 17:28:42
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zippsinc, as you probably know Craig posts here from time to time. it depends what you want them in reference to electronics, or how it is with music.. 2 places that'd be good is the library and maplins probably sells books. They used to do projects to make at home.. also there is plenty of home brew stuff on the net. e.g. making synths out of old computers and just generally modding things. you probably could even take it as an evening class at college, we did electronics as part of our computer b-tec years ago. Herb , we used to have radio shack here.. more known as tandy, but I haven't seen any of them shops for years. maplin is probably the nearest to that.
post edited by Fog - 2009/02/24 17:35:38
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Bristol_Jonesey
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RE: Electronics books for beginners???
2009/02/25 05:32:51
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Hah! Fog, you remind me of an event from my distant past. We bought all of the Maplin kits for a synth project they were running - Oscillators, Filters, Envelope Generators, absolutely loads of the things. We even partially redesigned the signal flow and built our own case for the thing. After about a year of putting together the PCB's and testing most of them, we realised the futility of it all, as about that time, fully fledged, polyphonic synths were hitting the market, at a street price less than what we paid for the sum of our modules - and it was only monophonic. I seem to recall swapping the whole thing for a guitar.   
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zippsinc
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RE: Electronics books for beginners???
2009/02/25 14:14:57
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ORIGINAL: Fog
zippsinc, as you probably know Craig posts here from time to time.
it depends what you want them in reference to electronics, or how it is with music..
2 places that'd be good is the library and maplins probably sells books. They used to do projects to make at home.. also there is plenty of home brew stuff on the net.
e.g. making synths out of old computers and just generally modding things.
you probably could even take it as an evening class at college, we did electronics as part of our computer b-tec years ago.
Herb , we used to have radio shack here.. more known as tandy, but I haven't seen any of them shops for years. maplin is probably the nearest to that.
Hi Fog Nah....I didn't know Craig Posted on here. What are the chances of that..lol. Just googled and found out he wrote a Sonar book too. Oopsadaisy. Maplins for books? Now yer talking. Outstanding. Thanks for that Fog. Although I haven't found a course locally as of yet. I'll keep looking but may have to consider a distance learning one. An old friend once done an Open University course in Electronics. I'll give him a ring and see wht he can tell me about it. Thanks again. Zipps
post edited by zippsinc - 2009/02/25 14:23:26
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