I’m new to electronics and looking to assemble an array of components and tools for working on and designing electronics & circuits. Something immediately apparent is that all of the widely available kits orient you towards working with microcontrollers and SBCs; these kits are cool, but I want to have a halfway decent understanding of the underlying analog components and circuit design before I go digital.
With that in mind, what should I get? If anyone could specify specifics to look into, I’d really appreciate that! Thanks for the help.
Current list
- A decent breadboard
- Jumper wires
- Multimeter
- Batteries
- Variable Power Supply?
- Assorted resistors (1Ω-?)
- Capacitors (Electrolytic and ceramic?)
- Various ICs?
- Transistors?
- Diodes, probably?
- Potentiometers
I don’t understand the list, the first don’t have a question mark, but then they do. Does that mean that the first items are already in your possession and you imagine needing the rest?
If you have all the stuff on your list, I get a book. Practical Electronics for Inventors by Paul Scherz is a terrific resource. With that in hand you can start dreaming up projects and realizing them.
If the question mark is the stuff you expect to need, I’d say that a lab power supply is almost a must have. Nothing fancy, something that’ll do 20 or 30V and a few amps, if you’re looking for something a bit more, then same specs but with current limiting. Something like this https://www.reichelt.de/de/en/laboratory-power-supply-0-30-v-0-3-a-risu-compliant-mcp-lbn-303-p324544.html but see if there’s a second hand market for this stuff in your area.
Some basic components kits like a resistor and a capacitor kit. Maybe assorted diodes and transistors. Maybe get some voltage regulators, 7805 7809 and 7812, they can come in handy, when you’ve only got a single output on the psu and need different voltages.
That should be enough for a few months of fun. Next you’ll maybe play with timing and triggers. So a pc scope opamps and some 555s.
Sorry, I should clarify - the list is items I believe I’ll likely need and the question marks indicate that I’m not sure if they’re necessary or that I’m not sure the specifics about what I should get. For example, I’m sure I need resistors, but I’m not sure if I need everything from 1Ω to 1MΩ, or which ICs to get. I was also unsure if I should get a variable power supply. Hopefully that makes more sense?
I think I understand now. I’ve taught intro to electronics for years, and I’d recommend you start out experimenting with resistor networks and measurement techniques. In that case you really don’t need to spend much. All you need is:
Try designing networks of resistors with pen and paper, calculate voltages across the individual resistors to get familiar with Ohm’s law and Kirchhoff’s circuit laws (BTW don’t attempt to understand Kirchoff using Wikipedia, someone wanted to flex their brain when writing that article). Build more and more advanced circuits, start out with series, then parallel, and finally mix series and parallel resistors. Try to work out the power draw of each resistor, and just once try to blow one up… On purpose, that is :)
When you’ve sorta got the hang of it, you can progress on to adding capacitance and inductance in you circuits, or digital logics, or what ever you like. But getting the hang on basic circuit theory? well, that can take some time.