So I just finished my first year of undergraduate electrical engineering study and feel like I don't know nearly as much electronics as I like or am willing to learn.
For the past couple of months I've been trying to teach myself by reading electronics magazines (Talking Electronics being one of them) and other articles here and there rather than learning from a text book. My concern is that I could be using my time a lot more effectively by solving exercises and working through textbooks. Especially considering I will have to in the coming years of my education.
What do you guys think?
As IanB says,build some stuff from other people's designs.
Once you get a feel for things,start analysing why the designer used a particular component or technique.
Often it isn't very "high tech",it just happened to be the part lying on the bench!
If you can,"Tear down" some Commercially made equipment,whilst looking at the schematic,if available,to determine how things are built in the real world.
After a while,you will notice that Manufacturers don't always strive for unique design,--If a Sony circuit looks a lot like a Philips or Sanyo circuit,is that a bad thing?
Many EEs,or would be EEs on this forum will advise you to "design something".
My problem with that,is that if you don't have a feeling for how things are done,you may get tied up trying to "design your way around" problems which someone sorted out in 1936!
As you are at Uni,don't neglect the wonderful resource you have in the University Library.
If your present knowledge doesn't give you an answer,look in the Library first,before you "Google",or ask on a forum.
You may get an answer to your direct question on the 'Net,but a book will often answer other secondary questions,& give you more background on the subject.
I was a contract Tech at UWA for a while,& one of the things I had to fix was a Nuclear Magnetic Resonance instrument.
Well I didn't know a thing about NMR,so I had a look at the Library,& there was all the information I required to make intelligent guesses about what the fault was.