EEVblog Electronics Community Forum
General => General Technical Chat => Topic started by: d4n13l on July 31, 2018, 10:12:32 pm
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Hello everyone,
I decided a little while ago I wanted to learn electronics, just for the fun of it. And to really commit I went and bought some parts, a multimeter and an oscilloscope.. It's been a little tough starting from basically zero and on my own, specially when often I lack free time, but I really enjoy it.
Anyway, I have posted just a little but everyone has been very friendly and helpful, so I'm just wondering about the demographics here, if you're willing to share. I guess most of you do this professionally? but are many also just learning? how old are you?
Btw I'm 30 years old and do plant research for a living ;) which I guess must be weird to find here..
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From what I remember there is a "polling" feature as part of the forum (or maybe I saw it on others). Anyways, you could create a poll/survey and have people anonymously click different age range options to get some idea. It will be biased and of course totally arbitrary as to who wants to divulge that info but again it may give you some insight. I would guess that the age ranges here run the gamut from teens to college grads to people just starting off in the industry, to veterans and even retirees. One of the advantages of these forums of course is also that whatever your age, sex, ethnicity, religion, politics and what have you, we all can assume the character of our handle name and thumbnail and be whatever you want to be! Because at the end of the day, none of that other stuff really matters anyways.
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There are three ages here:
People that know a lot ,
people that know less and
people that wouldn't be able to figure out how many buckets they have without help [1]
[1] If you have one bucket that holds 5 gallons and a bucket that holds 3 gallons, how many buckets do you have?
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[1] If you have one bucket that holds 5 gallons and a bucket that holds 3 gallons, how many buckets do you have?
Threeve, obviously. :P
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I would have 5.
I already have a 2 gallon (9 litre) bucket in the laundry and two more in the garage.
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I recall things being much cleaner when I was young. Then some idiot invented Dirt. Now it's everywhere and "clean-rooms" became a thing. Ha ha.
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How old?
1. Too young to care, a couple years ago this would be the YOLO group
2. Young and foolhardy
3. Somewhat careful but still like to “see what happens”
4. Age that would like to “see what happens” but concerned about the overall costs
5. Old enough to know better, but…….
6. Old enough to care that you keep all of your body intact
7. Old enough to thoroughly think through the risks before acting
8. Retired
9. Too old to worry about it anymore
10. What was the question?
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How old?
1. Too young to care, a couple years ago this would be the YOLO group
2. Young and foolhardy
3. Somewhat careful but still like to “see what happens”
4. Age that would like to “see what happens” but concerned about the overall costs
5. Old enough to know better, but…….
6. Old enough to care that you keep all of your body intact
7. Old enough to thoroughly think through the risks before acting
8. Retired
9. Too old to worry about it anymore
10. What was the question?
:-+
#7 for me.
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When I was born, leaded solder was legal and marijuana was illegal. Now do the math.
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I remember TV stations (what's cable TV?) signing off at midnight ...
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When I was born, leaded solder was legal and marijuana was illegal. Now do the math.
The answers to these are country (and in the case of the US, state) specific.
In my case, both are still true, at least for my purposes.
I only need lead-free if I want to produce new commercial product. For hobby use and repairs, no problem.
Marijuana is illegal without a prescription in my state. And technically illegal federally in any case, although that isn't really enforced much when the state laws are in conflict.
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When did UHF TV get started? I remember when we got our third TV station. It was on UHF and my grandfather had to take our TV to have a converter added so we could watch it. My age was probably still in the single digits at that time.
I remember TV stations (what's cable TV?) signing off at midnight ...
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I remember TV stations (what's cable TV?) signing off at midnight ...
Me too. :-[
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qNxFu_uDRAI (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qNxFu_uDRAI)
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When I was born, leaded solder was legal and marijuana was illegal. Now do the math.
The answers to these are country (and in the case of the US, state) specific.
Good point. I meant in most places of course.
(And TVs signed off at midnight too.)
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haha loved all the answers, thank you
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I remember having to get my arse out of the chair and go to the TV to change the channel.
There were only two channels to choose from so not a huge inconvenience.
I also recall the first TV remote I ever saw was a Zenith that used ultrasound... I thought that was so cool.
So what was the purpose of this topic anyway? ;)
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I remember TV stations (what's cable TV?) signing off at midnight ...
I worked at some like that.
The first lot were attended transmitting stations where we had to close down everything at night,
The Log would read:-
2355 GSTQ (later AAF)*
2400 HT off
0010 Fils off.
We would then wait for the Transmitter blowers to shut down, knock off the main breakers, do a quick security check, turn off unrequired equipment, including most of the lights, close the building & go home.
*Oz didn't want to rush into things, so we used "God Save The Queen" for many years, before finally making Advance Australia Fair" the official anthem in 1984. ;D
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I remember having to get my arse out of the chair and go to the TV to change the channel.
There were only two channels to choose from so not a huge inconvenience.
I also recall the first TV remote I ever saw was a Zenith that used ultrasound... I thought that was so cool.
So what was the purpose of this topic anyway? ;)
Ha, I remember the first TV I saw that didn't use ultrasoundor Infra red (not the first remote I'd seen, but such an oddity it stuck in my memory), it used tuned bars of some metal and had little mechanical hammers to make them 'ring'
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I remember having to get my arse out of the chair and go to the TV to change the channel.
There were only two channels to choose from so not a huge inconvenience.
I also recall the first TV remote I ever saw was a Zenith that used ultrasound... I thought that was so cool.
So what was the purpose of this topic anyway? ;)
The first unwired remote I saw was on an AEI/Ekco back in 1959 or '60.
It also used ultrasound, but the most impressive thing was the big mother of a motor which turned the turret tuner via what looked like a motorbike chain.
The sound of one of those things churning from one end of its range to the other was something to chill the spine.
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I remember TV stations (what's cable TV?) signing off at midnight ...
Me too, but that stopped AT MOST 20 years ago
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How old?
1. Too young to care, a couple years ago this would be the YOLO group
2. Young and foolhardy
3. Somewhat careful but still like to “see what happens”
4. Age that would like to “see what happens” but concerned about the overall costs
5. Old enough to know better, but…….
6. Old enough to care that you keep all of your body intact
7. Old enough to thoroughly think through the risks before acting
8. Retired
9. Too old to worry about it anymore
10. What was the question?
Probably 5 for the most part. My dad is similar, however. He decided that, he himself, without any decent power tools, and just a bow saw should cut down a very large branch (around 2 feet in diameter, maybe more) off the willow tree in our back yard. I, being the responsible, intelligent, and lazy person I am, decided to help him out, with the most impressively stupid moment being when he ran out of steam to cut through the rest of the branch's base, resulting in me climbing up the ladder with a pickaxe, substituting as a regular axe, and bring the rest of the branch down.
This branch happened to be above our wooden carport, which has a roof made of some weird cardboard-ish fibreglass something or rather (it's really the consistency of very strong, thick cardboard as of this point, but still cardboard). The branch of course fell on it, and didn't go straight through, it wasn't big enough for that, but still managed to puncture a few fist sized holes into the roof.
So afterwards, me, my dad, and our neighbor, who wasn't notified that we were doing this, but didn't mind helping along with what ended up on her property anyways, cut down most of the smaller stuff until we were left with a massive chunk of log on the carport roof that was too annoying to get through by hand. It stood there for a few days before one of my dad's coworkers came by with a chainsaw and sliced it into movable chunks.
This of course left our yard a massive mess, which was cleaned up over the course of a couple days. At least I saved some of the chunks of wood, which ended up going to craigslist for whoever wanted it, for use in our electric smoker. As it turns out, Willow is a really nice wood for smoking, and sort of tastes like chocolate and coffee.
Reading back through this extended ramble, perhaps I belong in category 10, but for what it's worth, and to answer the question, I am 16.
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Old enough that I should know better, young enough at heart that I don't care that I don't.
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Fourteen years as an 8 - retired.
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Old enough to have watched black and white TV with 3 VHF channels because there was no color and none of this remote kind of rubbish. I was the remote for my parents. ;D
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Sputnik...
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Snooker on a black and white portable as a kid - and still recognising the colours. ;D
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How old?
1. Too young to care, a couple years ago this would be the YOLO group
2. Young and foolhardy
3. Somewhat careful but still like to “see what happens”
4. Age that would like to “see what happens” but concerned about the overall costs
5. Old enough to know better, but…….
6. Old enough to care that you keep all of your body intact
7. Old enough to thoroughly think through the risks before acting
8. Retired
9. Too old to worry about it anymore
10. What was the question?
Physically a solid 8. Mentally getting to (who am I kidding - I'm past ) the point where I'm recognizing things I used to be able to do mentally, right off the top of my head, but sometimes escape me now. Even if I tell no one, it's embarrassing.
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My signature is all you need to know. >:D
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My first computer was not an iPad! It was a ZX Spectrum. ;)
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My signature is all you need to know. >:D
Likewise. ;)
https://youtu.be/pCCdT_THQzw (https://youtu.be/pCCdT_THQzw)
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When I started my professsional, tubes where still common in electronics. The first computer I worked with, filled a room and was programmed using a teletyper- Now do that math.
/PeLuLe
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I remember TV stations (what's cable TV?) signing off at midnight ...
I vaguely remember that, I have no recollection of when they switched to 24 hour broadcast though. In many ways I think TV was much better in those days. The channels didn't have logos and animated garbage superimposed over the content, they didn't edit or speed up shows to pack in more commercials, the commercials tended to be less annoying and abstract, there was still a reasonable variety of content. Now it's 300 channels of ad and logo infested reality garbage.
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Welcome to the forum, d4n13l. You're still a young'n, so no worries about just getting started.
I'm older than the Internet. *faint*
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Old enough that many of my compatriots and I made our first radio using an oatmeal box, lots of wire, a pencil and a razor blade.
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@bitseeker I used to think that was my case also when I was just becoming a teenager :palm:
I got to see how people started to get personal computers and internet became a thing with cybercafés popping in every corner in my city, this back in the 90s in Mexico, now of course I know that happened earlier in other countries and that internet was actually born maybe a couple decades before that. It's not the appearance of color TV but technologically speaking a significant moment to be a part of I think.
Anyway, yes, I think it's never too late to learn something, so, thanks for the welcome.
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Old enough for you to get off my lawn.
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Daniel, I was born during the Korean war, I saw the news when Sputnik was launched and then I watched president Kennedy announce the intentions of the US to reach the moon by the end of the decade on TV. I watched the coverage of the Apollo One fire and all of the different missions. I was glued to the TV for any coverage of the missions. I then watched men land on the moon and so on and so forth. I started in electronics in the '70s and dabbled ever since. I guess you will have to look the dates of those events up...
After working for NASA for 3.5 years at the high bay training building 9, I started working at Boeing on the commercial crew systems in 2012 and I have just finished my stint on the project and will probably move on to other commercial and military projects for Boeing despite that it is time for my retirement. In fact, I will continue to work as long any company continues to hire me because I love electrical work and always have. Perhaps this is what you really wanted to know from the start?
Hope this helps...
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I asked just to get a feeling of the people here.. When I was maybe 15 years old I started hanging out with a group of guys promoting free software. We used to meet and talk about projects some of them have, or just discuss linux related stuff, I loved it. They were probably in college at the time and obviously everyone their own stuff but all shared at least one interest in common, and they helped me to catch up quick. Anyway this forum reminded me of that, I think it's great.
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In my head, I reached about 28 and stopped there. The calendar, somehow, as I KNOW nowhere near that much time has passed, puts me in my early 50s. I like that place in my head better...
-Pat
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Sputnik...
I was 10 months old when it launched.
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Old enough, to know color TV was amazing :popcorn:! (coming from B/W)
With a handfull of TV channels and no internet: Miami Vice, we stayed home for to watch :-DD
The "Walkman" was like a huge tape-deck strapped to your belt :-DD
Keywords: ZX Spectrum, Commore 64, Kaypro II. My first Internet connection was a dial-up, I was online, but had not clue what to do. Just a shell (no mosaic), gopher, finger.
Oh yeah, we played hide and seek!
Yup, those where the days! :-+
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Hmm, the first TV transmission I've watched in my life was on the 16th of June 1963 - in a neighbour's house on a TV with 5'' screen and a big lens in front of it. I was a small kid then though - you may work out how I know the exact date.
Cheers
Alex
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Hmm, the first TV transmission I've watched in my life was on the 16th of June 1963 - in a neighbour's house on a TV with 5'' screen and a big lens in front of it. I was a small kid then though - you may work out how I know the exact date.
Tereshkova in Vostok 6?
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Hmm, the first TV transmission I've watched in my life was on the 16th of June 1963 - in a neighbour's house on a TV with 5'' screen and a big lens in front of it. I was a small kid then though - you may work out how I know the exact date.
Tereshkova in Vostok 6?
Obviously :-+ .
Cheers
Alex
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the commercials tended to be less annoying and abstract, there was still a reasonable variety of content.
Hamm's Beer from the land of sky blue water
Bucky Beaver "brusha-brusha-brusha with the new Ipana" toothpaste
Gillette and "look sharp, feel sharp" razor commercials
"See the USA in your Chevrolet"
and who can forget Olympia Beer and the Artesians?
Not a really ancient commercial:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eSnqQFY8fZ0 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eSnqQFY8fZ0)
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Sadly missed all the fun bits of ye old days,but on the bright side i get to make up for it now!
Oh and seeing as 90% of folk on here could be my dad, that is my age for you.
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your dad :-//
hmm, i was in England about 17 years ago, so unless your 16.. I'm probably not your dad.
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Well i am. :clap:
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Well i am. :clap:
:wtf: uhoh :scared:
I didnt do it, you cant prove anyting....
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In short this forum has people from all ages, including a bunch of grumpy old farts like me who are pleased to see that electronics is of interest to a whole new generation.
(https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Cls45-CWYAAMLdY.jpg)
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BACK IN MY DAY, REPAIRMAN USED MIRRORS.
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Once upon a time, the only electronics I was around were a transistor radio and the van's ignition system.
For after-dark light, we had kerosene lanterns.
For water, we carried pails down the hill and filled them from a hand pump.
For milk, we carried a milk pail to the neighbors dairy farm and got it fresh and unpasteurized.
For refrigeration, we put stuff in the so-called cold cellar.
For heat and cooking, we had the classic cast-iron stove.
To fuel the stove, we had to saw logs with a hand-saw and later chop them up with an axe.
The toilet didn't flush, but we sometimes dumped a scoop of lime down the outhouse pit to keep the smell down.
There were no cell phones.
(edit to fix typo)
Once upon a time. I don't do much that way anymore, but many of you can't even imagine living without modern conveniences.
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Only a couple years before I became interested in electrical/electronic stuff, I was 10. We used to spend a few weeks at "the cottage". It was a 3-room log cabin on a plot of land leased by my grandfather on an island situated just off the mainland. My dad and his dad built it from a small camper and the trees they felled on the plot. When the water was low you could drive over to it. There was:
No internet
No cell phones
No satellite TV
No 911
No hydro
No telephone lines
No generator
No heat or AC of any kind
No traffic
No neighbours
Entertainment was provided by a crank-up Victrola, by conversation around a campfire by the shore, by fishing or by playing hearts under a naphtha gas lamp and identifying the moths that collected on the front windows at night. Once a week we would trek into the nearest village for basic groceries and 50 lbs of ice for the ice box.
It was wonderful.
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There were no cell phones.
No cell phones
Ahhh... sounds Utopian.
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BACK IN MY DAY, WE USED CELEPHANE TO COLOR OUR TV'S.
what other colors did you need but green reddish-brown and blue for westerns anyway?
b&w tv hack - https://trulyskrumptious.wordpress.com/2012/11/29/instant-color-tv-screen/ (https://trulyskrumptious.wordpress.com/2012/11/29/instant-color-tv-screen/)
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I was in my mid teens when channel 4 appeared. That was the start of the downfall.
Snooker on a black and white portable as a kid - and still recognising the colours. ;D
For those of you watching in black and white, the blue ball is the one next to the brown.
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Once upon a time, the only electronics I was around were a transistor radio and the van's ignition system.
For after-dark light, we had kerosene lanterns.
For water, we carried pails down the hill and filled them from a hand pump.
For milk, we carried a milk pail to the neighbors dairy farm and got it fresh and unpasteurized.
For refrigeration, we put stuff in the so-called cold cellar.
For heat and cooking, we had the classic cast-iron stove.
To fuel the stove, we had to saw logs with a hand-saw and later chop them up with an axe.
The toilet didn't flush, but we sometimes dumped a scoop of lime down the outhouse pit to keep the smell down.
There were no cell phones.
(edit to fix typo)
Once upon a time. I don't do much that way anymore, but many of you can't even imagine living without modern conveniences.
My childhood was about the same with two exceptions - we had electric lights (no electric heating or cooling though, so the cellar was important) and on top of wooden logs we also used coal for heating. In winter it was not uncommon to wake up early in the morning and see some ice inside the house.
Cheers
Alex
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Once upon a time, the only electronics I was around were a transistor radio and the van's ignition system.
A bit earlier for me, we had valve (tube) radios---- a "4valve" portable, & my brother's "regen" shortwave set.
Our horse didn't have an ignition system! ;D
For after-dark light, we had kerosene lanterns.
For outside, yeah, but in the kitchen, we had a "Aladdin" mantle lamp----great light!
For water, we carried pails down the hill and filled them from a hand pump.
Our well was never worth a damn, except for watering plants, so we had big galvanised water tanks fed off the house roof gutters.
In summer, we sometimes had to take a 44gal (55 US) drum into town to fill up at the standpipe.
( poor old horse didn't like that at all!)
For milk, we carried a milk pail to the neighbors dairy farm and got it fresh and unpasteurized.
We went one better, had our own cow!
For refrigeration, we put stuff in the so-called cold cellar.
No cold cellar, but the bottom of the "kitchenette", right near the cement floor was always pretty cool.
We could also hang ( waterproof ) things in a big waterbag under a tree.For heat and cooking, we had the classic cast-iron stove.
To fuel the stove, we had to saw logs with a hand-saw and later chop them up with an axe.
We did this, too, but our block was pretty big, so we could often pick up reasonable sized bits of wood in the bush.
The toilet didn't flush, but we sometimes dumped a scoop of lime down the outhouse pit to keep the smell down.
Ours was a "chemical toilet"----it had some special stuff which the "dunny seat" lid dispensed every time you closed it, which was supposed to de-odorise things.
We ran out of the fancy stuff & used something else, can't remember what!There were no cell phones.
No phones---- full stop!
(edit to fix typo)
Once upon a time. I don't do much that way anymore, but many of you can't even imagine living without modern conveniences.
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I was in my mid teens when channel 4 appeared. That was the start of the downfall.
Snooker on a black and white portable as a kid - and still recognising the colours. ;D
For those of you watching in black and white, the blue ball is the one next to the brown.
For a year or so before the introduction of colour TV on Oz, the stations were transmitting chroma, but no colour burst.
Various " hackers" devised a "chroma lock" & were watching colour well before the official date.
We had a Philips "k9" official receiver at my work, & discovered that we could do a simple " bodge" to do the same job.
One problem was that it would sometimes lock up in the wrong phase.
Nothing like watching "Pot black" with brown felt & green woodwork on the tables!