Grob's basic electronics

What Hacker News says

1. RossBencinaJan 2026
   > Honestly, just pick up the Art of Electronics

   I got this advice in 1998. I have the book. I found it useful for the "art" part. It got me through the projects that I was working on at the time, but personally it didn't help me with the fundamentals. Paraphrasing what has been said on this site many times in the past: AoE is a great first book in practical electronics if you already have an undergraduate degree in physics. I showed my brother AoE when he was building guitar pedals and he couldn't make sense of it and said it was obviously assuming things that he didn't know (he had no high-school science background).

   There are a lot of potential and/or assumed pre-requistites even for basic electronics: high school physics, first-year calculus, maybe a differential equations course, certainly familiarity with complex numbers. As I understand it EEs take vector calculus and classical electromagnetism, that's a long road for self-study. For that reason it's hard to give general advice about where to begin.

   For someone starting out I think the first things to study are DC and then AC analysis of passive circuits (networks of resistors, capacitors, inductors), starting with networks of resistors. Ohms Law, what current and voltage actually mean, some basic introduction to the physics passive components. This is the basics, and I don't see AoE getting anyone over this hump. This could be learnt in many ways, electronics technicians and amateur radio people know this stuff -- there are no doubt courses outside university both on line and in person. If we're talking books, get a second hand copy of Grob's "Basic Electronics." Once that's covered you can move on to semiconductors. I can recommend Malvino's "Electronic Principles," but this book won't teach you about resistors, capacitors and inductors. After that I think the Art of Electronics would be approachable. And also more specialised topics like digital design or operational amplifier circuits.

   A book that usually gets a mention is Paul Scherz "Practical Electronics for Inventors." I got that book later, I personally found it a bit overwhelming with the mixture of really basic practical stuff combined with more advanced circuit theory, but it's no doubt popular for a reason.

   Another standard recommendation is to buy one ARRL Handbook from each decade (I have 1988), the older ones have less advanced (hence more accessible) material. But reading the "Electronics Fundamentals" chapter is no substitute for Grob and Malvino.

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2. jay3ssSep 2022
   A great introduction to circuits is Grob's Basic Electronics[0]. I used at a community collge intro to circuits course and it (and the course) gave me a good headstart for when I eventually transferred to a four year university.

   [0]: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/9467603-grob-s-basic-ele...

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3. cr0shNov 2018
   Hate to break it to ya, but this isn't really possible.

   I mean, you could have a series that explores and details the basics - ie, what is a resistor, capacitor, etc - and what they are used for, how they work, etc.

   But what you are terming "operating parameters" are specific for each part per manufacturer. Now - a carbon-film resistor made by just about any manufacturer is going to be about the same from one to the other, as it's a basic technology. Even so, certain parameters might be different (ie - how much does the resistance change with temperature and humidity might vary between manufacturers). Also, none of that applies if we are talking about wire-wound, or some other kind of resistor (and different manufacturers).

   Extrapolate this out to any other passive component, and you'll see the same thing (heck, just capacitors would overwhelm the idea). Get into simple actives (transistors, diodes, leds, etc) - and the amount of variation increases a magnitude, maybe more.

   Then drop into other components - integrated circuits, electric motors, light bulbs - heck, even simple wire; you couldn't cover it all.

   You'd know this, though, if you had any experience with electronics - which I suppose you don't, or you have little of it - otherwise you wouldn't be asking about such a youtube series.

   Instead, you should start with the basics - and for that, you're going to need to read some books (the best would be Horowitz's "Art of Electronics" and Grob's "Basic Electronics"). While it might be possible to condense some of those books into a video series, it won't be a small video series (and if you want honest and in-depth explanations - such a series would not be the most exciting to watch).

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4. cr0shAug 2017
   I'll second this book, but also recommend Grob's Basic Electronics. Also very expensive...

   ...but that last bit has a caveat: These books are only expensive if you opt for "the latest edition". If you are doing this at a hobby level (vs taking a dedicated college course or similar), purchasing an older edition will serve you just as well. Electronics haven't changed that much between today and when the book's prior revision was published (or the revision before that - or even 5+ revisions ago).

   Most of the changes are likely going to be very small and minor errata (spelling mistakes most likely).

   All that said, Art of Electronics doesn't appear too expensive, even for a current edition (provided you stay away from the academic hardcover version, I'd imagine). Grob's is on a different level price-wise, but again, you can find cheaper versions.

   I'd also like to point out Forrest M. Mims III's "Engineer's Mini Notebooks" series as something to go along with the above two books as well (or alone, if you just want the quick-n-dirty hack-on-electronics thing). They were originally sold by Radio Shack back in the day, but today can be picked up via Mims' site (which I think just redirects to Amazon). Old "vintage" copies (the new version combine multiple notebooks into one) can also be had fairly cheaply. They don't go into as much depth as the earlier mentioned books, but they can prove to give a quick and good understanding of the basics (provided you consume them in the proper order of course).

   But if you're serious about electronics, they can't substitute for the previous mentioned volumes; get those first, then get the Mims volumes later (IIRC, Mims did write a separate book on learning electronics - it's probably mentioned on his site).

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