Customer Reviews

Microelectronic Circuits (Oxford Series in Electrical Engineering)

5 star:		(47)
4 star:		(22)
3 star:		(10)
2 star:		(22)
1 star:		(16)

 

 

Authors try too hard in explaining the basics, but are too lazy to explain the more "challenging", more practical topics. Beware of words like thus, obviously, etc. which are used as an excuse to not explain things. Like, you'll be reminded constantly that Vbe ~ 0.7V, but when it comes to giving explanations for some of the most important points, they'll let the reader figure out the reasons themselves. So please don't tell me there isn't enough space to explain "everything". In other words, if you're a student that likes to memorize rather than understand what's going on, then this book is for you, because the authors fail to inform. And there is plenty of material for you to memorize. The problem of not getting enough EE students to emphasize on analog circuits is partly due to poor textbooks on the subject. If Sedra was writing a book about dogs, a line in his book would go: Because dogs love to lick on bones, flying saucers are round.

I was excited with this book. Some people told me it's a classic microelectronics textbook, yet I found a glaring deficiency in this book - the lack of in depth explanation and examples. The text material is clear and pretty fun read, but it gives a false sense of security that you understand the subject. And when the homework problems tell you that you don't fully understand the topic, the text does not help much in further understanding. I feel like the book is laughing at me now (you don't understand the concept, and I won't explain it to you, hahaha!). Bad book with an attitude problem! =)

I have tried my best to use this book as my primary textbook for introductory electronics. Unfortunately, my frustration with this book is still about the same. Every chapter or section starts out very clearly and seems to make perfect sense. But all of a sudden an avalanche of new information follwos in the form of (step-by-step)analysis and (tips) that no beginner student can possibly find intuitive. I got somethings out of this book, but only the very basic concepts. Advanced concepts are not covered with the biginner student in mind. Recently, I have come across the book by P.R. Gray and R.G. Meyer. Supposedly that is a higer level book than Sedra's. But it actually makes much more sense to me than "Microelectronic Circuits". I think it's much more structured,and geared toward developing the true understanding that a designer needs. I still use Sedra's book as a reference, however, every now and then.

In my theory the reason behind the great success of this book is that it is written for students in the way students like! As a matter of fact, learning from Sedra might be as tedious or maybe impossible as learning Greek from a Spanish text assuming that you know neither! It starts with bode plots and Op-amps. If you really have no idea about the very basic circuits and circuits' analysis (mesh analysis and node analysis) you will have a big trouble reading this book!

The text assumes that you understand the theory of operation of the reactive components and how for e.g. the RLC different configurations really work. Surly, if you are already familiar with the basic concepts of circuits' analysis you will find yourself enjoying the time all through the text.

However, the text is thorough by nature as it covers Op-amps, basic electronics (p-n junction and transistors), analog electronics and lastly digital electronics. Not every thing is perfect and ideal just like every text. Needless to say it is written by a human!

As a student, this text has a huge number of `solved' problems and exercises for you to practice which is preferred by students as it is the best way to check their understanding of concepts.

The Op-amps are thoroughly covered in the very beginning of the text which might not be preferred by those die hard bottom to up students. Despite the fact that Op-amps are not relevant before the analog electronics part it gives the reader motivation to go further in the subject. However, it connects your signals background with the analog implementation in such a comprehensive way that makes you need no other text whenever you are designing some Op-Amp based circuit which ,in turn, make this part a very useful part to consult whenever you are refreshing your memory beside that it is good and to the point to learn from!

For the first part of the text (Basic electronics), the presentation of information is not just intuitive, it is also a practical as it makes you see the big picture and not focused on the solid state physics which are taught in more advanced courses. In this part, the fast overview on solid state physics and the first time student friendly coverage of the analysis and design of simple circuits filled with a collection of relevant problems test some times the student insight and some other times the student knowledge of the theory make the student able to adapt with more advanced topics as fast as it is required for those increased pace courses. Moreover, it exposes the student to some advanced topics related with the industry which might motivate readers.

The Analog part of the text covers almost all topics needed in the undergraduate level as it covers thoroughly advanced topics like frequency response, filter design, Power amplifier classes and also there is one nice chapter devoted for Op-amp complete design.

The digital part is slightly covered compared with the analog part this text is more devoted to. It assumes that you are familiar with the very basic topics of electronics for e.g. Boolean algebra, logic gates ...etc. Although the digital part is not as thorough, the eye opener style gives the reader the ability to detect potential problems in digital integrated circuits in various ways as it gives you an example of implementing some digital integrated circuit then walks with you through it step by step then gives you the chance to see the problem then it solves it with you then shows you the modified (enhanced) circuit and do it the same way till you reach the best one that can resist noise, ground instability to some extent,overcome switching problems, ...etc; this is done in no more than two iterations! At some points you might find the technology used in some digital implementation is not as up to date as you might expect from a such a big text e.g. DTL; however, it rather gives you the creativity of the circuit designer than showing you the `free' latest technology journal! Which ironically is irrelevant as it depends on much more topics those are not covered in this volume!

To summarize this: if you are an undergrad. Student I strongly recommend this text to use all through the basic electronics course if and only if the course's topics are covered in the first part. Also, I would recommend this text on Analog electronics course which I find this text superior in the area to other texts I read (more than 3). As for digital electronics course I would recommend you use it as a supplementary text since it gives you some examples more involved with electronics than digital design concepts. Moreover, in such case I would recommend some other text like Tocci or Mano. Nevertheless, in my view, the text that would match Sedra in its analog part but in digital part is Rabaey.
As a circuits design professional (lucky you to have such a rare profession today!) this text would help you as long as you wont exceed the scale that make you think more about physics!

The bottom line is: This book will never be a waste of neither time nor money.

This is by far the worst book I have had the displeasure to read. The first problem is the incomplete examples. On page 128 the author claims that 10/10 = 1mA. In my book that is 1. The examples are only the begining of the problems with this book. The CD that came with the book (at least mine did) is filled with the exact pages from the book. How does this help anyone. Every person that has read the book (Including the teacher who teaches the couse) agrees, Never ever by this book if you want to learn electronics.

This book does a good job covering the basics of transistor operation and basic amplifier configurations. There are a few other sections which are done well, but beyond that, the text is not a very pleasant read. Not enough examples is one issue. Some topics, such as oscillators, are only briefly covered, without any particular worked examples. Sometimes authors state that they are making an assumption, but fail to provide reasoning.

In short, this one is ok for beginners, and it does it's job half decently, but I wouldn't recommend this as a reference, since it's not in depth and explanations are lacking in many places.

I am a Computer Engineering student at University of Toronto. If you notice, the authors of this book are from my university. I agree that this is a very bad book for beginners because I just finish an Introduction to Electronics course. This book contains too little examples and all of the examples are too easy compare to the exercises. This causes many students to have a difficult time understand the practical concepts. The books has so many errors on the examples. This also makes beginners to be fustrated and it is very time consumming trying to figure out what is wrong while learning at the same time... Last but not least the reason why I think this is a bad book because it doesn't explain how to apply all the concepts to real world problems... It just throw at you all the theories, numbers, and units and not to mentions many are wrong.

I've been designing circuits for 10 years, and Sedra and Smith was the first electronics text I used. It might be the de facto introductory text in Canadian (and other) universities, but it's not really a good place to start learning.

S&S proposes several completely impractical circuits, like two open-loop cascaded high-gain op-amps. It does not discuss current and voltage references in nearly enough detail and glosses over temperature and supply dependence. The treatment of feedback amplifiers is unnecessarily complex and yet not rigorous enough.

Though the book implies that circuit noise is a problem, it does not discuss how noise is generated in circuit, nor how to calculate its effect. But circuit noise is the most fundamental problem facing designers. The problem is that S&S is dated. It was never strong on circuit theory fundamentals, and now its examples are out-of-date. It offers little or no insight into analog integrated circuits.

This is not the right book to use if you want to learn either circuit theory or practical circuit design. For operational (transconductance) amplifier design, I would recommend Laker and Sansen's book, Design of Analog Integrated Circuits and Systems.

I want to change my review as I realize that it is not bad as it is made to seem.

Good analysis. If you want to understand overview.

Try these basic books:
-Electronic Devices and Circuit Theory (Hardcover)
by Robert L. Boylestad (Author), Louis Nashelsky (Author (EXCELLENT!!)
-Books by Albert Malvino
-Basic Electricity (Navy Book)
-Basic Electronics (Navy Book, old uses vacume tube but excellent)
-Basic Electronics (by GROB)

Harder Books:
Alan Grebene: Books by this author are the best. HE is the best author out there better than anyone else in terms of Analog Design. Use all his references as well. Without a doubt the best, better than Gray and Meyers
Gray and Meyer Book:
Jacob Millman Books:
Designing Analog Chips by Hans Camenzind: This is what the IC world is all about!! 20 dollars. Not much analysis, but is all intuition.
Check IEEE Journals for real circuit examples, and see if you can figure them out that is best idea, you can sample circuits on PSpice.

This is one of the worst circuits books I have ever encountered. The examples don't explain much, the questions asked at the end of each chapter don't match the examples, the topics are all over the place and don't have much relationship with one another, the explainations are poor and incoherent... Many important concepts are left untaught and expected from the student when doing exercises. My fellow electrical engineers, if your circuits class happen to use this book. I pity you. May God have mercy on us all for having to go through a semester with this book. Amen