Afroman covers the basics of how transformers work, where to shop for step down mains transformers, and how to wire one up to mains voltages without killing yourself. European and North American wiring is discussed. He finishes up with a quick example of AC to DC conversion in an unregulated dual rail power supply. Remember […]
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Oscillators are a fundamental building block in electronics. You use them as part of generating radio waves, controlling the speed of digital processors, generating synth music and more. But to start out with you might just want to try blinking an LED on and off. This video will show you some basic square wave and […]
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This video shows you what a photoresistor is, where to get one, and how to use one to turn a transistor on and off. You can then use the circuit to build a laser tripwire, just like in the movies! When the laser beam gets broken, you can toggle whatever you want.
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PWM circuits are fun. You can use them to dim LEDs, control the speed of fans and motors, control the power going to a thermoelectric cooler, or control the power going to pretty much anything you want. Just make sure that you don’t exceed the maximum voltage rating of your device. The video explains it […]
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Ever since the best decade of all time, the 1970s, people have been able to buy amplifiers in all-in-one chips rather than having to make them out of lots of discrete transistors. This video shows you the basics of op amps and has an example circuit where you build an amplifier to take a tiny […]
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You can use voltage dividers to generate reference voltages, control audio volume, power low powered devices from specific voltages and much more. This video shows you practical voltage divider design issues and shows you the relevant equations.
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You may have heard about infamous capacitor plague problem, where crappily manufactured capacitors died prematurely on people’s motherboards. Even if the capacitor was properly made, they still only have a finite lifespan, typically 10,000-100,000 hours. After this, you need to replace the caps or replace the whole board. This video shows you what to do! […]
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Function generators are handy gadgets that generate waveforms. You can use them to generate sine waves, square waves, triangle waves etc of varying frequencies. The video explains why this can be useful, and shows you where you can buy a function generator for cheap. Incidentally, this kit was my first function generator.
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Everyone who knows anything about electricity will have heard of multimeters. They allow you to measure voltage, current, resistance and more. In this video I show you how to buy a multimeter and how to use it without killing yourself (always a plus). Update: The multimeter shown in the video is no longer available. Here […]
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An oscilloscope is the most important piece of electronic test equipment you can buy after a multimeter. The first video shows you where you how to choose an oscilloscope. The second two videos show you how to use it.
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