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It's hard to build an oscillator

(lcamtuf.substack.com)
219 points chmaynard | 2 comments | 21 Nov 25 07:45 UTC | HN request time: 0s | source
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ofalkaed ◴[21 Nov 25 09:56 UTC] No.46002962[source]▶
When I was starting out in electronics I found the easiest way to build an oscillator was to build an amplifier and the easiest way to build an amplifier was to build an oscillator. I guess the trick is to be 7 years old and have far more ambition than skill. Couldn't guess at how many tries it took me to make an amplifier that didn't oscillate and when I moved onto oscillators, they never oscillated but they did amplify. In that first year or so, I couldn't actually read resistor color codes, but I thought I could.
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1. taneq ◴[21 Nov 25 11:41 UTC] No.46003565[source]▶
Often the biggest thing holding you back from doing something is the sensible, mature understanding that it’s impossible.
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2. dylan604 ◴[21 Nov 25 16:52 UTC] No.46006178[source]▶
Growing up, I never had the budget of a real TV studio, but had equipment that would approximate a real TV studio. I would come up with ways to recreate what they were doing because it could clearly be done, but by using totally different equipment that only looked like it was up for the task. Asking the real TV people if it could be done, they'd say no. I'd say hide and watch (too young to have a beer to ask them to hold).

Sometimes, the box a degree stuffs you into with all of that learning often means losing some creative out-of-the-box thinking abilities. I get away with things all the time because I didn't know you weren't supposed to not do this, yet now that I have, it works just fine.