Electronics

mantequilla

Turkey781 Posts

September 21 2016 12:33 GMT

I hope there are electronics people here who will see this.

I am a CS graduate. I wish to be able to:

- identify electronic components on a board

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* what are "c32" and such? I assume c means capacitor, and 32 is just a number to identify it. But there are also J5 and N252 ...

- have a general idea how does it work when I look at a board

- diagnose and replace/repair broken parts on a board

- design my own circuits...

What kind of books should I read, which sources should I study? Can you provide me with a little know-how?

Cryoc

Germany913 Posts

September 21 2016 13:35 GMT

For identifying components:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reference_designator
It is almost impossible to know how a board works by just looking at it without a schematic, unless it is very simple, has only two layers for wiring and doesn't have microchips on it.

ChapatiyaqPTSM

France1887 Posts

September 21 2016 16:03 GMT

C32 is a capacitor as you have guessed.
J5 is a connector, probably unmounted (the white rectangle below represents the space it would have taken), or maybe on the other side of the board.
N252 is probably not linked to a component in particular, but more to the board in general.
U4 is for the CREATIVE chip.
X1 is a quartz

Cryoc's wikipedia link can help you to understand all that.

Sometimes a simple cheap broken capacitor can cause a board to stop functioning, and is cheap (at worst a few bucks) to replace. You can find on Google good ways to visually identify such a broken capacitor.
A multimeter could be even better to find broken components. It will be harder to identify on complex components (like the CREATIVE chip).
It could also be that two tracks which are close to each other are slightly connected, causing a short circuit.

Looking at the references of the complex components (often the biggest) give you an idea of the global function of a board. Here I'm guessing it's a sound board, because of U2, U3 and mainly U4.

Schematics will help you get deeper into things, because it is generally organized by functional blocks, while the printed circuit board is sometimes organized to make things work (you need to have two components close to each other, you need to have all the connectors on one side of the board...)

To design your own circuits, if you're only speaking about schematics, you can draw them by hand. If you want to design the printed circuit board, you'll need a software. I have not used free software in a while so I don't know which one is good nowadays, but after a quick Google search, CircuitMaker seems like it could be good enough for you. The most difficult is to find component libraries, where you can find the components you want to use. But you can always create the entries yourself using data from the component datasheet.

You can learn by doing. There are some cool small projects you could read about in the internet, though sometimes it also includes programming as Arduino and Raspberry Pi have helped make things more accessible. Datasheets of complex components often come with advice about how it should be used, like what resistors and capacitors you should use with it.

If you want, you can also try to get general knowledge, though it's less fun. I learned at school, but there are probably good things in the internet. You can always find a book called "Introduction to electronics" or more advanced stuff if you want, then google the chapter titles if the price is too high.

Korakys

New Zealand272 Posts

September 21 2016 23:46 GMT

The white numbers on the board refer to matching numbers in the circuit diagram and in other documentation that you probably don't have. The more interesting numbers are those on the actual components themselves. They tell you what the components are so you know what to replace them with if they are broken. For example R36 says 221 on it which means it's a 220ohm resistor.

If you want to have general idea of what the board does I suggest finding the biggest chip on it and putting the number on it in a search engine. That should give some data as to what the board is for. But yeah, you can't glean much just by looking at a board, schematics are critical to conducting any but the most basic of repairs and even then it is not easy.

wholesaleelectronics

1 Post

March 18 2026 13:57 GMT

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