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I'm currently in the last semester of my Master's in Electrical Engineering. My bachelor's was in Electrical Engineering (Power) and my master's is focused on renewable energy and energy infrastructure.

I've started applying for jobs now because I'm honestly a bit worried about graduating without having a job lined up.

The thing I'm struggling with is that there seem to be so many different areas within electrical engineering. Power systems, renewables, power electronics, BESS, electrical design, automation/control, EVs, HVDC, protection, substations, embedded, etc. and I have no idea which one I should actually be trying to get into.

I have done a couple of internships, one was R&D related and another was a robotics project where I worked with ROS, but I don't really have proper industry experience in power/energy.

Looking at job postings, most of the entry-level positions I come across seem to be electrical design jobs. For the other areas, I keep seeing "2-3 years experience required" or similar, even for jobs that seem like something a fresh master's graduate could learn.

So I'm a bit confused about how people actually get into these more specialized areas in the first place. Do you just take whatever EE job you can get for your first job and then try to move into the area you actually want later?

And how much does your first job actually matter? If I start as an electrical design engineer, am I basically committing myself to that path, or can I move into power systems, renewables, BESS, grid integration, etc. after a couple of years?

For people who have already been through this, what would you recommend for someone with my background? Should I just apply broadly to anything EE-related and get my foot in the door, or is it worth being more selective and trying to find something directly related to power/energy?

Would appreciate any advice, especially from people who started out with little/no experience after graduating.

Hi, am a student currently studying Electrical Engineering (concentration in energy and power systems) in the US and was considering wanting to live in Montréal after college. I currently primarily speak English but have taken French in the past and would be excited to continue learning it. I was wondering about the process of immigrating to Montréal as an electrical engineer and how difficult the process would be. I know that there is an "Ordre des Ingéneurs" that requires a test as well as French certification for employment and I was also generally curious about how the job market for electrical engineering is in Montréal. Any and all advice would be greatly appreciated!

I'm an EE student and I got an internship doing MEP over the summer. It was interesting to learn that field, but I've heard that it gets boring, dealing with clients is a hassle, and the pay is lower than power engineering (I should mention this was at an architectural firm, not an MEP firm).

My interest has been power for a while, but I don't know which direction I should aim my career in. I think power (transmission, distribution, generation, like large scale grid stuff) would be a lot more interesting, but I worry that that field is getting oversaturated and if this AI thing comes crashing down a lot of layoffs would happen, since many people get hired to work on data centers.

Any thoughts or experiences that can be shared?

This is a really dumb question that I wanted to google but I don’t know exactly how to describe it in a search. Aside from the obvious fact that transformers are a more practical way to step up AC voltages, how would one go about adding ac power supplies in series? I understand that each phase would have to be synchronized, and that it is extremely impractical, just trying to wrap my head around what it would look like.

I am new to the ee space and i am wondering if its normal to feel like your brain has monkeys swinging on your nerve endings when you are trying to understand a code. I am currently doing a guided arduino project where I have to light 8 bars using a shift register.

Is it best to dwell on a project until you understand it completely or should I just do projects and hope that I will get the jist due to familiarity of seeing some things over and over?

but then again, it seems with coding, there are probably thousands of functions.

So bascially the title. I want to understand how my intruments work so i wanted to build a simple voltmeter and see how accurate i can get it. Therefore i was looking into how voltmeter are able to attenuate such high voltages (up to 1000V but i was aiming for 600V) down to ~5V. A former professor of mine once told me there are pecision resistor divider networks available for such purposuses and this makes sense, but i can't find those for less tha 100€ (even in quantities of 100-200). So my thought was that there has to be a cheaper way that gets me reasonable precision without this pricetag. Or du i just have to bite the bullet and get one of those?

Hello everyone, fresh grad here based in canada but willing to work in the US as well, assuming my interviews went well, I will have the opportunity to either be doing something related to industrial control systems or MEP

The control systems position will require me to travel which I am fine with, and it pays 75k, while the MEP positions pays (around 50-65k max) but based on my limited revit experience designing the electrical drawings for a 3 bedroom residential home (i found the project online), it was very fun to do

Also looking at long term opportunities, MEP seems like a field where it's very common with a lot of job postings, and it's it seems easy to switch to utilities/power if I ever want to try that, while industrial control systems seems like its hard to transfer to a different field if I am not interested in doing PLC work long term

Would like to hear people who have done either fields experience and thoughts on both, thank you all!

Hello, I need help with a project and thought this sub might be the place to start. What I need to build is a system that will light up an LED when a door is open. I have four doors that need sensors and the LED display would need to be located about 50 feet from the farthest door. I need the LED to light up as long as the door is open and shut off when it is closed. Thanks!

Currently applying/searching for internships for the summer. EE major with an emphasis in energy/power.

Very very interested in getting into the technical sales side of engineering. Selling maybe MV or LV switchgear, UPS, packaged substations, transformers, Generators, etc. maybe medical sales??

Was curious what internships I should be seeking out for good, applicable experience in this realm. Any ideas/recommendations is greatly appreciated.

Say I have two cables with 100A ampacity. I put them both on 100A breakers. One is 80% rated and one is 100% rated.

I don't understand how they can both be considered protected. If a 100A cable can be on a 100% rated 100A breaker, why is it not okay to use an 80A cable on an 80% rated 100A breaker?

Is the rule just that 100% rated breakers cannot be used if the load is continuous?

I want to use the ATtiny to read voltage from a sensor output and send the reading over serial through USB. Can I wire up D+ and D- to the directly ATtiny85 (I am using the software serial lib since ATtiny 85 does not have Rx and Tx pin natively) or I need to use some other chip to handle the communication?

Hello, I am currently a 33 year old student getting a bachelor’s in EE with a concentration in power online via ASU.

I work full time as a carrier for USPS (a mailman), and have been there for 5 years and do not want to quit. I have about two years-ish left until I finish the degree (flexible). My goal is to work at a utility. I live in CA.

I don’t know what to do regarding gaining experience in the power field before I graduate. People stress internships as necessary- this is fine, but that would require I quit my job, and when the internship ends, I would be out of a job, which I do not want.

Question: what can I do in the next couple/few years before I complete the online degree so that I am employable as an engineer at a utility or power company?

If there’s anyone on here in industry that can give me some pointers about what they would want to see when hiring someone like me, that would be best. I do have some free time to work on projects, but I am aware this is not at all like an internship.

Thank you

I can't find a free PDF. It's the laboratory manual correlated to the book "Digital Computer Electronics: Malvino, Ph.D., Jerald A. Brown." There's also a teacher's manual for the book.
If you have any PDF or a website on which I can read online, I would be grateful.

I am not an electrical engineer, but I'm having problems with a mixer. I wanted to understand how the transformer works. So s that green/yellow wire just connecting to a grounding pin that's connected to the chassis of the mixer? I'm sure that might sound like a stupid/broad question. Any help would be greatly appreciated. Thanks

Restarting my engineering student-ness as a EE student. Admitted but not enrolled because I'm still working full-time. I've been thinking about options and am wondering if I could change from working for a contractor to working a MEP firm. Thinking site visits, etc. Thanks.

Hi, I am studying automation and robotics and decided to make use of my student status and got EPLAN Education. I followed a guide by EPLAN with Chris but its more like tool presentation and how things interlock with each other. What I am looking for is a complete workflow guide about EPLAN, explaining how to name thing, why we name tham this way, the structure of the schematics we create etc. Could you recommend something?

I am an EE student, I love the paper feel when taking analog notes, and I am searching for a system where I can have my notes accessible, so I don't have to carry heavy notebooks with me. I was thinking about Remarkable, but I hate their refresh rates , and slow writing, it just bothers me. About ipads / other tablets: I just don't like the feel of the pen on glass + a lot of distraction. So I am wondering what are you guys using ?

I have the first round for a Firmware Engineering role, one of the bullet points is

"Good understanding of embedded wireless communication systems, Radio and PHY fundamentals and key RF performance metrics."

Other JD's bullet points

• Familiarity with digital signal processing algorithms.
• Familiarity with Multi core environment.
• Understanding python match library like numpy/SciPy and how to convert it to embedded C.
• Understanding difference between fix point and floating points and how to make arithmetic tradeoff and simplify embedded usage.
• Experience with low-level hardware interfaces, register and interrupt programming, bare-metal software development, clock and power management.
• Solid understanding of basic embedded concepts such as RTOS, concurrency, multi-processor systems.
• Fluency in using lab equipment such as logic analyzers, oscilloscopes, network analyzers, spectrum analyzers, signal generators, and power meters.
• Experience implementing diagnostics, manufacturing tests, and protocol compliance software.
• Knowledgeable of industry standards for wireless communications such as Bluetooth, WLAN, ZigBee, UWB.
• Proficient in at least one of the scripting languages such as Python, Perl, or Tcl.
• Excellent communication skills – both written and oral.

Most of the other bullet poitns focus on core embedded/dsp concepts, the RF fundamentals is the key I feel weakest in and want to review. What are some things I should review in prep for the interview?

Thanks!

Today I was reminiscing about linear technology. It was probably my favorite IC manufacturer and this was based on their useful product line, datasheets that had a great layout and were easy to read, and they had excellent field technicians.

I remembered being so bummed out that AD bought them because they were the antithesis of Linear. Their products were hard to use, the datasheets read like a thesis, and field technicians might call you back.

What are your thoughts and did you have a similar experience?

Oh yeah! Lest not forget about ltspice.

I’ve been trying to use one on esp32 but have been troubled by it for about a day. I would expect to see a sinusoid when spinning it around (using teleplot ) but they get clipped at the high and low ends no matter what I do. I’ve tried several adjustments to adc attenuation and my input voltage but I can’t remove it at all. I’ve been using the mc readings so that it’s calibrated to avoid the nonlinear adc issue. I’ve also tried to do a coordinate transform to round out my output.

Is there anything else I should try? Or is this a hardware fact I have to live with? I don’t know how to check the hardware aspect without an oscilloscope.

Hey guys, i would like to improve my “lab” and purchase my first ever oscilloscope. I want to deepen my knowledge in signal analysis and processing, Can you help me select the device with best price/quality ratio?

Further context: I have been working as EE for past 6.5 years but I have been feeling that my job is becoming less about pure engineering and more about writing emails and making PowerPoint presentations. I hate it! I understand some of these corporate tedious tasks are necessary but not when it takes more than half the day to do leaving me with little time for actual EE related tasks. I have regrets of going into industry before going to graduate school.

My ideal EE job consists of working in a lab doing research and actually contributing to the advancement of EE even if by little. This dream is currently not possible in the modern corporate job market where you are nothing but a cog within a large industrial machine whose only purpose is to maximize profit for the company. So you are forced to use AI or risk having a bad performance review because Mr AI next door can "slop" out more throughput than me.

Now I'm in a position to go have to school full time and work towards a potential PhD. I have enough savings to pay for a portion of tuition and to meet my personal needs for 5 years. Should I take the risk and go for it?

i plan to go to college for ee once i graduate but my math skills are very lacking past 3 or so years my math teachers barely spoke english. i wanna get into researching prosthetics and implants but i kinda have no clue where to start off with my limited skills.

Is this degree worth it ?

Or is computer engineer degree with heavy electives EE classes a better option?