electricity

Book just skims the topics mentioned in its title - just a disordered collection of a bit outdated drawings with childlike commentary. No word about power conversion essentials: topologies, magnetics, feedback, stability, EMI, power semiconductors.

This is by far the worst book I have bought on the subject of switching regulators. It is in essence a collection of manufacturer datasheets and application notes, thrown together in no particular order... with virtually no reference to feedback design, stability, or considerations for board layout. I guess all of the author's designs work perfectly on paper, but try building one and making it stable! Not a good choice for the beginner, definitely not a good choice for the seasoned designer.

This book presents different circuit configurations and tries to explain what they do theoretically. Definitely not for beginners in electronics. It does not give you an introduction to many things you should know to be able to understand what is explained here. It is good as a reference book.

Budden confuses known science with wild speculation,something that he claims his critics do.
His eye witness reports are scant/uncheckable.
He claims to be a sceptic,but uses hauntings/ghosts phenomena to explain hauntings/ghost phenomena,which is an odd position. :)
Witness views odd phenomena near power lines= power line effects
brain.
Witness views odd phenomena no where near power lines/rf etc= magnetic field from earth effecting mind.
Which makes the whole thing untestable.
Dead silent on ufo/paranormal ground traces/multiple witness reports of structured objects/ghost phenomena that appears to react to observer.
If you ignore all reports/evidence/observations that dont fit into the authors narrow/odd views and then you could say he was onto something.

Artie

The hottentots might believe that a watch works
because there are demons inside. If an alarm goes off
the demons explanation still 'works'.

For Budden, the demon is electromagnetism.
There is so much Hottentot in his book that it is just
as well we wait for someone who can write on the
subject with more rigor. He does not even use test
groups and putting together a few examples of reports
associated with EMF is hardly proof of a causal nexus.

I do not deny that it is an hypothesis worth looking
into for clarification of its influence. But at
present I find too much Hottentot in Budden's handling
of the subject.

Budden combines his familiarity with parapsychology, ufology, and electromagneticism into something amazing. Building on Michael Persinger's Tectonic Strain Theory, Paul Devereaux's Earth Light Hypothesis, as well as Clinical Ecology and work on EM pollution, Budden makes a real contribution toward understanding the ufo *and* abduction phenomena.

Along the way, we learn of the research of John Hutchinson, independent Canadian physicist who has been able to replicate poltergeist effects in a laboratory ("skeptics" take note!) by creating EM fields.

Budden's conclusions are controversial, he utterly rejects any external intelligence in his explanations of the various phenomena, so he will no doubt alienate many ufo "true believers" just as he has managed to alienate many parapsychologists, who so desperately want to believe their evidence proofs life after death.

This book should be of special interest to anyone interested in the HAARP project, as Budden's (and Hutchinson's and Persinger's) research has direct bearing on project potential uses. Imagine, create an ELF EM field around an enemy force, throw them into confusion, pacify them, have them experience "abductions" on the spot, make their weapon fly around like out the "Exorcist". Who needs a crashed UFO? If Budden and co. are right this line of research has bearing on fusion energy, earthquake prediction (and generation?), weather control, mind control, psychological warfare, non-lethal weaponry, and yes (the "nuts and bolts" crowd's favorite) *advanced propulsion systems*.

Finally, I find it interesting that quite independently of Budden's work. I found, while reading Thomas Allen, POSSESSED: A TRUE ACCOUNT OF AN EXORCISM (his account of the case that the "Exorcist" was based on), that during the boy's most violent attack, which occured just before his baptism as a Catholic, loud static came over the radio, even when it was turned off! Your witness, Mr. Budden.

How many kilowatt hours are included with this overpriced book? How ironic? Informative, but that's about it.

This book changed my views on customer choice and it's role in the energy industry's future. What an excellent publication!

this book is a complete disaster. As its mysterious title indicates, the book is very vague and does not explain any of the proposed matters. It seems like the author gathers information from here and there and throws it at you in an attempt to make up the chapters. To make the matters worse, the quality of the print and paper is almost as bad as the author's work. Although this book would make a great door stop, it's still a waste of a good tree. PLease save the trees and your money and don't buy this book.

"Electrical Energy Systems" provides easy to understand descriptions and sample problems for the reader. An excellent reference for anyone involved in the Electrical Power Industry.

It's a same with all the great books published today, that occasionally a book slide through that should have never made it to the press.

This book is a wonderful record of the way things were accomplished in everyday living when electricity and cars were beginning to make their way into homes. I found it enlightening, entertaining, and educating. I recommend it to anyone who is interested in rural life, history, and short story telling. It is a wonderful book to read to kids and to elderly people.

The fact that I was required to buy this book for a class is horrific. Several PAGES of corrections now have to be distributed at the begining of the class. The author, who also taught the class at RPI when I took it has no idea how to teach efectivly, in writing or in person. As soon as he stopped teaching it, the cirriculum was changed and his text eliminated. If you have any choice in the matter, do not buy this book!

This book is ~ok, i needed supplements to understand the course material, the author, which is very knowledgable is not the best teacher. Another reason why this book does not teach the material very well

this book includes all the topics that are necessary to thoroughly master the subject of electric circuits, and then some. not only are these topics included, but the material is brought together in an ideal manner, promoting intuitive understanding of the subject matter.

I used this textbook as a college undergraduate in the late 1980s and thoroughly hated it. I have since advanced my education in Physics, and have found MUCH better textbooks -- Griffiths' text on E and M is FAR better.

Barger's textbook is miles wide and millimeters deep. It resembles a book of mathematical formulas with practically no explanations or derivations. The notation is extremely difficult to decipher, and the book isn't arranged in any order. Topics are only loosely described, and there are few topics that are logically related.

You would do better to pass this book by.

Probably the worst electricity and magnetism textbook ever written. We used this for an intermediate level class, and not a single concept was adequately or reasonably explained. Wording is ambiguous, explanations and problem sets are unclear, and there are countless fundamental errors, both conceptual and mathematical. This book is so bad that it makes their Mechanics text look good by comparison.

The bad sometimes drives out the good: so it seems to be with the other reviewers preference for Griffiths' terrible (but popular) text. Griffiths (compared to B&O) reminds me of what Frodo says of servants of the Enemy (compared to Strider):
"I think a servant of the Enemy would look fairer and feel fouler". Griffiths may look fairer than B&O, but B&O is taking the reader over the proper (but difficult) road rather than glossing over the problems and teaching less to "looking fair". If Griffiths' words and examples seem too simple and easy, maybe they are! If you aim to travel the hard road of E&M (rather than a weekend romp through the Shire), take "unfair" Strider (B&O) as your guide.

Tesla, The Modern Sorcerer, is not what I expected. I wanted an biography of the scientist, but the dialogue with his father at the start led me to believe that it was a children's book, assuming details of actual dialogue were not recorded for posterity. However, after a more careful inspection of the jacket, I found that although the book is labeled Science / Alternate Technology, it is none too clearly also identified as a novel. This is not bad in itself. However, the writing is terrible! Names, dates and place are given and dropped as quickly without having any kind of cohesion. It became apparant to me that the author had writen an outline to help him structure his story, but then he copied the outline and filled in nothing. Details and dialogue are stacatto and stilted. He references, at one point, a machine that runs at so many Webers, without defining what a Weber is or even mentioning it again. Details appear to be decently researched, but the "novel" concept allows these to be manufactured. The authors other works are novels about UFO abductions, and he uses this book to tout his UFO theories. A waste of time to read, but perhaps interesting to a child without previous knowledge of science.

Though what you may learn of the subject matter is facinating, the novelization approach and contrived dialogue sometimes borders on annoying.

As well, the amount of background information (on Edison, J.P. Morgan, etc.) provided sometimes is more distracting than helpful.

I purchased this book wanting a good biographical account of Nikola Tesla. Though it is that, what I didn't realize was that it is really aimed at young readers (ages 9-12). Nothing on the cover or the introduction mentions that fact. The odd book size(wide format), the larger font size and the limited vocabulary give it away as a juvenile selection. I would recommend it highly for that age group. However it was not the adult biography I looking for. I think I will give my copy to my son. I believe he will enjoy it.

This is a pretty bizarre book, bizarre in that I honestly don't know who would find it useful. Whether you want a detailed mathematical understanding of circuits or just a qualitative picture of what's going on, this book is probably not going to help you either way. There is no discussion of even the most basic circuit principles such as Kirchoff's laws for voltage and current. A few circuits, such as the basic transistor oscillator, get vague handwavy explanations, but at least 1/2 of the circuit diagrams in the book come with no explanation whatsoever. The ordering of the chapters is apparently random, with most chapters focusing on a single type of component (transformers, transistors etc.) and later circuits. The circuits discussed are fairly complicated, and readers certainly won't have the tools to understand them based on reading the previous chapters alone.

I bought this book a long time ago (I believe just before entering high school) and I think I can honestly say that I didn't learn anything from it. Unforunately, I can't recommend much in the way of good electronics books since I have yet to find one, but I do recommend getting a college physics textbook for understanding the basics of electricity, capacitors, inductors and AC circuits. Those are the first few steps, at least.

Save your money. This book is full of errors, incomplete formulas, mis-labeled illustrations, and just simple errors. For a third edition, it is very poorly edited. All these mistakes should have been caught and corrected in previous editions. Some of the information herein may be accurate, but the reader cannot trust it to be correct because of all the other obvious inaccuracies. An unreliable textbook is worse than unhelpful to the dedicated student.

While I agree it is hard to find the "perfect" electronics book for everybody, I have to say that I did like the size, lay-out, and organization of this easy reference and review book.

Yes, it is probably better-suited for non-professional engineers, inventors, and hobbyists, and is on a level that everyone can use and understand. In fact, the author states plainly that he tried to avoid being "too technical" and intends this book for home-builders and hobbyists, which I appreciate!

My favorite chapters are "DC and AC," "TUBES," "RADIO," "BATTERIES" (which includes dry batteries and general battery rules), and "POWER SUPPLIES and CHARGERS" (which includes circuits for building a battery charger).

As (costly) electronics books go, this is probably one of the best organized I have ever seen, and a great place to start, especially for hobbyists and students in this field.

I am using this text right now in a circuit analysis course, and I believe the text is actually making the course harder than it needs to be. I have a number of years experience in electronics and have taken circuit analysis in the past (far past). This book, while doing a fair job on the basic explanation of the principals, uses trivial examples for illustration, then leaves you to figure out the more complex drill and homework problems with absolutely no help whatsoever. In addition, the authors and Prentice apparently think that a student solutions manual would hinder the education experience, so their solution set is illustrated only in the instructor's manual, which is unavailable to students. Consequently, you have no idea whether you have worked the problems correctly unless the instructor corrects them, or provides access to the solution manual somehow. If I'm working problems at 2 am, running to the library or the department office is not an option. The authors should redo this book completely and make it useful to students, rather than relying on the good graces of the teachers who use it. In the meantime, be prepared to do a lot of outside research to help you with the examples. Unless you have to have it for a class, send Prentice a message and buy a different book.

I used this book for my introductory circuits class three years ago and, upon reflection, it was one of the worst books I was forced to buy in 4 years of engineering. The examples are too trivial to help with the problems, which are too hard because the explanations are horrible. My teacher wasn't much better at explaining the material, making this the worst class I have ever taken. But after taking more advanced circuits classes, I find them to be less appalling.

I used the 5th edition of Nilsson and Riedel for my 2nd year circuits course (and a year 3 systems course) at Auckland University a few years back. The 6th edition, as far as I know, look pretty much the same as the 5th so my comments tend to apply to the current edition as well.

The book was not too bad but the explainations were sometimes too brief and a section on series and parallel resonance should be reintroduced (this is vital to understand 3rd year electronics and 4th year communications sys and RF electronics courses). Often it required much-more-than-necessary efforts to fully understand and tackle the problems at the end of many chapters (unless you come up with an excellent lecturer who had comprehensive course notes and you can forget about the text. We had such a lecturer for transient analysis, but we were forced to rely exclusively on the text for three-phase circuits and resonance).

A better alternative would be Linear Circuit Analysis by Davis (The school opted to this text instead of Nilsson for same Circuit course in 1999, but has since changed back to Nilsson)