Is there something wrong with Malvino's Electronic Principles

June 9, 2010 10:37 PM

Is there a reason Malvino's Electronic Principles would be considered a bad book?

A coworker told me that when he was in college in the 1980s, he was told to avoid Malvino's Electronic Principles because it was "full of errors" and "wrong". I've been going through an old edition (© 1973, 1979), and so far I haven't seen anything egregious; it seems to agree with other textbooks. But then there's this Amazon review, and the fact that I'm not an electronics expert.

Is it a poor pedagogical approach? The fact that Malvino uses ideal approximations when he shouldn't? Something else?

posted by Monday, stony Monday to Technology (2 answers total)

Everybody has a different approach to learning. What works brilliantly for you might appear to be absolutely useless to somebody else, and vice versa. Allow for that and the GIFT and I doubt you'd find any textbook that's never had a negative review.

Hell, I understand there are even people who don't like A FORTRAN Coloring Book.
posted by flabdablet at 11:40 PM on June 9, 2010

I used Malvino's Digital Computer Electronics for a class and it was excellent. I bought Electronic Principles because I loved DCE so much. His style is a little more conversational, and I suppose that some people really dislike that.
posted by 200burritos at 12:06 AM on June 10, 2010