Basic diodes are constructed from two semiconductor materials, germanium or silicon, to create a basic PN-junction. When two single diodes are connected to each other back-to-back, two PN-junctions that are connected in series are created. They share a common N or P terminal, which forms the basis of a BJT or Bipolar Junction Transistor. The BJT is a three layer, three terminal, and two junction device. BJTs are normally used in discrete circuit design as well as high-demand analog circuits such as RFs for wireless systems. They have also been Read More

A hydrophone is a type of microphone that is specifically designed to be used under water. Hydrophones depend on piezoelectric transducers to detect sound waves and other pressure waves coming from underwater vehicles, animals, and natural structures. Hydrophones were widely used in World War I, and II to detect U-boats (German submarines) and are still used today for underwater seismology, aquatic research, and recording deep sea sounds. While hydrophones can be used underground and in the air, they are specifically tuned to an acoustic impedance that is ideal for water. Read More

Landfill energy production operates similar to the way natural gas power plants do. Landfills could produce sufficient amounts of biogas (components of which are similar to natural gas and comprised mostly of methane) which could be refined and used as fuel for many applications that need it such as power plants. Landfills have always been used as a place to accumulate and isolate various kinds of waste materials. These landfills are also sometimes used for the management of organic waste materials such as agricultural wastes. These organic materials and other Read More

The 3D Accelerator is a type of graphics board that can be installed into a computer. A person who does so would be installing this board to speed up the time it takes for their machine to load and create images on the monitor of their computer. Because it incorporates its own board to function, 3D Accelerators are often known as individual computers themselves. But the most important thing to remember is that the Accelerator's sole purpose is to better create three-dimensional images on a person's computer screen. How a Read More

Junction gate Field-Effect Transistor (JFET) is also known as JUGFET. The JFET is the most simple type of field effect transistor currently in use and has either voltage controlled resistance or an electronically controlled switch. When using a JFET, the electric charge flows in a semiconducting channel that is located between the source and drain terminals. When a bias voltage is applied to the gate terminal, the channel is pinched in order to switch off the electric current. JFET History Julius Lilienfeld was the first to discuss/predict the JFET in Read More

A boot sector virus is a computer virus which infects the boot sector on hard disks, floppy disks, and theoretically also other bootable media such as CD’s and DVD’s. A boot sector virus does not need to be able to successfully boot the victims computer to infect it. Because of this, even non-bootable media can spread a boot sector virus. Once the infected computer successfully boots, the boot sector virus stays in memory and infects floppies and other media when they are written to by the infected computer. Boot sector Read More

What is VGA? The Video Graphics Array (VGA) is a type of display hardware. The VGA connector is a 15 pin connection which relays all of the visual data to be shown to the computer screen. Each pin corresponds to a color, ground or placement information for the display. This has been in use ever since the 1990s and has improved in quality of the display as well. It is now most commonly found on most built in computer hardware accelerators, video cards as well as high definition televisions. The High Density Video Graphics Array Read More

There are several ways to recover a lost windows password. Hidden administrator account method, Windows installation disk, and third party software are some of the methods you can try. Hidden Administrator Account Method If using a custom user account, Windows automatically creates an “Administrator” account that is hidden from the user selection log in screen. There are two options for logging into an administrator account: The first option is to start up the machine in the welcome or log in screen and pull up the classic log in screen. Press Read More

With the increased use of applications featuring live video chat options such as Google Talk, Skype, and Yahoo IM, setting up a PC microphone is now an essential task to ensure the highest quality of service while using these and other related products. Although most versions of the Windows OS are designed to automatically detect and auto-configure a microphone, to ensure optimum performance the device must be configured to minimize the effects of background noise on the quality of sound transmission. How to Set Up a PC Microphone Step 1 Read More

LAN vs WLAN Internet speed depends greatly on the type of network the computer is connected to. There are two basic types of networks that allow Internet connection. A LAN (Local Area Network) is a network that is established via an Ethernet cable and physically connects a computer to a router, modem, or access point. LANs provide much faster Internet speed, but limits the distance between a computer and the access point it is connected to. As a result, many switch to WLANs (Wireless Local Area Networks). A WLAN is Read More