MAKE Presents: The Transistor

What’s the deal with the clever transistor? We’ve been covering them all August in our Component of the Month series, and it’s time to pull out a classic explanation of the technology from the dusty archives of Make: H.Q. Once again, our pal Collin Cunningham (now with Adafruit) educates us on this amazing component, which basically revolutionized electronics.

Collin covers transistor chips, vacuum tubes, field-effect transistors, as well as the first point-contact transistor developed at Bell Labs. Collin describes the configuration of the transistor’s three pins. He even has time to describe a quick transistor project.