High School Student With Tech Career Questions

[Archangelhunter]

Hello,
I am a 17 year old high school student in the MPTA (Manufacturing, Production, Technology, Academy) and I am working on a summer assignment that requires me to go to online forums and seek information. I have made a "small" list of questions that I need answers to. I am VERY interested in the field of computer engineering and manufacturing, particularly in hardware and networking. If anyone would be kind enough to answer some or all of my questions I would greatly appreciate it. Thank you for your time.



1. What advantages/disadvantages are there to automation in mass, moderate, and job-lot production?

2. Is it a good idea to attend a 4-year college if I intend to persue this career?

3. If yes, what college courses will help me most?

4. What particular colleges in California are well known for their programs in Computer Engineering?

5. What qualities in a person are most benificial in this field of work? (Diligent, Hard-Working, Intelligent, Charismatic...)

6. Lastly...Do you feel that either of these careers (Hardware manufacturing/Computer Networking) will be a good idea to persue 5, 10, 15 years down the road?

THANK YOU!!

 

[Alphathree33]

Sorry, but I think that networking and computer engineering are seperated by distances of galatic proportions.

I'm tired of people equating college-bound, hands on students like network/system admins with university-bound engineering students.

There is just no comparison both in terms of what is studied and what is done on the job.

 

[dirtboy]

I'll answer question #2: it's always good to have a 4 year degree with any career.

 

[Archangelhunter]

Thank you for your input, if it helps, my main interest is in computer hardware. I consider networking more of a hobby. The questions I had in mind pertain mainly to a computer hardware major. (video cards, and cooling systems) Hope this helps you help me!!

 

[Siddhartha]

If you run your own business, you might not be held back if you do not have a college degree but in any other professional situation you need a degree.

 

[gopunk]

you can't go wrong with berkeley

as for #6, my only advice is to study what you love. unless you anticipate that at some point you will no longer love it...

 

[Archangelhunter]

I was thinking of going to Cal Davis or maybe Cal Poly. If neither of those colleges accept me, I'm williing to move to go to college in Seattle where Microsoft is located. If this sounds like a bad idea, please tell me before it gets too late . Does anyone have an answer for #1? That's one that nobody's touched on. Thank you all for helping me so far.

 

[notfred]

1. What advantages/disadvantages are there to automation in mass, moderate, and job-lot production?

I dunno, WTF are those things?

2. Is it a good idea to attend a 4-year college if I intend to persue this career?

Um, if it's Comp. Eng. related, yes.

3. If yes, what college courses will help me most?

Probably a Comp. Eng. Degree, but I still don't know what job-lot production is.

4. What particular colleges in California are well known for their programs in Computer Engineering?

Cal. Tech.

5. What qualities in a person are most benificial in this field of work? (Diligent, Hard-Working, Intelligent, Charismatic...)

Logical thinking, willingness to put in a LOT of hours, patience.

6. Lastly...Do you feel that either of these careers (Hardware manufacturing/Computer Networking) will be a good idea to persue 5, 10, 15 years down the road?

Only if you like them. But yes, the fields will still be there.

 

[KevinMU1]

Archangelhunter, one of your comments kinda bothers me:

The questions I had in mind pertain mainly to a computer hardware major. (video cards, and cooling systems) Hope this helps you help me!!

There is no such thing as a "computer hardware major." No program is gonna tell you about what video cards are good, or how to make a video card (in any significant detail), how to spec them, benchmark them, etc, or how to make a good cooling system for a PC. Those are hobbyist type things. You could go into computer engineering or electrical engineering or computer science or something, but there is no "I love hardware and want to make a college career out of it major." Those things lend themselves more to certifications and specialized training programs.

Your question #1 is so vague that no answer can be provided b/c it is totally dependent on what is being produced and the exact production environment.

A college degree has to help. Your salary will be $x higher with a college degree (where $x is significant), and this can be shown by any study of salaries.

Courses cannot be determined without knowing more about you and your exact interests. What exactly do you WANT TO DO? EXACTLY. Name a specific career path.

I'm not familiar with California colleges.

You need to be intelligent and hard-working, and learn easily.

I'm not in the business of predicting the future. It's impossible to say how computers will change.

 

[Archangelhunter]

I guess i've been too generalized with my question asking . Thanks for pointing it out KevinMU. What i meant in question #1 was how automation would improve or slow down the process of manufacturing computer hardware. Since I have no idea how it is done, I was hoping someone with experience would explain in a simple way how it's done. Ex/ How does nVidia or Crucial make those green circuit boards with chips, diodes, resistorrs, and caps embedded on them? Does a robot solder them on or does an engineer pain-stakingly solder each chip on?


For question #1:
What I really want to know is, what type of production does computer hardware generally fall under? (ex/ manufacturing video cards)

Mass production - produced continuously at high volume for a considerable period of time.
Moderate production - produced in relatively large quantities, but the output may be more variable than for mass produced parts and more dependend on sales orders.
Job-Lot production - production is usually limited to lots closely attuned to sales orders or expected dates, employees may be more highly skilled, performing various tasks depending on the part or assembly being made.

Sorry if I've confused anyone further. And thanks for those who posted some answers recently!!

 

[Farmall]

#1 - Mass production will generally bring the part cost down, and in my opinion will to a certain extent bring a higher ratio of defective parts due to the nature of the production.
Job lot production will definetly have the highest cost per part but will invariably have the highest ratio of "good" parts. Moderate falls somewhere in the middle.

#5 - I think if you are not honest and willing to work hard, it doesn't matter how intelligent you are.

IMO honesty ranks higher than them all. I have seen it before in my line of work where someone will mess up, and rather than say anything will attempt to hide the fact, it will most of the time be found out and will cost far more to fix later than at the time of the mistake. More often than not the person who did try hide the mistake will be "known" anyway.

 

[Archangelhunter]

Originally posted by: Farmall
#1 - Mass production will generally bring the part cost down, and in my opinion will to a certain extent bring a higher ratio of defective parts due to the nature of the production.
Job lot production will definetly have the highest cost per part but will invariably have the highest ratio of "good" parts. Moderate falls somewhere in the middle.

Which would you say video card production falls under? Mass, Moderate, or job-lot?

 

[IcemanJer]

another disadvantage to mass production is that if you produced all the hardware and no one buys it, you've spend all these money in fixed and variable costs that won't generate any revenue.

video cards, I'd say falls somewhere between moderate and mass production, although probably closer towards moderate production. It's definately not mass production because not every computer needs a video card these days (integrated video, produced by motherboard manufacturers), but in the market trend definately doesn't reflect moderate production where high volume comes in bursts.

 

[IcemanJer]

1. What advantages/disadvantages are there to automation in mass, moderate, and job-lot production?

mass - large quantity, lower average variable cost (well, up to a certain level of output), and higher yield.
job-lot - the output level might not merit the amount of fixed cost that goes into production, or the revenue is so low that you're making negative profit.

2. Is it a good idea to attend a 4-year college if I intend to persue this career?

it's always a good idea to attend a 4-yr college, even if what you study in college isn't related to your field. I have a friend who took computational neuroscience as her undergraduate major, but right now she working as a consultant with Solomon Smith Barney. I know music majors who went on to med school. However, given that a field such as engineering or computer related is perhaps more focused and narrow and would require the entire 4 years of education, but your undergraduate years shouldn't be devoted to just that. Broaden your horizon, learn about other subjects, expand your knownledge. Your mind will thank you for it later. It's very important to have a broad range of interest and knowledge, to be able to strike up a conversation with anybody about anything (well, almost anything). If you want to specialize, that's what graduate schools are for.

3. If yes, what college courses will help me most?

it would all depend on what you want to pursue.. to become essentially a technician, or someone with a diverse knownledge base with concentration in one discipline.

4. What particular colleges in California are well known for their programs in Computer Engineering?

Berkeley.
CalTec.

5. What qualities in a person are most benificial in this field of work? (Diligent, Hard-Working, Intelligent, Charismatic...)

being charismatic certainly doesn't hurt. you gotta be able to work with other people in a team, be able to manage interactions between people, communication..... have an open mind to other people's suggestions, have the enthusiasm for your field, be willling to learn anything very fast (I guess that ties in intelligence). But I think the most important thing is that you know where and how to look for answers to questions that you don't know, and be not afraid to fsckup real bad.

6. Lastly...Do you feel that either of these careers (Hardware manufacturing/Computer Networking) will be a good idea to persue 5, 10, 15 years down the road?

computer engineering will always be around. it may get very specialized and intricate as time goes on, but as long as there is a need for computers, there will be a need for someone to design them. And our world is becoming increasingly interconnected, so network hardware will also be an asset in the future, be it in researching faster and more secure ways of communcating, or something complete unthought of.

 

[Archangelhunter]

::This is a shameless bump of my own topic ::
Thanks again for recent input!!