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EEVblog #555 - 555 Timer Kit

14 videos recommended on HN
YouTube
2 HN users recommended this tutorial2 months2014–2019 score 2.5
Years with an HN recommendation, 2007–2026

Recommended as a deep, hands-on explanation of how a 555 timer works inside.

Dave Jones builds the Evil Mad Scientist discrete-component 555 timer kit, then tests it and explains the internal circuitry of the 555 at transistor level. He finishes with scope waveforms.

“Please watch this clip as Dave dives deep into how a simple 555 chip works at the transistor level” (HN, 2019)

1 strong recommendations · 1 recommendations · 1 citations · Tutorials · intermediate

3 Hacker News comments

From the HN archive; up to 20 kept per video, favoring different commenters. Recommendations first.

@spectramax Apr 2019 Strongly recommends
on HN thread How to Read a Schematic
Read more
I totally agree with you. There is a deeper problem I think across the board, whether it is electronics books or programming tutorials, mechanical engineering, etc. For example, no one teaches you the way you see in this particular segment of an old EEVBlog episode [1]. Please watch this clip as Dave dives deep into how a simple 555 chip works at the transistor level, breaking down into modules and explaining how each module works. What we need is a book that does the following: Break down REAL circuits from the wild, explain each module in isolation, then explain how it fits into the larger system. No one does this, not in my 15 years of experience in engineering. It is the same everywhere regardless of the subject, teaching is difficult thing to master. 3Blue1Brown is a rare exception, a unicorn of a guy. Richard Feynman's physics lectures are also an example. Programming books are littered with content pages that list: 1. Variables, 2. Loops, 3. Conditionals, 4. Strings, 5. Functions, 6. Objects,..I am already asleep. YAWN. This is a wrong way to teach people how to program . I couldn't emphasize it enough. Most people won't remember what all these things are and they'll lose interest as they grind through this mindless mess of syntax that they have never seen before. Instead programming should be taught by building a goal to automate something. Start out by hard coding everything, then introduce variables. Add functions to make your code modular. Then introduce objects, e
Breaks down 555 at transistor level, module by module
@okket Oct 2018 Recommends
on HN thread The 555 and How It Got That Way
Don't miss the #555 Episode of EEVBlog where Dave Jones solders this kit and talks a lot about how the 555 works its history: [this video]
Solders discrete 555 kit and explains how the 555 works

Citations, criticism and jokes

@cogburnd02 Dec 2014 Cites it
on HN thread To elaborate on why open-source hardware is hard
> You could have an open replacement for e.g. the 555 There is already a kit [1] for a 555-like circuit (I think Dave [2] says there's some reason it can't be used in place of an actual 555) made of discrete components. But there's no indication that it's Open Hardware, though. :-( [1] [link] [2] [this video]
Dave builds a discrete-component 555 kit

Video list and Hacker News comment labels from HackerTube (prompted by @karpathy), released under ODC-By 1.0, built on the open-index/hacker-news archive. Hacker News data is provided by Y Combinator; comments remain the work of their authors. Video titles, channel names and thumbnails belong to their creators and are shown via YouTube. HackerTube Watch is an unofficial edition. Data export of 2026-10-31.

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