Thursday 26 February 2015

Explain small signal model of transistor to a beginner



I am a little weak in analog circuits even though electronics is my subject (Engineering course). Transistor is like a Pandora box to me. Last day I read a question about how to use transistor as switch in this site. It made complete sense to me. That gave me confidence to learn more about transistors. I want learn deep about that now. Deep enough so that I can even do analysis myself without referring any textbooks. So please explain me about transistor models in plain English.


I know what transistor is. What I dont know is about its models for circuit design like hybrid model, small signal model etc. I dont what equations (I got books for that). Tell something in plain language.


EDIT: Explain about Small signal model.



Answer



These small signal models are important if you want to characterize the frequency response of whatever amplifier you end up building with these transistors. In a lot of applications, it is not enough to just know the gain for a given DC input.


Suppose I have built myself a common-emitter amplifier out of a BJT for the purpose of amplifying an audio signal. Let's say I've added my decoupling and bypass capacitors and biasing circuit as well. How would I go about determining whether or not my amplifier ends up attenuating 15 KHz signals? How would I determine if my signal output at 40 Hz is strong enough? For the purpose of amplifying audio, these frequencies are important to consider.


The gain is not uniform across all frequencies and this is due to the inherent capacitance and resistances inside the BJT itself. Thus we need to construct these models that closely resembles the transistor's internals for the purpose of performing circuit analysis on paper (or in CAD, if your tools allow) that will tell us if our amplifier design is suitable for our application or not. The parameters you speak of are usually given in the transistor's datasheet such that you can plug them in to one of the commonly accepted small signal models and perform your calculations.


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