Transistor

A **transistor** is a miniature electronic component that can do two different jobs. It can work either as an amplifier or a switch. It is the key component to all modern electronics and is superior to its predecessor, the Vacuum Tube.

## Overview

### Description

It is composed of semiconductor material usually with at least three terminals for connection to an external circuit. A voltage or current applied to one pair of the transistor's terminals controls the current through another pair of terminals. Because the controlled (output) power can be higher than the controlling (input) power, a transistor can amplify a signal. Today, some transistors are packaged individually, but many more are found embedded in integrated circuits.

### Function as a Switch

A tiny electric current flowing through one part of a transistor can make a much bigger current flow through another part of it. In other words, the small current switches on the larger one. This is essentially how all computer chips work. For example, a memory chip contains hundreds of millions or even billions of transistors, each of which can be switched on or off individually. Since each transistor can be in two distinct states, it can store two different numbers, zero and one. With billions of transistors, a chip can store billions of zeros and ones, and almost as many ordinary numbers and letters (or characters, as we call them).

### Function as an Amplifier

it takes in a tiny electric current at one end (an input current) and produces a much bigger electric current (an output current) at the other. In other words, it's a kind of current booster. That comes in really useful in things like hearing aids, one of the first things people used transistors for. A hearing aid has a tiny microphone in it that picks up sounds from the world around you and turns them into fluctuating electric currents. These are fed into a transistor that boosts them and powers a tiny loudspeaker, so you hear a much louder version of the sounds around you.

## Advantages

* lower power consumption (tubes require a cathode heater even when on idle)
* Much smaller in size for same power/voltage rating - smaller PCB footprint
* Also, operates at much lower voltages (depending on the circuit, it may be from around 1V or so while types required anode voltages around 100V–200V). Thus much safer.
* Much more resilient to vibrations and mechanical shocks.
* Tubes are usually mounted in the sockets, which add a whole bunch of poor contact issues. Transistors are usually soldered, so if only the soldering is good in the first place then nothing is going to happen over time and no contact issues expected.
* Much more reliable - lower failure rate under nominal conditions (on the other hand, tubes can survive short overloads much easier).
* Stable parameters - no problems with gasing and lost emission (the burn-out)
* Do not cause overheating to neighboring elements (e.g. electrolytic capacitors which are pretty sensitive to high temperatures as it shortens their life), thus higher density of PCB design is possible
* In audio applications, transistors do not require bulky output transformers (impedance matching)
* Are immediately ready and operational - no cathode warm up required.
* First of all - can be integrated into monolithic circuits (ICs) with millions and billions of transistors (modern CPUs) on a single chip. No way a vacuum technology could achieve that ! Biggest integration of a vacuum technology is a plasma TV screen.
* As per the sound quality - it’s a real thing to some extent and a subjective impression as well. Measurements indeed confirm that the distortions introduced by tubes are much different than these introduced by bipolar transistors (and also different than these of MOS transistors). It’s even vs odd harmonics. Some sound better than others. But with well designed and fabricated audio amp, it is much easier to minimize the distortions with transistors than tubes.

## Applications in the New World

### Second Civilization Area and the Gra Valkas Empire

For nations that are dependent on mechanical technology, countries such as Mu could only see electricity as a source of energy, and not as a means to transmit data. As a result, Mu engineers do not understand the fundamentals of a computer or even a simple-function, pocket calculator. Therefore their level of technological advancement was at a crawl by the time Japan appeared.

After witnessing the FCS of the Oto-breda 127/54 Compact Gun, the engineers were astounded by its rapid rate of fire and accuracy. Their minds boggled at the thought of the thousands of calculations one would have to do, in order to fire accurately on the move while at sea. They were even further amazed with Japan's jets, smartphones, guided missiles, torpedoes, submarines and even satellites. Though they still could not understand the workings of an LSI circuit, they started to realize that learning the fundamentals of Japanese electronics would advance their own civilization's technology by decades. Currently, Mu is trying to follow in Japan's footsteps and have sent several engineers and scientists to Japan to learn all they could.

For the Gra Valkas Empire, the level of electronic technology is still in the heyday of the vacuum tube. As such, they already have devices such as television, radios, radar, etc. However, their concept of a computer is a huge machine that can fill a room or even the whole floor of a building. This is due to the fact that the Gra Valkas engineers believe that the vacuum tube is the apex of what electronics can achieve. Unfortunately, this limitation in thinking and arrogance, has caused their technology to be woefully behind Japan's, and this is made painfully apparent during the New World War.

### First Civilization Area

Due to the fact that the Holy Milishial Empire still relies on reverse-engineering relics from the Ravernal Empire, they too are astounded by the incredible accuracy of Japan's guns and guided missiles. Like Mu, they also have no understanding of how a computer works and how it is able to make millions of calculations per second, thanks to the transistor. The Empire's ambassador tried to impress his counterparts with a bulky, mechanical calculator, only to be embarrassed when the Japanese ambassador displayed his calculator app on his smartphone.

### Japan

The country of Japan was one of the leading experts in electronics on Earth, and they have brought their expertise to the New World. The transistor and computer is what makes nearly all of Japan's technology possible, both in military and civilian aspects.