I found the course to be fascinating since I enjoy the hardware side of CPE as much as the software side. Initially it was slow since we were starting at the very basics learning about boolean expressions, logic gates, types of circuit components, and timing background. Things really started to pick up after the first exam once we started Verilog and started to learn about more complicated designs.

This course is essentially one the foundations for CPE students that will carry over to other related courses. You will turn boolean equations and truth tables into actual circuits and design a few yourself. You will learn all the different types of circuit elements at their most basic level and learn how they operate. This is where you'll learn about the basics of Verilog. The main take aways from the course is Verilog and finite state machines since these will come up.

Dr. Pang was a thoughtful professor as she cared about the students who were struggling. She did have trouble communicating some more complex topics and student input was low so she did assume majority of the time that we understood it, so be sure to speak up.

Brush up on boolean algebra and K-maps to be ready for the first few weeks. Take some time to learn some Verilog basics, we used Intel Quatrus but Xilinx Vivado works too. Also finite state machines are must since you will use them in later courses.