Advantages of Transistor | disadvantages of Transistor
This page covers advantages and disadvantages of Transistor. It mentions Transistor advantages or benefits and Transistor disadvantages or drawbacks. BJT transistor type is used for discussion on working operation, applications etc.
What is Transistor?
• The transistor is a solid state equivalent of a triode valve which was used in radio and early
computers.
• It is made of three layer semiconductor materials. Common semiconductor materials in transistor construction are silicon and germanium.
• It act as an insulator and a conductor.
• The 3 layered transistor is also known as BJT (Bipolar Junction Transistor).
The name has been derived from the term "bipolar" due to use of both electrons and holes
as charge carriers in the structure of the transistor. BJT transistor is categorized into
NPN and PNP types.
• Transistor has three regions viz. emitter, base and collector.
Emitter is heavily doped, base part is lightly doped and collector part is moderately doped.
• Basic planar structure of BJT transistor is shown in the figure-1.
• The symbols of transistor of NPN and PNP types are shown in the figure-2.
• There are difference types of transistor viz. BJT, FET and MOSFET etc.
• BJT is a current controlled device which provides amplification or gain to the input signal.
FET is a voltage controlled device with terminals source, gate and drain.
• For transistor to be operational, BE (Base-Emitter) junction is forward biased and
BC (Base-Collector) junction is reverse biased. As a result of this connection, current flows
where, IE = IB + IC. This is shown in the figure below.
• There are three operating regions of a BJT transistor viz.
cutoff, linear and saturation. This can be resembled to different conditions of a water tap viz.
OFF, ON and full ON respectively.
• Transistor can be used as switch >> and also as an amplifier. As a switch it operates in either cutoff or saturation region. As an amplifier, Due to small changes in the base current, collector current will mimic input base signal with higher amplitude.
Refer PNP vs NPN transistor >> , BJT vs FET >>, MOSFET vs BJT >> and UJT >> for more information.
Benefits or advantages of Transistor
Following are the benefits or advantages of Transistor:
➨Input impedance is highest and output impedance is lowest for
common collector BJT amplifier. Darlington pair is used where
very high impedance is needed. Darlington pair offers very high current gain.
➨It is used as current controlled current source.
➨It is used for fast switching applications.
➨It is available at very low cost.
➨It is very smaller in size.
➨It has longer life.
➨It uses low voltage for its operation. Hence
it offers more safey.
➨There is no power consumption by cathode heater.
Drawbacks or disadvantages of Transistor
Following are the drawbacks or disadvantages of Transistor:
➨Due to its small size, it is difficult to trace out faulty ones due to failure.
Moreover it is very difficult to unsolder and replace new ones.
➨Manufacturing techniques are very complex and requires clean room environment.
➨Transistor has non zero ON resistance. Hence when it is ON, voltage across
transistor is never zero. Moreover during OFF state also, there is flow of
small leakage current. Hence it does not work as efficiently as
mechanical switch or electrical switch or relay.
Advantages and Disadvantages of other wireless technologies
What is Difference between
difference between OFDM and OFDMA
Difference between SC-FDMA and OFDM
Difference between SISO and MIMO
Difference between TDD and FDD
FDMA vs TDMA vs CDMA
FDM vs TDM
CDMA vs GSM