Computer Engineering Career
Information Technology (IT) is the common name for several areas including Computer Science (CS), Software Engineering (SWE), Information System Management (ISM) and Computer Engineering (CE). When the other areas are software oriented, Computer Engineering (CE) is the combination of both hardware and software. CE is the study of computer hardware, especially the development, manufacturing, and installation of computer hardware such as computer chips, circuit boards, computer systems, network system, multimedia devices, and related equipment such as keyboards, routers, servers, and printers.
This field should not be confused with Electronics Engineering (EE) that focuses on the broader scale of design of electronic components. Computer Engineering (CE) is narrowing only on works relates to computers and computer equipments. The field of CE is rapid advancing in recent years due to the high demand in consumer electronic devices such as smart-phones, tablets, medical devices, network systems as well as Cloud Computing.
CE students learn about the design, planning, development, testing, and even the supervision of manufacturing of computer hardware, from chips to device controllers, from computer networks to the transmission of data and multimedia across the intranet and internet. Students study about the interface between different hardware devices; between hardware and software to come up with new capabilities or improving existing systems. The CE area is based in the electronic hardware such as circuits to chips but also on operating systems, system architecture, and software interface. Computer engineers must understand logic design, microprocessor design, computer architecture, computer interfacing, and continually focus on system requirements and design.
According the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, the starting salary for Computer engineering graduates is $82,160 to $92,000. Because this field requires a lot of experiences in the industry, senior CE with five years can make $125,000 to $145,000 and could go higher as Chips Designer engineer in some semiconducting and electronics companies such as Intel, Motorola, ARM or Texas Instrument. Today a majority of CE focus is in mobile platforms instead of computer platforms and there is a difference in pay for different job duties, but these variations are linked to experience. For example, engineers whose responsibilities include technical management make the most; follow by people in designer, research and manufacturing. Entry level is mostly in support, quality control and systems implementation.
Students who want to pursue advanced degree in Computer Engineering could select several specialty areas such as:
Computer Vision: in this area student will focus on visual sensing, in which images of a scene are taken as input and estimates of the three-dimensional characteristics of the scene are output. Students will addresses efficient visual depiction and communication of the environment, and then the acquired information is used to perform tasks such as navigation and assembly. The key application is to improve image communication, and human-computer interfaces, as well as devices such as special-purpose cameras with versatile vision sensors. Graduates in this specialty often work for electronic company and government research laboratories.
Integrated Circuits, Very Large-Scale Integration (VLSI) Design In this specialty, students will focus on enhancing the speed, reliability, and energy efficiency of the Very Large-Scale Integration (VLSI) circuits and micro-systems. Students learn about the design process, VLSI algorithms and architectures, noise-tolerance, and digital signal processors, mixed-signal integrated circuit design, Micro Electro Mechanical Systems for integrated passive radio frequency components, electro-thermal simulation and electrostatic discharge protection for silicon-on-insulator CMOS (complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor) circuits. Graduates in this specialty often work for semiconducting or electronic industry such as Intel, National Semiconductor, ARM, Motorola etc.
Signal, Image, and Speech Processing Computer engineers working in this area focuses on developing improvements in human-computer interaction, speech recognition and synthesis, medical and scientific imaging, or communications systems. Computer vision tasks such as facial feature recognition, when combined with multimedia databases and novel schemes for representation and compression, are examples of work in this area. Work in speech and language engineering would seek to understand human language faculties and to develop computer systems with comparable faculties. Dynamic MRI (Magnetic Resonance Imaging) fast computed tomography, electron microscopy, laser imaging of ocean mines, and passive radar imaging of aircraft using radio and television signals are among the imaging systems currently being developed. Signal processing projects might focus on developing new advances in hearing aid technology. Graduates in this specialty will work for Medical devices companies such as Siemens, GE, Phillips and private research laboratories such as Bell Labs etc.
Communications and Wireless Networks This specialty area focuses on a broad range of topics that will advance the frontiers of communications systems and wireless networks, modulation and error-control coding, and information theory. Students working in this area may explore wireless communication opportunities to take advantage of new frequency bands and increase the efficiency of current bands. Other areas of focus are design techniques for high-speed networks, interference suppression and modulation, design and analysis of fault-tolerant systems, and storage and transmission schemes. Graduates in this specialty often are employed by telecommunication companies.
Computer Networks, Mobile Computing, and Distributed Systems Students working in this area would build integrated environments for computing, communications, and information access over heterogeneous technologies. Students will learn about shared-channel wireless networks, adaptive resource management in dynamic distributed systems including mobile systems, improving the quality of service in mobile and ATM environments, a platform for adaptive computing and seamless memory over heterogeneous wireless networks, and reliable and efficient communication on a fast Ethernet cluster. Graduates in this specialty often work for telecommunication companies and communication equipments such as Cisco, Google etc.
Sources
- Blogs of Prof. John Vu, Carnegie Mellon University
