Program Overview

Overview of Electronic and Computer Engineering

The Electronic and Computer Engineering program is a joint degree that combines aspects of both Electronic Engineering and Computer Engineering. This program is designed to provide students with a foundation in how analogue and digital electronic circuits work, as well as how information is coded and transmitted across noisy channels.

What is Electronic and Computer Engineering?

Electronic and Computer Engineering involves organizing both hardware (electronic) and software (computer) components into a useful and productive system. The principal job of an electronic and computer engineer is to lead product design that requires both critical hardware and software expertise.

Do You Enjoy:

• Using computers to interface with things in the real world?
• Interpreting data to automate or understand sophisticated tasks?
• Understanding how communication systems work?

Graduate Skills and Career Opportunities

There is a wide spectrum of careers open to graduates of the Electronic and Computer Engineering course. Graduates can develop reconfigurable hardware for high-speed Artificial Intelligence calculations in the cloud or algorithms for driverless cars. There are also opportunities in business and financial management where the analytic and problem-solving skills of electronic and computer engineers have long been appreciated. Companies employing Electronic and Computer Engineering graduates include Google, Intel, Movidius, and Accenture.

Your Degree and What You’ll Study

This degree option blends aspects of both the Electronic Engineering and Computer Engineering options into one course. Students will be given a foundation in how analogue and digital electronic circuits work, delve into how information is coded and transmitted across noisy channels, and learn how these complex channels can be crafted into worldwide networks, such as the Internet. On the computing side, students will learn how the basic analogue and digital circuits combine to form complex processors (CPUs), how these are programmed at machine level (assembly language), and how operating systems (such as Linux and Windows) make the machine capabilities accessible for high-level application programmers.

By the time students get to the fourth year, they are ready to undertake a major individual Capstone project or opt to take an internship with an employer in the computing and electronics industries. Students can choose from a range of modules exploring how computers can render complex graphics, how they can see and understand video images, and how this can be used with headset hardware for augmented reality. Students can further explore how hackers break into computer systems and how to defend against attack.

Course Details

Awards

• (NFQ Level 8) and 5 year (NFQ Level 9)

CAO Information

• CAO Points 556 (2024)
• CAO Code TR032

Admission Requirements

Leaving Certificate

• H4 in Mathematics

Advanced GCE (A Level)

• Grade C in Mathematics

International Baccalaureate

• HL Grade 5 in Mathematics

English Language Requirements

All applicants to Trinity are required to provide official evidence of proficiency in the English language. Applicants to this course are required to meet Band B (Standard Entry) English language requirements.

Course Fees

For a full list of undergraduate fees, please refer to the relevant section.

Study Computer Engineering, Electronic and Computer Engineering, or Electronic Engineering at Trinity

Overview of Electronic Engineering, Electronic and Computer Engineering, and Computer Engineering streams in the School of Engineering at Trinity College Dublin.

Research Areas

Students will have the opportunity to choose specialist telecommunications and signal processing modules. There may also be the opportunity to undertake a placement in industry or with a research group or to spend some time studying abroad through the Unitech, Erasmus, or Cluster programmes.

The fifth (optional) year leads to a Master’s degree (M.A.I.) in Engineering, and it is here that students get to carry out a major dissertation on a topic of their choice. This is a chance to really become a world-class expert in your favourite topic, researching what others have done across the world and building a hardware or software prototype that demonstrates this. As with the fourth year project, the topic could be anything from wireless communications, signal processing systems, biomedical devices and systems, helping to manage huge cloud computing facilities, through novel face recognition algorithms to uncovering fraud in bitcoin transactions. To support your work on the dissertation, you can take a number of optional courses in the first semester including:

• Motion Picture Engineering
• Speech and Audio Engineering
• Statistical Signal Processing
• Wireless Networks and Communications
• Distributed Systems
• Fuzzy Logic
• Formal Methods
• Advanced Computer Architecture
• Networked Applications
• Artificial Intelligence
• Real-time Animation

Conclusion

The Electronic and Computer Engineering program at Trinity College Dublin offers students a comprehensive education in both electronic and computer engineering, preparing them for a wide range of career opportunities in the field. With its strong focus on research and practical application, this program is ideal for students who are interested in pursuing a career in electronic and computer engineering.