Electrical and Computer Engineering

terenc
Mon, 07 Jan 2013 04:43:37 +0000

Since the other posters don’t seem to have been very clear on the differences between all three, I’ll break it down for you.

Computer Science (CS) is purely software. You will always be doing programming. You will have a limited/nonexistent understanding of hardware. This is not a disadvantage for software. You will be qualified for any programming / software job.

Computer engineering (CE) is typically, but not always a mix of low-level software and hardware. You will take both CS and Electrical Engineering classes. HOWEVER, this depends on the university you go to because the definition varies. So you need to look at the course catalog and see what are the differences in terms of courses. You typically get a job in “systems” software development or computer hardware. CE is a lot less clear cut in this regard since it’s a mix of software and hardware.

Electrical engineering (EE) is purely hardware. There is almost slight overlap between it and CS. There is overlap with CE. You will have a limited knowledge of software. You typically get a job in electronics or computer hardware. Depending on the specific field of EE you go into, you may find yourself “coding” in a chip design language, but it is almost nothing like software engineering.

None of these majors have any inherent, clear-cut advantages over one another.

What do YOU want to do as a career?
Do you want to design computer chips / hardware / electronics (examples: CPUs, actual physical smartphones, wireless routers)?
Or do you want to design/create software (examples: operating systems like Windows, apps like Microsoft Word, websites, databases, smartphone apps)?