<p>Hi, I would really appreciate for you guys to answer this question truthfully so I can get the best of it. Well, I have used computers for quite awhile now and of course simple things I can do very well, but going into anything else a little bit more complicated than normal day to day use would leave me to be confused. That being said, I'm not a pro on computers, however, I have decided that I am very interested and would like to take computer engineering in college. </p>
<p>I've heard many people say that computer engineering is on of the hardest majors to have. Well, my one question is, if I try my best to learn in college, would I do well in computer engineering if I went in the course knowing close to COMPLETELY nothing about how computers operate? Or will I just flunk because everyone taking that major at least knows quite a bit about computers already?</p>
<p>Thanks for reading! Hope to see your answers.
-oxyg3n</p>
<p>Do a little bit of studying in the summer and you should be fine. Many computer engineering students enter their first class with no prior programming experience. The first class is taught for students with no prior experience. Check out the flow chart for your college’s computer engineering major. Take a look at the first courses and google them (Ex: “Cal Poly CPE 101”) to determine what language they will be teaching you in the first course. Whatever language it is, get a good book on that programming language (you may be able to get recommendations here or from the college professor’s website), and study it in the summer. If you google my example above you will see that the second link is one of the professor’s websites. You can check out their notes and their assignments. Perform the coding projects on your own without searching online like if you were getting a grade for the code. I would expect this to greatly help you on your first semester or quarter. Here is a good place to start learning how computers work. [Howstuffworks</a> “Computer”](<a href=“http://computer.howstuffworks.com/]Howstuffworks”>http://computer.howstuffworks.com/)</p>
<p>One thing you will find out about college is that NO ONE knows everything going in. Everyone has gaps in their knowledge, and there is no guarantee that any essential fact is known by everyone. As such, colleges teach everything from the ground up - otherwise they will lose talented students who didn’t happen to catch that one little thing they took for granted.</p>
<p>Read up on the basics beforehand, tackle the classes vigorously and (very very importantly) ask your professors and TA’s questions if there are things you don’t understand. Your lack of knowledge will not hurt you if you acknowledge it and work to correct it during your classes. In my experience the far bigger danger is thinking you already know the material - it makes people stop paying attention, and they don’t realize that they’ve suddenly fallen behind until they start flunking finals.</p>
<p>The reason why people find it harder (not the hardest… you can’t have multiple hardest…) than some other engineering disciplines is that some people are more fluent in one and not in the other. You may enjoy CS more than EE, or sometime you might find both ridiculously hard. </p>
<p>But what is interesting about CpE is that you can actually learn the computer more thoroughly. Recently I’ve been looking over my old courses thus far, and I figure I really need to master my EE part because these days I have been writing Android application and one of my ideas requires EE knowledge!</p>
<p>Despite I have several years of experience with technology (very savvy about it!!!), but trust me I look like a noob in front of some of my peer. Some of them are doing exceptional research projects already… in my EE lab I am pairing up with a student who works as assistant engineer, and I am realizing how little I know about electrical engineering. </p>
<p>Look at the CpE program on your school website. Look at the faculty, the syllabi (if any available), faculty website, etc.</p>
<p>Don’t go too far on your own. You will lose yourself. The first thing you need to understand computer is to get familiar with basic stuff on your computer. What does cache mean? Troubleshoot your computer problems. They will lead to many interesting things that you will learn in your CpE study. I can’t remember one right now - I am brain dead. But when I was in switching system, I was like “OHHHHHHHHH” (learning things that look familiar in computer programming)…</p>