[relaxing]

The closest thing to an IBM PC and daq is… an Arduino. Simple cpu, simple interface library, go from zero to making stuff move in no time.

A modern PC as a platform is in no way helpful to learning how sensors and actuators work. You’d be spending hundreds more for unnecessary frustration.

The Art of Electronics is not a good choice for a beginner. It’s aimed at good university educated EE’s.

[YZF]

I read the Art of Electronics as a beginner. A university educated EE should have had pretty much everything covered in their studies so it would be surprising to me that would be their reference of choice.

I still think the convenience of a laptop or a PC beats the Arduino. That said, I'm not up to date on what sort of I/O you can get (e.g. USB based I/O) and that's the cost. I have to imagine there are options that are not that expensive.

[relaxing]

Horowitz and Hill is used for 300 and 400 level university courses. It assumes a lot of prerequisite physics and engineering knowledge. I’m not using that definition of beginner.

> I'm not up to date on what sort of I/O you can get

I have to imagine you know you’re allowed to just not post, right.