IIT Delhi - Part 2 - Interview Experiences


So I came to the room after the VDTT Interview and slept in the room without disturbing others who were having different interviews

I woke up @ 5 and along with 2 others went to the VDTT Office for the results @ 6pm on the same day. The results got delayed and it went on to 9pm finally. We waited out of curiosity and then you know what happened...

                  I AM IN ......




So after a lot of failures, I had some hope now. 
I had two VLSI Interviews on hand the next day and Computer Technology Interview also.

I filled myself with all the inspiration. I thought to myself, yes this is moment may be for which I am waiting. I need to give my best.

I need to thank one of my friend's friend Kalyan Kota. He was helpful in making a lot of decisions.


So the day ended for many but it never ended for me because I was anxious, afraid, hopeful for a brighter tomorrow.

I read upto late night. - I always had only 2 books for my Electronics - Sedra & Smith and Razavi.

So the next day. 
             
                                   Let me check it out.. 

 Hope things go fine. - IEC / VDTT.
                                                              Please.. 







IIT Delhi - Par1 - Interview Experiences

Before going to Delhi, just 2 days back I got Kharagpur VLSI, so I was a bit uncertain whether I will be going because I was comfortable with VLSI in top 5 IITs. But then to my luck, the reservation was confirmed and I along with 2 others have gone there. From Hyderabad, it almost took 30 hours journey.


I had a lot of Interviews in IIT Delhi – IEC, VDTT, JTM, Computer Technology.

We got into the college 1 day before the Interview. IIT Delhi is good in one aspect that it doesn’t have written tests. I have not been qualifying the tests so far may be because they were written test  ( Jokes are excuses some times)


I have a friend Roopesh Sharma there ( JTM Student and AIR 245 in Gate 2014) . The hostels in IIT Delhi are not that great in terms of look. Food is ok. My friend had luckily made me familiar with few seniors of IEC and VDTT.

I had conversation with few persons of both IEC, VDTT. I came to know about the process but then I had to appear for the process.

VDTT Interview : 
                            Initially they verified our documents and divided us into few groups and each group for each Interview panel. Mine was Panel 2. Initially every panel students were coming out but in our panel there was no one who even went inside. I was the first person as per sequence in my panel.

After a while, I was asked to come into. The Panel had 2 Professors, old enough to make me afraid. I greeted them and even they followed it up with a nice little smile, that made me feel a bit relaxed.
I was asked the following questions.


                                    1. Draw CMOS Inverter
                                    2. In the same diagram, now ground and power supply are exchanged?
                                     3. Implement Y = AB+C+D (whole bar) in NMOS,PMOS,CMOS logics
                                       4. If I add 2 sin signals with one of them having frequency f1 and other 2*f1                                               or say some 1000*f1. Then draw the resultant as a diagram.
                                            5. Why CMOS. Why not NMOS or PMOS.

The results where supposed to be announced in the evening. 
               I was waiting upto evening.
I was in an unknown status. Going by my heart, I thought I was in. But then Bangalore and Madras kept me thinking and reminding about my luck again and again...



JTM Interview :
                            Didn't attend the Interview because some how I was confident about VDTT and also even if I don't do VDTT well, I had IEC chance the next day. So, thought of preparing for them rather than going for JTM interview. Because any how even I had to go to Communications, I would go to IIT Bombay or Madras.

                        I will tell about the next part of VDTT in the next post.
                             
                   

IIT Madras - Interview Experiences

Yes. After the failure of IISC Bangalore, I went to IIT Madras. I came here for Texas Sponsored MS.
It is one of the very good programs in IITs in the field of VLSI. IIT Madras is best for some one interested in Analog Research.  I was prepared for a tough fight. 

I knew mentally that It would be very difficult for me to clear the rounds because the number of people whom they will call is all ECE Rankers < 1000 and all Instrumentation and Electrical guys with Ranks< 750.

There is no reservation for this program. Luckily I haven't had any.

I got there on May 1stitself. I had a friend Charan working in TCS. Both of us roamed around the city and went to sea shore and few other places. It was as if I came there for some other reason. But thanks to him, atleast roamed a lot in Chennai. Thanks for him for a lovely care.

Next day on May 2nd , I went to the College – IIT Madras. In the presentation by the Texas team, they have really made us get goose bumps for the company it is. It produces diverse products and today Texas is in the top position in Analog research and IIT Madras is like heaven for analog research. 

It has 3 gods of Analog – Nagendra Krishnapura, Anirudhan, Shanti Pavan.  Texas came with an offer of employment of 16L after successful completion of MS, although nothing is assured. They will also give us higher stipend of 20K for the first year and 30K for the next 2 years.  

I went to the written test. I was shocked to see the questions. They were not easy but neither were they out of box. I can assure you u can never come across such questions any where in any question bank.


Most of the guys were in the same mood. Don't know what to comment. They were such questions which required us to be theoretically Mr. Perfect, nothing less.

I will update all the questions once I sit back to write all those in a notebook. In the mean while you can refer to the given link. Actually One thing is that Texas will only ask transient analysis and Analog Electronics to a very deep level.


But this was a bit too tougher on my part. I knew that syllabus is Network theory and Analog Electronics. But I could not clear the written round due to my lack of understanding things in even perfect way.

It required a lot of mastery of the subject much better than mine.


But learnt again that I still need to improve.

               With low levels of Confidence and may be in a spot of bother whether I will not be able to manage to get VLSI seat through Interview, I read more for the next time... 

                            Chalo Delhi. next


IISC - Interview Experiences

Hi Every one ..

So this is the post where in I will be sharing with all of you my CEDT written test experience.

Just like others, don't just have a negative opinion about IISC Bangalore that it has only research guys and no placements. It is very good institute and if you want to study peacefully, it is the best.

Be prepared for some good knowledge sharing during the two years of Mtech in IISC.

So the written test was scheduled on April 20th 2015, I arrived 1 day before. I have one friend there Satya Narayana who is studying there as CEDT student. He got 699 rank(OBC) last year ( When I got 751 Rank in General ).  Last year, I accompanied him to IISC because I had a call from Computation sciences with my last year rank. So due to this, It didn't take much of time for me to go to IISC after getting down at the Bus stop.

I will share few questions that I remember.

1. How to make mux with de mux and vice versa.

2. 5 to 8 questions on Embedded Systems ( Strange experience for most of the students )

3. Simple Biasing question on BJT Transistor

4. Simple question on Flip Flops and Micro Processor

5. Question on Sub Threshold Region in MOSFET

6.  Easy 2 questions in Mathematics

7.  EM Theory about trasmission

8. Design from 15V to 5V un regulated power supply

9.  1 question on IPV4 and IPV6. It had one question also about router working.

10. Little Endian and Big Endian question.

11. Rise Time and fall time question and graph of output voltage vrs time when you have a capacitor and resistor connected in the output stage of a transistor

12. Design a circuit for Chess board type of K-Map. Find the minimum number of xnor and xor gates.

I will keep on updating few other questions.. as and when I remember them or get it from few of my friends.... But mostly I have done it.

Some how after the Exam, I felt I would be in with 60% chance and 40% out.
     
               Unfortunately - the 40% came true.....


So immediately took a train to Hyderabad and came back...

                     Next Journey is to the Ultimate Madras after 1 week gap...

                                                                                      Check it out next. . 

What all I applied .............


1. IISC Bangalore - 
       The preference order went like this
                                                                1. ME Micro Electronics
                                                                2. ME Communications and Networks
                                                                3. Mtech CEDT

I got call for Mtech CEDT Written test/ Interview. 
I got direct admission for ME Communications and Networks in the first counselling.


2. IIT Delhi
        The preference order went like this 
                                                               1. IEC
                                                               2. Computer Technology
                                                               3. Communications
        Interdisciplinaries that I applied
                                                               1. JTM and JVL

I got call for IEC, Computer Technology, JTM, JVL  Interview





3. IIT Bombay
        The preference order went like this 
                                                                1. TA - Micro Electronics
                                                                2. TA - Electronic Systems
                                                                3. TA - Communication Systems

         I applied even for RA, Mtech+Phd also in the same preference order

I got call for RA, Mtech+Phd interviews and direct admission of TA-Communication Systems in the first counselling. I waited upto 3 rd counselling, I got Electronics System.

4. IIT Kharagpur
        The preference order went like this 
                                                              1. VLSI
                                                              2. VIPES
                                                              3. Communications 
I got VLSI in the first round

5. IIT Madras
    The preference order went like this 
                                                                    1. VLSI
    I applied for MS, Texas MS, direct Phd.  I got call for MS of both types and direct Phd.
   I didn't get VLSI in IIT Madras in the first 2 rounds.

The rest of the IIT s I didn't apply.

GATE Preparation


Having posted all this stuff, the next responsibility would be from my end would be to put up the information about how I prepared for GATE and get a rank of 70 in Gate 2015 inspite of working in Infosys.

Although, I got AIR 751 in Gate 2014, sincerely I had put more efforts if not pain. But Gate 2015 was put more pain inside into.

I would put forth the links to the books to be downloaded shortly.

 1. SemiConductor Physics - Prof. Karmalkar NPTEL Videos & Neamen
            Read concepts well but mostly the formulae are very important in this subject. Be thorough with the proofs of each formulae because they may ask for different situations. This can happen only if u know the formulae derivation. Like in GATE they can ask u like what if the length is doubled then you tell what will be the current. If you just remember the formulae with constants, you will not be able to do so.

2. Micro Electronics - Sedra and Smith & Prof. Radha Krishnan Videos
          Read concepts well and practise a lot of problems. Identify which regions of operation is BJT,MOSFET is in. I will add shortly few links of videos regarding JFET, which are helpful.
Formulaes regarding Pinch off is important because students often miss the poliarity and end up doing it wrong.

3. Electro Magnetic Theory - Prof. Shiv Goenkar Videos and Alexander Sadiku Book
         Often the most difficult subject. Yes it is but then if you have practised the solved problems of Alexander Sadiku Book, you will surely get goot understanding.

4. Control Systems - Ogata and Nagoorkani for Practise
         It is the easiest subject and often the scoring subject. Understanding the 4 things - Polar Plot, Nyquist Plot, Bode Plot, Routh Hurth Criterio and their special cases is very important. Also the block diagram to Transfer function telling.

5. Signals and Systems - Openhiem
         This subject may seem to be difficult for few students initially but as and when you go on understanding Communications, you will be understanding thiings here in a better way. But read things well and often few direct questions from Openhiem will be given, that says the std of the text book it is

6. Communications ( Analog and Digital ) - Taub and Schilling, B.P. Lathi and my friend Harish ( Mtech IIT Hyd pursuing)
Difficult subject. But then you have to practise a lot of problems. Understanding about modulations schemes is not easy. You have spend some quality time and then you have to understand the things in a crystal clear way. Take a lot of time for this subject. Don't just run away with formulae

7. Engineering Mathematics - Few Videos in the You Tube and also few lecture notes
    Linear Algebra, Differential Equations, Calcilus, Approximations are the important things. Practise few problems. It will be easy.

8. Network Theory - Alexander Sadiku Network Analysis and few un covered topics from the net. 
           If you are done with the whole book of Alexander Sadiku, then you can assume you are done in all aspects apart from Graph Theory which is not there in this book. Practise few problems in Power anaylsis. Try to understand the difference between the real and apparent power.  Take units seriously. Power factor correction is often neglected by students. Transient analysis is very important. Try to solve few questions from the placements of Texas, because they are known to be the masters of Transient analysis.

9. Digital Electronics -  NPTEL Videos of  Prof Srinivasan and Marris Mano.
Easiest subject may be if u understand and toughest if you don't. I would recommend local author book first like Anand Kumar and then practise questions from You tube and then later on read marris mano. Don' forget to read logic families. There will be few easy questions, why miss them.

Kanodia Practise Book was very helpful and I recommend you to solve it mostly for practise.
But there are many unnecessary questions in it and few wrong explanations. Don't mind them.




Planning

See, read upto November. Keep December for only practicing old question papers. Buy a hard copy book that consists of last 20 years papers. Solve each paper and see how much you are getting. Then understand the solution and see the topics again which you feel you are not comfortable.


Do it 3 times atleast so that it will be such a huge advantage that the moment you see a question from some topic then you will surely get an idea as to what or where in this question , will the questioning person will try to fool or trap us.

The next thing is to buy a test series that can be really useful for practicing.

For those who start preparing for gate after this. This should be your road map.

                  1. Up to November - Prepare to the best and pratice as good as possible.
                   2. December - Only test series and Old question Papers. Solve and Learn
                     3. January - Revise and revist things. Don't learn new things. Perfection is important.

So, with this. I will go forward with the way the journey went on.

I am reminding you about my details

                                             Gate 2015 ECE Rank:   70
                                                                    Score :    899
                                                               Category:    General

MY GATE 2015

Many people who are reading this blog might have asked themselves what is this person doing now??

So, having being frustrated with the work, I along with few other friends have started preparing for GATE. Four of us prepared and all four of us being from Infosys managed to prepare well and end up getting good ranks.


Shivananda Rapolu – AIR 303 ( AIR 400 odd in Gate 2014 ) - Seat in IISC DESE now in 2015.

Sreenu Kakunuri – AIR 141 ( AIR 500 odd in Gate 2014) - Seat in Kgp VIPES now in 2015.

Mahendra Mundru – AIR 22 ( CSE )  ( AIR 300 odd in Gate 2014 ) - Seat in IIT Bombay in 2015.

Raghavapudi VNK Neeraj ( Myself ) - AIR 70 ( AIR 751 in Gate 2014)- Seat in IIT Delhi VDTT in 2015.

You can claim that all of us have improved our ranks but then we had to write Gate again because we didn't knew many things like the Mtech RA of IIT bombay which is super for our ranks last year ones,
IIT Madras TI MS and regular MS in VLSI which are just awesome, IIT Delhi Computer Technology, JTM, JCA, Hyderabad RA and Direct Phd programmes in all IITs


Don't take rest post gate. Travel a lot. Appear for a lot of Interviews... Run Run. Run.. 


But we all had to take the pain of writing GATE again while working .

My biggest gratitude to My Parents, who have been always with me and supporting me, My Philosopher, my guide - Mr. Sudhakar Reddy ( My college HOD ), All my friends and in specific  my buddy - Harish Kumar ( studying Mtech Communications in IIT hyd).

Without Harish, a lot would have not been possible. Thanks to him from the bottom of my heart.

By now, you would have got the reason why I blogged this information. I don’t want any one to miss things because he has no information regarding it.


Hope this helps....

Getting AIR 70 didn't stop my struggles..  I travelled to many IITs still........... 

Keep viewing and get the rest of the story - Of how I failed in IISC CEDT and how I was out smarted by the Texas and How did I outsmart the Delhi Professors.. 

Keep Viewing. . 
                                  

The Unknown Mtech degrees ?

1. IIT Madras Regular and Texas M.S are very good and often people over look it. Don’t do it.

 2. IIT Delhi VDTT

 3. IIT Delhi JTM   and Computer Technology  
                                                                   
M.S. in India........

          Its been few years that research is getting good boost up in India. M.S. is one of the prominent courses to have got started in IITs. Not all IITs over it. IIT madras, delhi, kgp offer M.S. All the three are good.
Though the degree is equal academically with Mtech, the duration will be round 1.5 to 2.5 yrs. It is more of research oriented and less of courses.  It is like MINI Phd. as one of my friend Karishma (M.S. @ IIT kgp) says

Don't compare Mtech and MS that IITs offer. Both are different courses meant for different purposes.
Admission is mainly based on written test and Interview. But GATE is mandatory

Shortly I will add a write up regarding MS in IITs and about research. It will be from my friend Karishma, pursuing her MS in IIT Kgp.  

Why not Direct PHD...


Yes, many don't know about this. There is provision of direct PHD in India and few IITs have integrated course like the IIT Bombay which has Mtech+PHD course. Again Admission is mainly based on written test and Interview. But GATE is mandatory.


Understand Yourself First before deciding whether to take research or conventional courses

M.S. vrs Mtech

Both are good. MS is research oriented. If your research is in commercially viable areas, surely you will get placed in Companies in R&D sector. If not, you can go for Phd and plan for an academic career.
                  
 Mtech  RA good or bad

Institute RA

 1. You will work in any one of the laboratories (System Admin lab, communications and DSP lab, microelectronics lab, power electronics and machines lab, electronic circuits lab) of the institute. Your work may be heavy or light depending on the lab you get.
2. You are free to choose your final year project and guide based on your interests.
3.For shortlisting for interview, 50% weightage is given to GATE score and 50% weightage to your marks in the written test

Project RA

1.You will be assigned  a particular project under a particular professor. This may be an institute sponsored project or a project sponsored
2.Gate Score weightage is 75%
3.You are not free to choose your final year project and guide

More information about IIT Bombay RA is given in the later posts where I have shared one of my friends' experience and I bet it is totally worth it reading.

As I said that there is no difference in the degree you get. All are same and it depends on you  as to how well you do.

With this, I will end up telling you things and now start telling you things that made me get good rank in GATE 2015.
 What all did I study? 
        How did I manage time inspite of working in a company?
                   What books did I study?
        
                                              Come on explore more for all the secrets.