Mechanical or Mechatronical enginering?

[digitman]

Which is better in terms of employment prospects, etc?

[Learnphysics]

At the current point in time, I'd say mechanical. Most employers don't even know what mechatronics is, and are hesitant to employ someone with such a degree. (See even the spell check here doesn't recognize it as a word)

HOWEVER, this might completely change in the next few years because with a lot of mechanical/electrical and software systems coming together in the growing field of robotics, people will probably look for multi-skilled engineers, and therefore mechatronics ones.

The best thing (although itl'l take a few more years) is to do a mechatronics degree, and THEN do either an electrical/software or mechanics degree after that. Because mechatronics 1,2,3 years cover similar subjects to all of these degrees you should get a lot of exemptions that reduce the length of the second degree to only 2-3 years.

[Jones1987]

I'm currently doing a Mech Eng degree, I have Mechatronics as a module choice. I'd say go with the Mechanical as it has given me a broader insight to the different topics of engineering. If you have the choice later on to do Mechatronics go with that.

I also do robotics and automation module, which teaches me the IEC 61131-3 programming languages which apparently are a very niche market in industry at the moment. Thought I' add that in as you seem to have an interest in the software side of things.