A personal computer is made up of different components typically engineered and manufactured by different companies and sold under a common badge.
In order to engineer compatible components manufacturers abide to standards. Knowledge of these standards allows computer hardware technicians to remove and replace faulty components when there is a hardware failure.
Individual circuits are rarely repaired. Rather, the entire component is removed and replaced. Troubleshooting these components generally involves reasoning and sometimes a little help from the remaining hardware by way of audible PC speaker beep codes known as BIOS beep codes.
The major components of a computer include;
The case and power supply. Also known as the 'box', 'tower' or 'chassis', it is the enclosure that houses all the computer components. The power supply attached to the case is responsible for converting the (AC) current from your wall outlet into (DC) current used by the computer components.
The power supply may be included with the case when purchased as a component. Check that the power output capacity is adequate for your hardware. Generally speaking, additional hardware such as extra disk drives as well as high-powered video cards may require higher power output capacity from your power supply.
The motherboard. This is the underlying circuit board that connects all the computer components together. If your computer was a house then the motherboard would be the concrete slab. All your computer components will connect to the motherboard one way or another and it will transfer data between components as required.
The Processor. This is the brain. The processor power is measured in Giga-Hertz. Giga is a standard multiplier for 1 billion just like kilo is the standard multiplier for 1 thousand. And Hertz is a unit of frequency. The higher the frequency the faster the processor.
Today processors are sold as dual and quad core. Each core can be thought of as an individual processor package bundled into the one physical unit. The processor is often unjustly blamed for slow systems. Other components such as insufficient memory or inadequate video cards are often the cause of poor performance.
Memory. Memory is the hardware component that is used to temporarily store files and code for super fast access by the processor. It is more accurately referred to as RAM (Random Access Memory) in order to avoid confusion with storage capacity in the hard drives which may also be referred to as 'memory'. Current memory standards include DDR2 and DDR3. The motherboard memory slots determine which standard is appropriate for your computer.
Insufficient memory (RAM) is a major cause of poor computer performance. One indicator that your computer may have insufficient RAM is that your Hard Drive light on the front panel of your computer case is on for prolonged periods when you are not performing large storage tasks such as saving or opening big files.
A Video Card. The video card is responsible for generating output images to the monitor. Modern video cards include specialized hardware to improve 3D graphics performance usually associated with video games or computer aided design software.
The current video card to motherboard connection standard is PCI-E. When purchasing a video card, the motherboard video card slot should be checked in order to ensure compatibility.
Mass Storage. The hard disk drive is a long term persistent storage device that retains stored information even when the system is powered down. This is type of persistent storage is called non-volatile memory. The operating system and applications are stored on the hard disk drive.
Hard disk capacity is measured in Giga-Bytes and the connection standard with the motherboard comes in two flavours - IDE or SATA. A motherboard can typically support a small number of hard disk drives with one being set as the 'primary' or 'master' drive which is used at boot time to load the operating system.
The Monitor. The monitor is responsible for the visual display. Screen size and refresh rates are factors that affect the prices of monitors. High refresh rates are generally associated with video games.
![[Valid RSS feed]](http://www.alltimeinfo.com/images/icon_Rss.png "XML Feed For RSS"){kind=icon}
Category Rss Feed
Print This Article
Add To Favorites
