ch2 Flashcards
pc hardware
1. Which of the following are components you might find inside a PC? (Select all correct answers.) ❍ A. CPU ❍ B. Motherboard ❍ C. Keyboard ❍ D. Printer ❍ E. RAM ❍ F. Cable modem
CPU
MOTHERBOARD
RAM
- Answers: A, B, and E. Common components inside a PC include the CPU,
motherboard, and RAM, along with the power supply, adapter cards, and hard
drives. Keyboards (and mice) are input devices that are located outside the PC.
Printers (and displays) are output devices that are located outside the PC. A cable
modem is an Internet communication device that is outside of the PC. Know the
internal components of a PC!
2. Which device stores data over the long term? ❍ A. CPU ❍ B. RAM ❍ C. Hard drive ❍ D. Video
Hard drive
- Answer: C. The hard drive stores data over the long term. The hard drive stores the
OS and data in a nonvolatile fashion, meaning it won’t be erased when the computer
is turned off. The CPU calculates data and sends it to RAM for temporary storage; the
RAM (which is volatile) is cleared when the computer is turned off. The video card
stores temporary video data within its onboard memory, but this, like RAM, is volatile
and is cleared when the computer is turned off.
3. You would normally plug speakers into what type of port? ❍ A. Parallel ❍ B. DVI ❍ C. 1/8-inch TRS ❍ D. 1/4-inch TRS
1/8 inch TRS
- Answer: C. 1/8” TRS jacks (also known as mini-jacks) are the most common for
speaker connections. Speakers normally plug into a sound card or motherboard.
Parallel ports are older connectors normally used for printers or scanners. DVI
(Digital Visual Interface) is a type of video port. The larger 1/4” TRS connections
are for instrument cables or full-size stereo connections
In electronics, a phone connector is a common family of connector typically used for analog signals, primarily audio. It is cylindrical in shape, typically with two, three or four contacts. Three-contact versions are known as TRS connectors, where T stands for “tip”, R stands for “ring” and S stands for “sleeve”. Similarly, two- and four-contact versions are called TS and TRRS connectors respectively
4. To which type of expansion slot would you install an x16 card? ❍ A. PCI ❍ B. PCIe ❍ C. AGP ❍ D. PCI-X
PCIe
Not to be confused with PCI-X.
PCI Express
- Answer: B. PCI Express (PCIe) slots accept x1, x4, and x16 cards (pronounced “by
sixteen”). PCIe is by far the most common expansion slot for video cards (which are
usually x16). PCI is an older expansion bus that can accept video cards but, unlike
PCIe, they have no particular designation. AGP works with video cards, but the cards
are normally numbered as 1x, 2x, 4x, and 8x (pronounced “eight x”). PCI-X is used
mostly in servers, for example, with network adapters
Year created
2004
Created by
Intel·
Dell·
HP·
IBM
Supersedes
AGP·
PCI·
PCI-X
Width in bits
1–32
Number of devices
One device each on each endpoint of each connection. PCI Express switches can create multiple endpoints out of one endpoint to allow sharing one endpoint with multiple devices.
Speed
Per lane, in each direction:
v1. x: 250 MB/s (2.5 GT/s)
v2. x: 500 MB/s (5 GT/s)
v3. 0: 985 MB/s (8 GT/s)
v4. 0: 1969 MB/s (16 GT/s)
For a 16-lane slot, in each direction:
v1. x: 4 GB/s (2.5 GT/s)
v2. x: 8 GB/s (5 GT/s)
v3. 0: 15.75 GB/s (8 GT/s)
v4. 0: 31.51 GB/s (16 GT/s)
Style
Serial
Hotplugging interface
Yes, if ExpressCard, Mobile PCI Express Module or XQD card
External interface
Yes, with PCI Express External Cabling, such as Thunderbolt
PCI Express (Peripheral Component Interconnect Express), officially abbreviated as PCIe, is a high-speed serial computer expansion bus standard designed to replace the older PCI, PCI-X, and AGP bus standards. PCIe has numerous improvements over the older standards, including higher maximum system bus throughput, lower I/O pin count and smaller physical footprint, better performance scaling for bus devices, a more detailed error detection and reporting mechanism (Advanced Error Reporting, AER[1]), and native hot-plug functionality. More recent revisions of the PCIe standard provide hardware support for I/O virtualization.
The PCI Express electrical interface is also used in a variety of other standards, most notably in ExpressCard as a laptop expansion card interface, and in SATA Express as a computer storage interface.
Format specifications are maintained and developed by the PCI-SIG (PCI Special Interest Group), a group of more than 900 companies that also maintain the conventional PCI specifications. PCIe 3.0 is the latest standard for expansion cards that is in production and available on mainstream personal computers.[2][3]
Contents
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5. What part of the computer checks all your components during boot? ❍ A. CMOS ❍ B. POST ❍ C. BIOS ❍ D. EEPROM
POST
Power on self test
A power-on self-test (POST) is a process performed by firmware or software routines immediately after a computer or other digital electronic device is powered on.
.5. Answer: B. The POST (Power-On Self-Test) is part of the Basic Input Output System
(BIOS). It runs a self-check of the computer system during boot and stores many of
the parameters of the components within the CMOS. EEPROM is a type of ROM chip
on which the BIOS might reside. BIOS is known as firmware.
The results of tests run by the POST may be displayed on a panel that is part of the device, output to an external device, or stored for future retrieval by a diagnostic tool. Since a self-test might detect that the system’s usual human-readable display is non-functional, an indicator lamp or a speaker may be provided to show error codes as a sequence of flashes or beeps. In addition to running tests, the POST process may also set the initial state of the device from firmware.
In the case of a computer, the POST routines are part of a device’s pre-boot sequence and only once they complete successfully is the bootstrap loader code invoked to load an operating system
- Tim installs a new CPU in a computer. After a few hours, the
processor starts to overheat. Which of the following might be
the cause?
❍ A. The CPU is not locked down.
❍ B. The CPU is not properly seated.
❍ C. Thermal compound was not applied.
❍ D. The CPU is not compatible with the motherboard
Thermal compound was not applied
6. Answer: C. Without the thermal compound applied, the processor might overheat after a few hours. If the CPU is not locked down, or is not properly seated, the PC will simply fail to boot. If the CPU is not compatible with the motherboard, either it will not fit the socket or the PC will not boot
- If you have a flat-panel monitor, what type of technology is most
likely being used? (Select the best answer.)
❍ A. LCD
❍ B. CRT
❍ C. RGB
❍ D. DVI
LCD
- Answer: A. Liquid Crystal Display (LCD) is most commonly the type of technology
that a flat-panel monitor uses, though there is also light-emitting diode (LED)-backlit
LCD, Plasma, and Organic LED (OLED). Cathode ray tube (CRT) is an older type of
tube technology resulting in a much bulkier monitor. RGB simply stands for red,
green, blue (the three primary colors of a CRT monitor). DVI is short for Digital Visual
Interface, a port you would find on a video card
8. Which of the following could cause the POST to fail? (Select all correct answers.) ❍ A. CPU ❍ B. Power supply ❍ C. CD-ROM ❍ D. Memory ❍ E. Hard drive
CPU
Memory
- Answers: A and D. The CPU and memory need to be installed properly for the POST
to run (and to pass). The hard drive and CD-ROM might or might not be installed
properly, but they are not necessary for the POST to complete. If the power supply is
defective, the system will simply not boot and will not even get to the POST stage.
9. Which expansion bus uses lanes to transfer data? ❍ A. PCI ❍ B. PCI-X ❍ C. PCIe ❍ D. IDE
PCIe
- Answer: C. PCIe (PCI Express) uses serial lanes to send and receive data. That means
one bit at a time per lane. PCI, PCI-X, and IDE are parallel technologies, which means
8 bits at a time or multiples of 8. IDE stands for Integrated Device Electronics, the
predecessor to SATA hard drive technology
Lane[edit]
A lane is composed of two differential signaling pairs, with one pair for receiving data and the other for transmitting. Thus, each lane is composed of four wires or signal traces. Conceptually, each lane is used as a full-duplex byte stream, transporting data packets in eight-bit “byte” format simultaneously in both directions between endpoints of a link.[7] Physical PCI Express slots may contain from one to 32 lanes, more precisely 1, 2, 4, 8, 12, 16 or 32 lanes.[6][5] Lane counts are written with an “×” prefix (for example, “×8” represents an eight-lane card or slot), with ×16 being the largest size in common use.[8]
Serial bus[edit]
The bonded serial bus architecture was chosen over the traditional parallel bus due to inherent limitations of the latter, including half-duplex operation, excess signal count, and inherently lower bandwidth due to timing skew. Timing skew results from separate electrical signals within a parallel interface traveling through conductors of different lengths, on potentially different printed circuit board (PCB) layers, and at possibly different signal velocities. Despite being transmitted simultaneously as a single word, signals on a parallel interface experience different travel times and arrive at their destinations at different moments. When the interface clock rate is increased to a point where its inverse (that is, its clock period) is shorter than the largest possible time between signal arrivals, the signals no longer arrive with sufficient coincidence to make recovery of the transmitted word possible. Since timing skew over a parallel bus can amount to a few nanoseconds, the resulting bandwidth limitation is in the range of hundreds of megahertz.
A serial interface does not exhibit timing skew because there is only one differential signal in each direction within each lane, and there is no external clock signal since clocking information is embedded within the serial signal itself. As such, typical bandwidth limitations on serial signals are in the multi-gigahertz range. PCI Express is one example of the general trend toward replacing parallel buses with serial interconnects; other examples include Serial ATA (SATA), USB, Serial Attached SCSI (SAS), FireWire (IEEE 1394), and RapidIO.
Multichannel serial design increases flexibility with its ability to allocate fewer lanes for slower devices.
- Which of the following are 64-bit CPUs? (Select all correct
answers.)
❍ A. Core i5
❍ B. Phenom II
❍ C. Pentium IV
❍ D. x64
Core i5
Phenom II
- Answers: A and B. Intel’s Core i5 and AMD’s Phenom II are both 64-bit CPUs. The
Pentium IV is an older 32-bit CPU. x64 is the name given to 64-bit processor technology
but is not an actual CPU.
11. Which kind of socket incorporates “lands” to ensure connectivity to a CPU? ❍ A. PGA ❍ B. Chipset ❍ C. LGA ❍ D. Copper
LGA
(Land Grid Array) A chip package with a very high density of contacts. LGAs differ from traditional chips with protruding pins that are inserted into a socket. An LGA chip has flat pads on the bottom of its package that touch contacts on the motherboard socket
12. How should you hold RAM when installing it? ❍ A. By the edges ❍ B. By the front and back ❍ C. With tweezers ❍ D. With an IC puller
By the edges
13. Which device should you use to protect against power outages? ❍ A. Multimeter ❍ B. UPS ❍ C. FedEx ❍ D. Surge protector
UPS
An uninterruptible power supply, also uninterruptible power source, UPS or battery/flywheel backup, is an electrical apparatus that provides emergency power to a load when the input power source, typically mains power, fails. A UPS differs from an auxiliary or emergency power system or standby generator in that it will provide near-instantaneous protection from input power interruptions, by supplying energy stored in batteries, supercapacitors, or flywheels. The on-battery runtime of most uninterruptible power sources is relatively short (only a few minutes) but sufficient to start a standby power source or properly shut down the protected equipment.
A UPS is typically used to protect hardware such as computers, data centers, telecommunication equipment or other electrical equipment where an unexpected power disruption could cause injuries, fatalities, serious business disruption or data loss. UPS units range in size from units designed to protect a single computer without a video monitor (around 200 volt-ampere rating) to large units powering entire data centers or buildings. The world’s largest UPS, the 46-megawatt Battery Electric Storage System (BESS), in Fairbanks, Alaska, powers the entire city and nearby rural communities during outages.[1]
14. Which of the following uses a 24-pin main motherboard power connector? ❍ A. ATX ❍ B. ATX 12V 1.3 ❍ C. ATX 12V 2.0 ❍ D. ATX 5V 2.0
ATX 12V 2.0
ATX (Advanced Technology eXtended) is a motherboard configuration specification developed by Intel in 1995 to improve on previous de facto standards like the AT design.
It was the first major change in desktop computer enclosure, motherboard and power supply design in many years, improving standardization and interchangeability of parts. The specification defines the key mechanical dimensions, mounting point, I/O panel, power and connector interfaces between a computer case, a motherboard and a power supply.
With the improvements it offered, including lower costs, ATX overtook the AT configuration completely as the default design for new systems within a few years.
ATX addressed many of the AT’s designs annoyances which had frustrated system builders.
Other standards for smaller boards (including microATX, FlexATX and mini-ITX) usually keep the basic rear layout but reduce the size of the board and the number of expansion slots. In 2003, Intel announced the BTX standard, intended as a replacement for ATX.
As of 2009, the ATX design remains a standard for do-it-yourselfers; BTX has however made inroads into pre-made systems. This[clarification needed] was designed to solve the problems in BAT and LPX motherboards.[citation needed]
The official specifications were released by Intel in 1995 and have been revised numerous times since. The most recent ATX motherboard specification is version 2.2.[1] The most recent ATX12V power supply unit specification is 2.31,[2] released in February 2008.
A full-size ATX board is 12 × 9.6 in (305 × 244 mm). This allows many ATX chassis to accept microATX boards as well
ATX12V 2.0[edit]
ATX-450PNF by FSP Group
The above conclusion was incorporated in ATX12V 2.0 (introduced in February 2003), which defined quite different power distribution from ATX12V 1.x:
Most power is now provided on 12 V rails. The standard specifies that two independent 12 V rails (12 V2 for the 4 pin connector and 12 V1 for everything else) with independent overcurrent protection are needed to meet the power requirements safely (some very high power PSUs have more than two rails, recommendations for such large PSUs are not given by the standard).
The power on 3.3 V and 5 V rails was significantly reduced.
The main ATX power connector was extended to 24 pins. The extra four pins provide one additional 3.3 V, 5 V and 12 V circuit.
The 6-pin AUX connector from ATX12V 1.x was removed because the extra 3.3 V and 5 V circuits which it provided are now incorporated in the 24-pin main connector.
The power supply is required to include a Serial ATA power cable.
Many other specification changes and additions
15. What is the maximum data transfer rate of SATA revision 3.0? ❍ A. 1.5 Gb/s ❍ B. 150 MB/s ❍ C. 3.0 Gb/s ❍ D. 6.0 Gb/s
6.0 Gb/s
Transfer rate for
SATA III
also called SATA 3.0
Serial ATA (SATA) is a computer bus interface that connects host bus adapters to mass storage devices such as hard disk drives and optical drives. Serial ATA replaces the older AT Attachment standard (later referred to as Parallel ATA or PATA), offering several advantages over the older interface: reduced cable size and cost (seven conductors instead of 40 or 80), native hot swapping, faster data transfer through higher signalling rates, and more efficient transfer through an (optional) I/O queuing protocol.
SATA host adapters and devices communicate via a high-speed serial cable over two pairs of conductors. In contrast, parallel ATA (the redesignation for the legacy ATA specifications) used a 16-bit wide data bus with many additional support and control signals, all operating at much lower frequency. To ensure backward compatibility with legacy ATA software and applications, SATA uses the same basic ATA and ATAPI command-set as legacy ATA devices.
SATA has replaced parallel ATA in consumer desktop and laptop computers, and has largely replaced PATA in new embedded applications. SATA’s market share in the desktop PC market was 99% in 2008.[2] PATA remains widely used in industrial and embedded applications that use CompactFlash (CF) storage, which is designed around the legacy PATA standard, even though the new CFast standard is based on SATA.[3][4]
Serial ATA industry compatibility specifications originate from the Serial ATA International Organization (SATA-IO). The SATA-IO group collaboratively creates, reviews, ratifies, and publishes the interoperability specifications, the test cases and plugfests. As with many other industry compatibility standards, the SATA content ownership is transferred to other industry bodies: primarily the INCITS T13 subcommittee ATA, the INCITS T10 subcommittee (SCSI), a subgroup of T10 responsible for Serial Attached SCSI (SAS). The remainder of this article will try to use the terminology and specifications of SATA-IO.
16. A Compact Disc you use is rated at a speed of 48X. What does the X refer to? ❍ A. 150 KB/s ❍ B. 1.32 MB/s ❍ C. 133 MB/s ❍ D. 4.5 MB/s
150 KB/S
150 kilobytes per second
Most optical drives today are combo CD/DVD drives that support DVDs and all the CD formats: CD audio, CD-ROM, CD-R and CD-RW. The speeds of the drives are rated by their CD-ROM and DVD transfer rates. The original CD-ROM drive (1x) transferred data at 150KB per second. By doubling the spindle RPMs, the data transfer rate increased to 300KB/sec (2x) and so on. See CD-ROM and DVD drives.
CD-ROM CD-ROM
X Rating Data Transfer Rate
1x 150 Kilobytes/sec 2x 300 Kilobytes/sec 4x 600 Kilobytes/sec
8x 1.2 Megabytes/sec
10x 1.5 Megabytes/sec
12x 1.8 Megabytes/sec
20x 3.0 Megabytes/sec
36x 5.4 Megabytes/sec
40x 6.0 Megabytes/sec
48x 7.2 Megabytes/sec
50x 7.5 Megabytes/sec
52x 7.8 Megabytes/sec
17. Which type of adapter card accepts broadcast programming? ❍ A. FireWire card ❍ B. Video capture card ❍ C. Network interface card ❍ D. TV tuner
TV tuner
18. Which of the following types of custom PCs requires an HDMI output? ❍ A. HTPC ❍ B. Gaming PC ❍ C. Virtualization workstation ❍ D. CAD/CAM workstation
HTPC
(Home Theater PC) A personal computer that is used to store and play music and movies as well as display photos. Also called a “living room PC,” an HTPC is installed in the A/V cabinet and connects to a stereo or home theater system. The HTPC’s CD/DVD drive is used to play the media or rip titles to the hard drive.
With media player software, a quality sound card and quiet case, a standard PC can be turned into an HTPC. For example, the Media Center interface in Windows provides the so-called “10-foot user interface” for HTPC deployment. An HTPC’s CD/DVD drive often provides an economical alternative to stand-alone CD/DVD decks and digital media servers designed strictly for home theaters. However, high-end HTPCs can be significantly more costly than regular PCs. See digital media server, Windows Media Center, 10-foot user interface and home theater.
A Windows Media Center PC
Designed for A/V cabinets, CybertronPC makes a variety of Media Center PCs. This Core i7-based model has 2 terabytes of disk storage and an HDTV tuner card. (Image courtesy of Cybertron International, Inc., www.cybertronpc.com)
Software Solutions
The 10-foot user interfaces in the Zinc software (top) and Boxee software (bottom) turn a computer into a home theater PC. Zinc provides access to video content, while Boxee is an alternative to Windows Media Center. See video portal.
19. How many pins are inside a SATA data connector? ❍ A. 15 ❍ B. 7 ❍ C. 24 ❍ D. 127
7
20. Which of the following ports would you most likely connect a printer to? ❍ A. USB ❍ B. LPT ❍ C. FireWire ❍ D. eSATA
USB
UNIVERSAL SERIAL BUS
(1) Short for “USB flash drive” or “USB port.” See USB drive and USB port.
(2) (Universal Serial Bus) The most widely used hardware interface for attaching peripherals to a computer. There are typically at least two USB ports on laptops and four on desktop computers, while USB “hubs” provide more connections (see below). After appearing in 1997, USB became the standard for connecting keyboards, mice, printers and hard drives, eventually replacing the PC’s serial and parallel ports and the Apple Desktop Bus on Macs (see serial port, parallel port and ADB).
21. What is the delay in the RAM’s response to a request from the memory controller called? ❍ A. Latency ❍ B. Standard deviation ❍ C. Fetch interval ❍ D. Lag
Latency
22. What is the minimum number of hard drives necessary to implement RAID 5? ❍ A. 2 ❍ B. 5 ❍ C. 3 ❍ D. 4
3
RAID 5 (Redundant Array of Independent Disks Mode 5) A popular disk subsystem that increases safety by computing parity data and increasing speed by interleaving data across three or more drives (striping). RAID 5 is similar to RAID 3, except that RAID 5 parity is distributed among all drives, whereas RAID 3 uses separate parity drives.
- A user’s time and date keeps resetting to January 1, 2000. What is
the most likely cause?
❍ A. The BIOS needs to be updated.
❍ B. Windows needs to be updated.
❍ C. The Windows Date and Time Properties window needs
to be modified.
❍ D. The lithium battery needs to be replaced
lithium battery needs to be replaced
24. What type of adapter card is normally plugged into a PCIe x16 adapter card slot? ❍ A. Modem ❍ B. Video ❍ C. NIC ❍ D. Sound
Video
25. To prevent damage to a computer, the computer should be connected to what? ❍ A. A power strip ❍ B. A power inverter ❍ C. An AC to DC converter ❍ D. A UPS
UPS
(Uninterruptible Power Supply) A device that provides battery backup when the electrical power fails or drops to an unacceptable voltage level. Small UPS systems provide power for a few minutes; enough to power down the computer in an orderly manner, while larger systems have enough battery for several hours. In mission critical datacenters, UPS systems are used for just a few minutes until electrical generators take over.
- A computer has 1024 MB of RAM. It has 128 MB of shared video
memory. How much RAM is available to the operating system?
❍ A. 512 MB
❍ B. 896 MB
❍ C. 448 MB
❍ D. 1024 MB
896 MB
27. Which of the following components could cause the POST to beep several times and fail during boot? ❍ A. Sound card ❍ B. Power supply ❍ C. Hard drive ❍ D. RAM
RAM
(Random Access Memory) The main memory in a computer, smartphone or tablet. RAM is the temporary workspace where instructions are executed and data are processed. What makes RAM “random access” is its capability of reading and writing any single byte. This “byte addressability” differs from storage devices such as hard disks and flash memory chips, which read and write sectors containing multiple bytes. In addition, RAM is used as a temporary space for the software, while storage is permanent until deleted by the user. To learn how memory is used, see computer (look at the memory examples). Also see memory, memory module and future memory chips.
RAM Is DRAM or SRAM
The most common type of RAM is dynamic RAM (DRAM). When a computer data sheet states 4GB of memory or 4GB RAM, it refers to DRAM (see dynamic RAM). Higher-speed SRAM is also used as an internal staging area (see static RAM).
Memory Is Often Not RAM!
A smartphone or tablet’s specification of 16GB or 32GB of memory does not refer to RAM; rather it is the unit’s flash memory capacity for storing apps and data. The internal RAM is in the 256MB-3GB range but is not widely promoted to the general public, presumably to avoid confusion between RAM (temporary workspace) and flash memory (permanent storage). See storage vs. memory.
- Which of the following is the proper boot sequence of a PC?
❍ A. CPU, POST, boot loader, operating system
❍ B. Boot loader, operating system, CPU, RAM
❍ C. POST, CPU, boot loader, operating system
❍ D. CPU, RAM, boot loader, operating system
CPU,POST,boot loader,operating system
Boot loader calls operating system into memory
POST power on self test
- Roger informs you that none of the three SCSI drives can be seen
on his SCSI chain. What should you check?
❍ A. Whether the host adapter is terminated and that the
disks have consecutive IDs of 1, 2, and 3
❍ B. Whether the SCSI adapter has an ID of 7 or 15, and
whether all the disks are terminated and have consecutive
IDs of 0, 1, and 2
❍ C. Whether the host adapter has an ID of 0, and whether
the disks are terminated with the same ID
❍ D. Whether the SCSI adapter has an ID of 7, and whether
both ends of the chain are terminated, and that each
disk has a unique ID
D. Whether the SCSI adapter has an ID of 7, and whether both ends of the chain are terminated, and that each
disk has a unique ID
30. Which of the following has the fastest data throughput? ❍ A. CD-ROM ❍ B. Hard drive ❍ C. RAM ❍ D. USB
RAM
(Random Access Memory) The main memory in a computer, smartphone or tablet. RAM is the temporary workspace where instructions are executed and data are processed. What makes RAM “random access” is its capability of reading and writing any single byte. This “byte addressability” differs from storage devices such as hard disks and flash memory chips, which read and write sectors containing multiple bytes. In addition, RAM is used as a temporary space for the software, while storage is permanent until deleted by the user. To learn how memory is used, see computer (look at the memory examples). Also see memory, memory module and future memory chips.
RAM Is DRAM or SRAM
The most common type of RAM is dynamic RAM (DRAM). When a computer data sheet states 4GB of memory or 4GB RAM, it refers to DRAM (see dynamic RAM). Higher-speed SRAM is also used as an internal staging area (see static RAM).
Memory Is Often Not RAM!
A smartphone or tablet’s specification of 16GB or 32GB of memory does not refer to RAM; rather it is the unit’s flash memory capacity for storing apps and data. The internal RAM is in the 256MB-3GB range but is not widely promoted to the general public, presumably to avoid confusion between RAM (temporary workspace) and flash memory (permanent storage). See storage vs. memory.
31. Which kind of form factor is commonly found in HTPCs? ❍ A. ATX ❍ B. Pico-ITX ❍ C. microATX ❍ D. Nano-ITX
micro-ATX
32. Which of the following CPU cooling methods is the most common? ❍ A. Heat sink ❍ B. Heat sink and fan ❍ C. Liquid cooling ❍ D. Liquid nitrogen
Heat sink and fan
Definition of:heat sink
A material that absorbs heat. Typically made of aluminum, heat sinks are widely used in amplifiers and other electronic devices that build up heat. Small heat sinks are the most economical method for cooling microprocessors and other chips. They are commonly found glued or clipped to the top or the side of the chip package. See heat pipe, CPU cooler and thermal grease.
- You need to store 4 GB of data to an optical disc (without using
compression). Which of the following will meet your requirements?
(Select the two best answers.)
❍ A. CD-ROM
❍ B. DVD-RW
❍ C. CD-RW
❍ D. BD-R
BD-R
(Blu-ray Disc-Recordable) See Blu-ray
DVD-RW
(DVD-Read Write) A rewritable (re-recordable) DVD disc for both movies and data from the DVD Forum. Also called “DVD Dash RW” and “DVD Minus RW,” DVD-RW uses phase change recording. The media hold 4.7GB per side and can be rewritten 1,000 times. See DVD, DVD storage capacities, DVD drives, DVD+RW and optical disc.
In practice, the term “DVD” refers to all DVD formats. The phrase “rewrite the data on the DVD” really means “rewrite the data on the DVD-RW or DVD+RW.” See DVD.
34. Which of the following is not a video port? ❍ A. DVI ❍ B. HDMI ❍ C. Display Port ❍ D. CNR
CNR
Communications and Networking Riser (CNR) is a slot found on certain PC motherboards and used for specialized networking, audio, and telephony equipment. A motherboard manufacturer can choose to provide audio, networking, or modem functionality in any combination on a CNR card. CNR slots were once commonly found on Pentium 4-class motherboards, but have since been phased out in favor of on-board or embedded components
- What does a CAD/CAM workstation require? (Select the two best
answers.)
❍ A. Powerful CPU
❍ B. HDMI output
❍ C. Surround sound
❍ D. High-end video
Powerful CPU
High end video
36. You need to install the fastest hard drive possible. Which port should you connect it to? ❍ A. USB ❍ B. SATA ❍ C. IDE ❍ D. eSATA
SATA
(Serial ATA) The standard hardware interface for connecting hard disks and CD/DVD drives to the computer. SATA was introduced in 2001, and nearly all computers use SATA drives.
37. What type of power connector is used for an x16 video card? ❍ A. Molex 4-pin ❍ B. Mini 4-pin ❍ C. PCIe 6-pin ❍ D. P1 24-pin
PCIe (6-pin)
PCI Express (Peripheral Component Interconnect Express), officially abbreviated as PCIe, is a high-speed serial computer expansion bus standard designed to replace the older PCI, PCI-X, and AGP bus standards. PCIe has numerous improvements over the older standards, including higher maximum system bus throughput, lower I/O pin count and smaller physical footprint, better performance scaling for bus devices, a more detailed error detection and reporting mechanism (Advanced Error Reporting, AER[1]), and native hot-plug functionality. More recent revisions of the PCIe standard provide hardware support for I/O virtualization.
The PCI Express electrical interface is also used in a variety of other standards, most notably in ExpressCard as a laptop expansion card interface, and in SATA Express as a computer storage interface.
Format specifications are maintained and developed by the PCI-SIG (PCI Special Interest Group), a group of more than 900 companies that also maintain the conventional PCI specifications. PCIe 3.0 is the latest standard for expansion cards that is in production and available on mainstream personal computers
38. Which kind of current does a typical desktop PC draw from a wall outlet? ❍ A. Direct current ❍ B. Neutral current ❍ C. Alternating current ❍ D. Draw current
Alternating current
- Which of the following are output devices? (Select the three best
answers.)
❍ A. Speakers
❍ B. Keyboard
❍ C. Mouse
❍ D. Printer
❍ E. Display
❍ F. Stylus
Speakers
Printer
Display
- A customer complains that he gets a headache when he’s viewing
his display for more than an hour. What should you do?
❍ A. Raise the resolution to a higher setting
❍ B. Install an antiglare filter
❍ C. Dim the lights near the customer’s desk
❍ D. Upgrade the video connector from DVI to VGA
Install an antiglare filter
