Chapter 1 - Introduction to a Typical Computer Flashcards
What is CompTIA?
A not-for-profit, vendor-neutral organization that certifies the competency level of technicians through examinations written to test specific areas.
What is A+ Certification?
The certification awarded fro completing CompTIA which is recognized throughout the industry as a certification of basic PC repair and support skills.
What is this and by whom is it manufactured?
A CPU/Microchip made by AMD
What is this?
A scientific grade computer used for research and other demanding calculations. Also used widely for hosting servers such as with google’s large databases.
What is this?
A Dell home computer. Standard PC in todays world.
What are Digital Electronics?
Electronics in computers that use on and off conditions. The device either has full voltage or no voltage at all.
What are Analog Electronics?
Computer parts that produce and use a varying amount of voltage.
What is a Computer?
An assembly of electronic modules that interact with software to create, modify, transmit, store, and display data.
What is data?
Data is information such as text, graphics, and sounds.
What is a binary number system?
A form of code that consists entirely of ones and zeros, where ones mean a yes, or power, and zeros mean a no, or no power.
What is the hexadecimal number system?
A system of coding that uses 16 characters, numbers 0-9 and letters A-F
What is ASCII?
the American Standard Code for Information. The first attempt to standarize copmuter character codes among the varieties of harware and software. This helped create networks such as the letter k on a keyboard to the letter k on the monitor to the letter k being printed out of a printer. Today many key codes represent symbols on the Windows GUI through alt codes like ▲(Alt+3+0) which is done on the numpad.
What is a bit?
A bit is a single binary character of one or zero.
What is a byte?
A byte is a string of 8 bits, which was the original bandwidth used by computers.
What is a word in a computing sense?
A word is the total number of bytes a copmuter can process at one time. This will vary from computer to computer like in todays age most computer OS’s range from 32 to 64 bit processing bandwidth.
What is Serial Transfer?
Data being sent through a port one bit at a time in successive order.
What is Parallel Transfer?
A method of transfer where data is sent side by side, in bytes, or otherwise termed packets in networking.
What is a peripheral?
A peripheral is an optional piece of equipment used to display data or to input data. For example the mouse or keyboard right in front of you, or the monitor you’re reading this off of.
What is this a diagram of?
A motherboard, more specifically the I/O ports.
What is a device bay?
A drive bay designed to accommodate the easy hot swap of devices such as hard drives, tape drives, and optical drives.
What is a CPU?
A CPU, or Central Processing Unit, is the “brain” of the computer in simplest terms. It performs most all of the calculations on the computer and consists of millions of transistors that are electrically connected in such a way they are able to interact with computer programs and process data. Typically batches of cpu’s are made and they are cut from a “die”
What is a Hard Drive or HDD?
A hard drive is a stack of several disks in a sealed box which then stores data magnetically on the disks for a computer to read and write as it pleases. The HDD is in the notion of being replaced by the SSD today, as the SSD boasts higher read/write speeds and less chance of failure without disk limitations.
What is a power supply?
A power supply is the component in a computer that converts the 120 volt ac power from American wall outlets to dc voltages of either 3.3V, 5V, or 12V for the computer to use. In Europe it changes the voltage from 220V.
What is the fan/radiator mounted on the CPU here called?
A heatsink. In this scenario, it is the Corsair H100i.
What is a motherboard?
A rectangular piece of circuit board with many conductors that provide electrical energy paths to the computer components and expansion slots.
What is RAM?
Random Access Memory, a temporary state of memory where programs are cached, ready to be loaded and accessed on the spot.
What is firmware?
Hardware specific software required to boot the computer and support communication between the operating system and hardware devices. This kind of software is exampled by a BIOS.
What is a battery used for in a computer?
The battery supplies power to the CMOS, which contains the firmware settings for the BIOS. This helps retain those settings and others such as time, date, etc.
What is an expansion card?
A board that can be easily installed in a computer to enchance or expand its capabilities. This includes cards such as Video Cards, Sound Cards, etc.
What is an expansion card slot?
An expansion card slot is a port such as PCI-E which is used to install cards such as a video card and connects directly to the electornic circuitry in the motherboard and to communicate with the other devices on the motherboard.
What are cooling fans?
Fans typically mounted inside a case to keep a consistent air flow across the inside of the case in a specific direction to keep cool air carrying the heat given off out of the case.
What tool should be used to prevent ESD?
An anti-static wrist strap, or a ground strap.
