Chapter 2 Expensions cards, Storage Devices, Power Supplies Flashcards
What’s an alternative word for expansion card?
Adapter card
What do you still need to install for integrated components?
A driver, so the operating system is able to talk to the hardware
What are the four most common categories of expansion cards installed?
- Video
- Multimedia
- Network Interface
- Input/Output
What are the two types of classes of video cards?
- Onboard cards (intergraded cards)
- Add-on cards
In what type of bus slot do you need to plug the expansion card in?
Into a matching bus type on the motherboard. Ex. a PCIe expansion card must go into a PCIe bus slot.
What does a video card do?
It sends information to a display. It converts data sent to it by the CPU into pixels and addresses and other info for the display.
What are 2 multimedia expansion cards?
- Sound cards
- video capture cards
To insert a microphone, headphone or speakers into a sound card, what type of connector are you using?
1/8” jack connector, also known as a mini-jack connector
What kind of port did older systems use to connect MIDI devices to the computer?
DA15 game port
What does MIDI stand for?
Musical Instrument Digital Interface
How many pins does a MIDI connector have?
5 pins
What type of connector is nowadays used to connect MIDI to a computer?
USB
What does a video capture card do?
It saves a video stream on a computer so it can be edited later or shared
Name two types of connections used to connect a video capture card to the computer?
- PCIe
- USB
Before buying a video capture card, what do you need to check first?
- If it saves on your preferred resolution
- if it also records the audio
What does NIC stand for?
Network Interface Card
What are two types of NICs?
- Wired NIC
- Wireless NIC
What does a NIC do?
It connects a computer to a network so it’s able to communicate with other computers by translating the data from the parallel data stream used inside the computer to the serial data stream that makes up the frames used on the network.
What type of connections does an internal NIC use?
- PCI
-PCIe
What type of connection does an external NIC use?
USB
What do you need to install when physically installing a NIC?
drivers
What kind of cables can be used for a connection to a NIC?
- UTP (Unshielded Twisted Pair)
- COAX (legacy)
- Fiber connection
What kind of interfaces are being used to connect with a NIC?
- RJ-45 (Registered Jack 45) for UTP/STP and fiber connection
- BNC for legacy COAX
- Antenna for wireless
What is a unique characteristic of a wireless NIC?
You need to configure the devices the NIC is going to connect to first. i.e. if the NIC is going to connect to an AP (Access Point), the AP needs to be configured first, like for SSID, Password etc. Also configure Ad Hoc devices.
What are input/output cards?
Cards that enhances the computer with interfaces that give input to or output from the computer, like expansion USB cards, PCIe card, Storage cards like eSATA.
What does PnP mean?
Plug and Play, it’s means that certain devices like an USB expansion card will be recognized immediately by the computer without installing any drivers.
What do you need to do when a expansion card isn’t recognized by the computer?
Check the BIOS settings or install necessary drivers.
Name the 6 steps you need to do when installing and configuring an expansion card?
- Make sure the power of the computer is off.
- Install the adapter (of the expansion card) in an open slot.
- Connect power to the power supply if the expansion card needs additional power.
- Boot up the computer and install drivers. (PnP might install drivers automatically)
- If the card isn’t recognized or isn’t working as expected, check the BIOS for the configuration settings.
- For other configuration settings check for the manufacturers utilities.
What does HDD stand for?
Hard Disk Drive
How are HDD also known for?
Conventional drives
What kind of storage medium do HDD use?
Magnetic storage medium
What are the 3 critical components of a HDD?
- Controller
- Hard Disk
- Host Bus Adapter (HBA)
What does the controller chip of a HDD do?
It controls the drive. So it controls how the motors and actuator arms of the drive work. And it receives signals from the read head.
What is the Hard Disk on the HDD?
It’s the physical storage, where the data is written to small disk or multiple disks stacked upon each other called platters.
What are platters in a HDD
The actual disks where data is written to or read from.
What does HBA stand for?
Host Bus Adapter
What is the range in diameters of platters used in HDD’s
From 1 - 5 inches
What does the Host Bus Adapter do?
The HBA is the translator, that converts signals from the controller to signals that the computer (‘s system bus) can understand and vice versa.
Where can you most likely find the HBA?
On the motherboard
When talking about HDD, on modern systems, where can you find the controller?
On modern drives it’s incorporated in the drive assembly itself.
IDE PATA nowadays is obsolete, but standard did it follow?
ATA/100 with a maximum of 100MB/s
other types were ATA/133 and ATA/167, but they were rare.
What does SAS (in computing) stand for?
Serial Attached SCSI (pronounced “scuzzy”)
Name 6 components on a HDD?
- Platters
- Read/write heads
- Cylinder
- Tracks
- Sectors
- Clusters
What is another name for clusters in HDD?
Allocation units
What did older drives use to move the actuator arm?
stepper motors
What do newer drives use to move the actuator arm?
voice coils, which use magnetism to move around. The controller tells the coil to turn and the magnetism pushes the actuator arm in a direction.
Before you can store data on a HDD, what must be done beforehand?
It must be prepared. A factory preparation makes sure that the controller will know which parts of the drive have flaws so it will not use those parts to store data on. It will also create magnetic tracks (rings) and sectors (domains).
What are tracks on a HDD?
They are magnetic rings that contains sectors. So the controller know on which track and which sector to store certain data.
What are sectors?
Sectors are magnetic domains and they are the smallest storage units on the platters. The size of the drive is the number of sectors it contains.
What are the common size of sectors?
Sectors commonly have a size of only 512 bytes.
What are cylinders in a HDD?
The cylinder is basically the spindle where the platters are attached to and it spins with the platters.
What does LBA stand for?
Logical Block Addressing
What is LBA?
Logical Block Addressing is a method how the BIOS communicates with the controller of the drive. The BIOS knows globally where the data is stored, but will ask the controller, which knows exactly where it’s stored, to provide the data.
How many files can be stored in a HDD sector?
A sector only allows one file to be stored.
What is a cluster in HDD?
A cluster are multiple sectors combined to form bigger blocks where a file can be stored. This is to increase speed and decrease the possibility of fragmentation.
What happens if a file is smaller that the size of a unit?
The files will be stored and the excess storage space will become waste, because only 1 file will be able to be stored in a sector
How many files can be stored in a cluster?
1 file can be stored in a cluster, just like in a sector.
What will happen when the file is smaller than the size of a cluster?
The file will be stored and the remainder of storage will be waste.
When talking about LBA, what kind of address will the BIOS give to the OS?
A linear address space. It’s a simplified address that the OS can give to the BIOS which will then give it to the controller which will know where the file is actually stored.
When the factory preparation of a HDD is done, what will happen next to the drive?
It will be formatted with a Filesystem (i.e. FAT32, NTFS) and sectors will be grouped into allocation units (clusters). This is because OS designers have to settle on a finite number of addressable units of storage.
Why did HHD spin faster with newer generations?
Because the HBA technology became better and it could handle higher speeds of data. So the drives had to spin faster to give that data at a higher speeds as well.
Name 5 speeds used in HDD?
- 5400 RPM
- 7200 RPM
- 10.000 RPM
- 12.000 RPM
- 15.000 RPM
What disadvantages are there for higher speeds of HDD?
- More heat production
- More power consumption.
E.g. a laptop without software that needs high speed drives, like video editing, audio editing software, slower speed drives might be better.
What form factors are there for HDD?
- 2,5” drives
- 3,5”drives
(extra drives not necessary to learn):
- 5,25”
-1,8”
- 8,9”
What does SSD stand for?
Solid State Drive
What is a SSD?
It’s a drive without moving parts and more comparable with a flash drive. It can produce higher speeds than HDD and have smaller form factors.
Name some advantages of SSD.
- Faster start-up and read times
- Less power consumption
- Less heat production
- Silent
- More reliable with heat and physical shocks
- Higher data density per cm2
What are disadvantages of SSD?
- More expensive than HDD
- SSD has a finite write and erase operations.
What are Hybrid-drives?
Hybrid drive use the advantage of SSD and HDD through SRT (Smart Reponse Technology).
What ways can Hybrid drives be implemented?
- SSHD: Solid State Hybrid Drive
- Dual-drive solutions
What does SSHD stand for?
Solid State Hybrid Drive
What does SSHD do?
SSHD is a conventional HDD with a lot of SSD flash memory which is used as cache. So if a program or file is being used often then it will load that into the SSD part of the drive for quicker access in the future. It only stores in its SSD part when it’s used often, and only then it has the use of its faster SSD speeds.
What is Dual Drive Solutions?
Dual Drive Solutions is when two separate drives are being used, a HDD and a SSD. The files are manually placed of either drive by its user. For example the OS and other software are being placed on the SSD and the bulk of less important data is being placed on the HDD.
Name 3 SSD Communication Interfaces.
- SATA
- NVMe
- PCIe