Hardware 101

Question 1

Form Factors

Answer 1

The Motherboards have different shapes and sizes. Most popular are:

ATX (Advanced Technology Extended):

• standard form factor
• 12 x 9.6 inch
• 1995, Intel

micro ATX:

• 9.6x9.6
• cheaper than the ATX

Question 2

Motherboard

Answer 2

‘mobo’ or ‘mainboard’

basically a circuit board

Question 3

What does a motherboard have?

Answer 3

North and South Bridge (chipsets):
North: communication for the fast boys: CPU, GPU, RAM - now done almost entirely by the CPU
South: communication between the hard drives, I/o etc. - now done PHC (Platform Hub Controller)
BUS slots (extensions such as the GPU)
CPU socket
SATA connectors, M.2 slots, memory slots
Also has a Clock Generator that’s responsible for synchronisation in the PC.
I/o interfaces

Question 4

I/O interfaces

Answer 4

USB (Universal Serial Bus)
Integrated Video: HDMI, Display Port, DVI, VGA
Network Internet Card
Integrated Sound Card

Question 5

BIOS

Answer 5

Basic Input Output System (Firmware)
stored on the BIOS chip
non-volatile memory (memorysaved when there is no power)
initialises the computer hardware, checks the peripherals

Question 6

P.O.S.T

Answer 6

Power On Self Test - the computer must past this test (initialised by the BIOS) in order to boot up

Question 7

CMOS chip

Answer 7

System settings first set up by the user that are saved when the PC is turned off
Volatile
Data & time, boot sequence, hardware settings
It’s powered up by a special battery called the ‘CMOS battery’

Question 8

UEFI

Answer 8

Unified Extensible Firmware Interface
replaced the BIOS
user-friendly, graphical interface

Question 9

CPU

Answer 9

Central Processing Unit
understands machine code (1s and 0s)
Performs all of the arithmetical operations
Performance based on: number of cores, clock speed, size of registers, pipeline length, type

Question 10

Cores

Answer 10

• processing unit
• ALU (arithmetic- logic unit)
• CU (control unit) - directs operations to the processor
• registers

Question 11

Clock Speed

Answer 11

How many instruction per second (Hz)

The value which is initial (came from the factory) can be altered with (overclocking)

Question 12

Cache

Answer 12

Memory which is on the CPU, storing often accessed data and instructions. Fast cause doesn’t need constant power (refreshing). There are different levels, which are checked for instructions before checking the memory (RAM). L1 (8-64KB)-> L2 -> L3.

Question 13

Size of registers

Answer 13

How much data can be processed per clock cycle

Question 14

Pipeline length (not sure)

Answer 14

One instruction after the other so I guess pipeline length specifies how many instructions can be fit into one cycle ?

Question 15

Primary functions of a CPU

Answer 15

Fetch, read/decode, ALU, memory, write

Question 16

RISC

Answer 16

Reduced Instruction Set Computer
Many line of code
1 line of assembly = 1 clock cycle
machine oriented
breaking down complex instructions into a lot of small, simple operations
software
good for smaller devices such as mobile devices
easy to pipeline

Question 17

CISC

Answer 17

Complex Instruction Set Computer
1 instruction = several clock cycles
more complex instructions
less code
hard to pipeline
programmer oriented

Question 18

Static and Dynamic RAM (differences)

Answer 18

Static: faster, expensive
Dynamic: slower, cheaper

Question 19

ROM

Answer 19

Read-only memory
non-volatile
usually contains information about the starting or booting up the computer
Data can’t be changed

Question 20

RAM

Answer 20

Random Access Memory
Pretty Fast
temporarily access data
volatile (will lose memory if power is off)
If the CPU has enough RAM memory it won’t have to access the hard drives and therefore it will be a lot faster.

Question 21

TYPES OF RAM

Answer 21

DRAM (dynamic)
- constantly refreshed because uses capacitors
- stores data in memory cells (capacitors and transistors)
- computer’s main memory
SRAM
- CPU cache
- more expensive and faster than the DRAM
- no refresh circuit

Question 22

Types of DRAM

Answer 22

1) Synchronous DRAM (SDRAM)
- runs at the same speed as the CPU
- more instructions can be performed
2) Double Data Rate SDRAM
- double the bandwidth - 2x data rate, without altering the frequency
- double pumping method
- DDR4

Question 23

Memory Types

Answer 23

RAM
NVRAM (non-volatile): flash, SSDs
ROM 
PROM (programmed once by the user)
EPROM (can be erased electronicaly)
EEPROM (can be erased and rewritten)
FLASH: EEPROM but smaller, faster and has more storage

Question 24

DRAM packages

Answer 24

SIMM (old, 32-bit)
DIMM (Double In-line Memory Module)
the wider the bus, the more data can pass through it

Question 25

BUSES

Answer 25

control, address and data bus
transfer data through wires
parameters: width, speed, throughput

Question 26

Control bus

Answer 26

Contains information such as what the operations if (read, write), enable and other ‘control’ stuff

Question 27

Address bus

Answer 27

Used by the CPU to tell the memory what the address for the data is

Question 28

Data bus

Answer 28

Data is transferred through that bus

Question 29

width of the address bus

Answer 29

how many addresses can be accessed -

if the width is f.e. 32-bits then 2^n locations can be accessed

Question 30

width of the data bus

Answer 30

How much data can be transferred at once

usually the same as the machine

Question 31

bus speed

Answer 31

number of transfers per second

bus cycle: single transfer over the bus

Question 32

data throughput (efficiency)

Answer 32

width * width

Question 33

Addressing the I/O devices

Answer 33

Separate address space and Mapped

Question 34

Separate address space

Answer 34

Separate address space for the I/O with different machine code

Question 35

Mapped I/O

Answer 35

Share the address space with the memory but have specific address locations (contained in the control bus)
Same machine code - simpler

Question 36

Storage Devices

Answer 36

Internal (HDDs) and External (USB, optical)