Computer for the Macintosh, AMD and Cirrus for PC's and others.

The 'speed'
of a CPU's processing is measured in megahertz. The CPU is the
By Vangie Beal place that holds info about the operating system (DOS or Windows,
Related Terms for example).
 PC - personal computer RAM: RAM is what you know as
 PC - personal computer “Memory”, as in how much memory does
 personal computer game your computer have? It is not permanent
 home computer memory - the RAM is erased when the
 network computer computer turns off. Permanent memory is
 MPC stored on the hard drive. Memory is
 Apple Computer measured in increments of bits and bytes. Generally the least
 pervasive computing memory you should ever have with a Pentium computer is 64 MB
 computer business (megabytes: look up kilo-, mega-, and giga- for more info), and more
 end-user computing is much better. There are places on the motherboard (called “slots”)
Computer generally means a programmable machine. The two for memory modules. The memory modules are small printed circuit
principal characteristics of a computer are: it responds to a specific boards with memory chips on them and are usually either SIMM’s
set of instructions in a well-defined manner and it can execute a (Single Inline Memory Modules) or DIMM’s (Dual Inline Memory
prerecorded list of instructions (a program). Module).
Don't confuse this with ROM.
Modern Computers Defined This is an add-in or expansion board such as a video card, sound
Modern computers are electronic and digital. The actual card or modem. On every motherboard there are places to add circuit
machinery — wires, transistors, and circuits — is called hardware; boards to extend the capabilities of the computer. The most common
the instructions and data are called software. circuit boards used are the internal modem, sound card, and the
video display adapter. There are various types of expansion slots that
may be on the motherboard. The ISA (Industry Standards
Association) expansion slot is the older type and most of the older
Parts circuit boards used this type of slot. A more sophisticated type of slot
is the PCI and the newer modems, and more sophisticated sound
CPU: stands for 'Central Processing Unit' cards require this type of slot. The newest type slot in a PC is the
and is the 'brain' of the computer. Most AGP (Accelerated Graphics Port) slot, which is specifically designed
CPU's today are made by Intel and bear for a video display adapter. The AGP port enables high performance
such names as 'Pentium', 'Pentium Pro' and graphics capabilities, especially for 3D graphics.
'Pentium II'. Older Intel CPU's include the The video card controls what you see on the monitor. It determines
80486 and 80386 families. Other how many dots across the screen and down the screen the computer
manufacturers also make CPU's: Motorola
can look after. The more dots, the more information or the more standard type and keyboards are named according to the type of
detail you can see. The video card also controls how many colors connection it makes to the computer. The two common types of
you can see. Most computers today can show anywhere from 256 connectors that go from the keyboard to the computer motherboard
colors to many millions of colors. The sound card controls the sound. are the AT and the PS/2. The AT is the larger older type, and the
Most computers come with pretty cheap speakers, and the sound card PS/2 is a newer type and communicates better with he computer.
can probably produce much better sound than the speakers can. With
good speakers, today's sound cards can make your computer sound
as good as a stereo! A modem allows your computer to
connect to another computer using the
normal telephone line. It converts data
The hard drive uses disks that are made from a computer format, which requires
of aluminum or glass (and therefore many wires, into a format that can be sent
'hard'). Each disk can store much more using only the two wires of a telephone
information than either a floppy or CD- line. At the other end of the telephone
ROM. Sometimes, there may be several wires the process is reversed. Data transfer rates from the modem
disks in a hard drive. However, the disks vary from 14.4Kbs to 56Kbs. (14.4Kbs, 28.8Kbs, 33.6Kbs, 56Kbs)
in a normal hard drive can not be removed There are special types of modems such as cable modems that can
or replaced. Today, hard drives are measured in gigabytes. That's one communicate at much higher data rates.
thousand million bytes. 1 gigabyte is about 1 1/3 CD-ROM disks.
Sometimes a special cache is used for quick retrieval of often-used
information (such as web pages). This is just a separate directory on The USB (Universal Serial Bus) connector
the hard drive. is the newest type port (connector) on the
PC. It is extremely easy to use. You just
plug in a USB compatible device and the
CD-ROM stands for Compact Disk – Read Only computer automatically configures itself to
Memory. The original name was WORM drive, use the device. The computer does not
which meant Write Once Read Many. So the term have to be turned off or rebooted. As many
CD-ROM is not really very accurate, but it is the as 127 USB peripherals can be plugged into a computer at one time.
name that has stuck. At 12Mbits per second it is more than 100 times as fast as a serial
port. The next generation USB motherboards will communicate at
480Mbits per second.
At one time there was the
PC keyboard, the AT keyboard, and
the 101 key enhanced keyboard, which
had F9 through F12 keys and a
separate numeric keypad. Now the 101 key enhanced keyboard is the