ABOUT

COMPUTER
Hardware
MR. BERNIE ACDAL
Personal Computers
Electrical Safety
• Electrical devices have certain power requirements.
• AC adapters are manufactured for specific laptops.
⚬ Exchanging AC adapters with a different type of laptop or device may cause damage to both the AC
adapter and the laptop.
• Some printer parts, such as power supplies, contain high voltage. Check the printer manual for
the
location of high-voltage components.

Follow electrical safety guidelines to prevent electrical fires, injuries,

and fatalities.

10
Electrical and ESD Safety
ESD
• Electrostatic discharge (ESD) can occur when there is a buildup
of an electric charge that exists on a surface which comes into
contact with another differently charged surface.
• ESD can cause damage to computer equipment if not
discharged properly.
• At least 3,000 volts of static electricity must build up before a
person can feel ESD.

Follow these recommendations to help prevent ESD

damage:

⚬ Keep all components in antistatic bags until you are ready

to install them.
⚬ Use grounded mats on workbenches.
⚬ Use grounded floor mats in work areas.
⚬ Use antistatic wrist straps when working inside computers.
© 2016 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Cisco Confidential 10
PC Components
Cases
• The case houses the internal components such as the power supply, motherboard,
central
processing unit (CPU), memory, disk drives, and assorted adapter cards.
• The term form factor refers to the physical design and look of a case. Common
desktop computers are available in form factors including:
• Horizontal
case Many case manufacturers may have their own
• Full-Size naming conventions, including super tower, full
Tower tower, mid tower, mini tower, cube case, and
• Compact more.
Tower
• All-in-one

© 2016 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Cisco Confidential 10
PC Components
Power Supplies
• Computers use a power supply to convert AC power into a lower voltage DC power required
by
internal components.
• Desktop computer power supply form factors include:

⚬ Advanced Technology (AT) – original power supply for

legacy computer systems

⚬ AT Extended (ATX) – updated version of the AT

⚬ ATX12V – the most common power supply on the

market today

⚬ EPS12V – originally designed for network servers but is

now commonly used in high-end desktop models.

© 2016 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Cisco Confidential 10
PC Components
Connectors
• A power supply includes several different
connectors. They are used to power
various internal components such as the
motherboard and disk drives.
• Some examples are:
⚬ 20-pin or 24-pin slotted connector
⚬ SATA keyed connector
⚬ Molex keyed connector
⚬ Berg keyed connector
⚬ 4-pin to 8-pin auxiliary power connector
⚬ 6/8-pin PCIe power connector

© 2016 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Cisco Confidential 10
PC Components
Power Supply Voltage
• The different connectors in a power supply also provide
different voltages.
• The most common voltages supplied are 3.3 volts, 5 volts,
and 12 volts.
• The 3.3 volt and 5 volt supplies are typically used by digital
circuits, while the 12 volt supply is used to run motors in disk
drives and fans.
⚬ Power supplies can also be single rail, dual rail, or multi
rail.
⚬ A rail is the printed circuit board (PCB) inside the power
supply to which the external cables are connected.
A computer can tolerate slight fluctuations in power,
but a significant deviation can cause the power
supply to fail.

© 2016 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Cisco Confidential 10
PC Components
Motherboards

• The motherboard is the backbone of

the
computer.
• It is a printed circuit board (PCB) that
contains buses, or electrical pathways,
that interconnect electronic
components.
• These components may be soldered
directly to the motherboard, or added
using sockets, expansion slots, and
ports.

© 2016 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Cisco Confidential 10
PC Components
Motherboard Components
• Major components on a motherboard
include:
⚬ Central Processing Unit (CPU)
⚬ Random Access Memory (RAM)
⚬ Expansion slots
⚬ Chipset
⚬ Basic input/output system (BIOS) chip
and Unified Extensible Firmware
Interface (UEFI) chip
⚬ SATA connectors
⚬ Internal USB connector

© 2016 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Cisco Confidential 10
PC Components
Motherboard Chipset
• Chipset consists of the integrated circuits
on the motherboard that control how
system hardware interacts with the CPU
and motherboard.
• Most chipsets consist of the following two
types:
⚬ Northbridge – Controls high speed access to
the RAM and video card.
⚬ Southbridge – Allows the CPU to
communicate with slower speed devices
including hard drives, Universal Serial Bus
(USB) ports, and expansion slots.

© 2016 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Cisco Confidential 10
PC Components
Motherboard Form Factors
• The form factor of motherboards pertains to the size and shape of the board.
• There are three common motherboard form factors: Advanced Technology eXtended
(ATX),
Micro-ATX, and ITX.

The choice of motherboard form factor determines how individual components

attach to it, the type of power supply required, and the shape of the computer
case. © 2016 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Cisco Confidential 10
PC Components
What is CPU?
• The central processing unit (CPU) is responsible for interpreting and executing
commands.
• The CPU is a small microchip that resides within a CPU package.

• The CPU socket is the connection between the

motherboard and the processor.
• Modern CPU sockets and processor packages are built in following architectures:
⚬ Pin Grid Array (PGA) - the pins are on the underside of the processor package and is inserted
into the motherboard CPU socket.
⚬ Land Grid Array (LGA) - the pins are in the socket instead of
on the processor.

© 2016 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Cisco Confidential 10
PC Components
Cooling Systems
• Computer components perform better when
kept cool.
• Computers are kept cool using active and
passive cooling solutions.

• Active solutions require power while passive

solutions do not.

• Passive solutions for cooling usually

involve reducing the speed at which a
component is operating or adding heat
sinks to computer chips.
• A case fan is considered as active cooling.

© 2016 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Cisco Confidential 10
PC Components
Types of Memory
• A computer might use different types of memory
chips.
• All memory chips store data in the form of bytes.
⚬ A byte is a block of eight bits stored as either 0 or 1
in the memory chip.
• Read-Only Memory (ROM) – such as ROM chip.
• Random Access Memory (RAM) is the
temporary working storage for data and programs
that are being accessed by the CPU. RAM is
volatile memory.
• Adding more RAM in a computer enhances the
system performance. However, the maximum
amount of RAM that can be installed is limited by
the motherboard.
© 2016 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Cisco Confidential 10
PC Components
Types of ROM
• Types of Read-only Memory (ROM)
include:
⚬ ROM chips.
⚬ PROM chips.
⚬ EPROM chips
⚬ EEPROM chips.

© 2016 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Cisco Confidential 10
PC Components
Types of RAM
• Types of Random Access Memory (RAM) include:
⚬ Dynamic RAM (DRAM)
⚬ Static RAM (SRAM)
⚬ Synchronous Dynamic RAM (SDRAM)
⚬ Double Data Rate Synchronous Dynamic RAM (DDR SDRAM)
⚬ DDR2 Synchronous Dynamic RAM (DDR2 SDRAM)
⚬ DDR3 Synchronous Dynamic RAM (DDR3 SDRAM)
⚬ DDR4 Synchronous Dynamic RAM (DDR4 SDRAM)
⚬ GDDR Synchronous Dynamic RAM (GDDR SDRAM)

© 2016 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Cisco Confidential 10
PC Components
Memory Modules
• Memory chips are soldered to a circuit board to create a memory module
which is placed into a memory slot on the motherboard.
• Different types of memory modules include: DIP, SIMM, DIMM
memory, and SODIMM.
• The speed of memory has a direct impact on how much data a processor
can process in a given period of time.
• The fastest memory is typically static RAM (SRAM) which is used as
cache memory

© 2016 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Cisco Confidential 10
PC Components
Memory Modules (Cont.)
• The speed of memory has a direct impact on how much data
a processor can process in a given period of time.
• The fastest memory is typically static RAM (SRAM) which is
used as cache memory
for storing the most recently used data and instructions by the
CPU.

⚬ The three most common types of cache memory are:

￭ L1 cache – integrated into the CPU
￭ L2 cache – was original mounted on the motherboard, but now
integrated into the CPU
￭ L3 cache – used some high-end workstations and server CPUs

© 2016 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Cisco Confidential 10
PC Components
Memory Modules (Cont.)

• Memory errors occur when the data is not stored correctly in the memory chips.
The computer uses different methods to detect and correct data errors in
memory.

⚬Different types of error checking methods include:

￭ Nonparity – Nonparity memory does not check errors in
memory.
￭ Parity – Parity memory contains 8 bits for data and 1 bit for error checking.
￭ ECC – Error Correction Code memory can detect multiple bit
errors in memory and correct single bit errors in memory

© 2016 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Cisco Confidential 10
PC Components
Adapter Cards
• Adapter cards increase the functionality of a computer by adding controllers
for
specific devices or by replacing malfunctioning ports.

⚬Common adapter cards include:

￭ Sound adapter
￭ Network Interface Card (NIC)
￭ Wireless NIC
￭ Video adapter or display adapter
￭ Capture card
￭ TV tuner card
￭ Universal Serial Bus (USB) controller card
￭ eSATA card

© 2016 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Cisco Confidential 10
PC Components
Adapter Cards (Cont.)
• Computers have expansion slots on the motherboard to install adapter
cards.
• The type of adapter card connector must match the expansion slot.

⚬ Common expansion slots include:

￭ Peripheral Component Interconnect (PCI)
￭ Mini-PCI
￭ PCI eXtended (PCI-X)
￭ PCI Express (PCIe)
￭ Riser card
￭ Accelerated Graphics Port (AGP)

© 2016 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Cisco Confidential 10
PC Components
Types of Storage Devices
• Data drives provide non-volatile storage of data.
• Some drives have fixed media, and other drives have removable media.

⚬Data storage devices can be classified according to the media on which the data
is stored:
￭Magnetic – like hard disk drive and tape drive
￭Solid state – like solid state drive
￭Optical – like CD and DVD

© 2016 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Cisco Confidential 10
PC Components
Storage Device Interfaces
• Storage devices inside a computer connect to the motherboard using Serial AT
Attachment (SATA) connections. The legacy interface is Parallel ATA (EIDE).
• The interface standards define the way that data is transferred, the transfer rates,
and physical characteristics of the cables and connectors.
• There are three main versions of the SATA standard: SATA 1, SATA 2, and SATA
3.
• The cables and connectors are the same, but the data transfer speeds are
different.

© 2016 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Cisco Confidential 10
PC Components
Magnetic Media Storage
• This type of storage represents binary values as magnetized or non-magnetized

physical areas of magnetic media.

• Common types of magnetic media storage
drives:
⚬ Hard Disk Drive (HDD) – the traditional
magnetic disk devices with storage capacity
ranging from gigabytes (GBs) to terabytes
(TBs).
⚬ Tape Drive – most often used for archiving
data.
￭ Tape drives use a magnetic read/write head and
removable tape cartridge.
￭ Common tape storage capacities vary between a
few
GBs to many TBs.
© 2016 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Cisco Confidential 10
PC Components
Semiconductor Storage
• Solid-state drives (SSD) store data as electrical charges in semiconductor flash
memory. This makes SSDs much faster than magnetic HDDs.
• SSDs have no moving parts, make no noise, are more energy efficient, and
produce less heat than HDDs.
• SSDs come in three form factors:
⚬ Disc drive form factor – similar to an HDD
⚬ Expansion cards – plugs directly into the motherboard and mounts in the computer
case like other expansion cards
⚬ mSata or M.2 modules – these packages may use a special socket. M.2 is a
standard for computer expansion cards.

© 2016 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Cisco Confidential 10
PC Components
Semiconductor Storage (Cont.)
• The Non-Volatile Memory Express (NVMe) specification was developed
specifically to allow computers to take greater advantage of the features of SSDs
by providing a standard interface between SSDs, the PCIe bus, and operating
systems.
• NVMe allows compliant SSD drives to attach to the PCIe bus without requiring
special drivers.

• Solid State Hybrid Drives (SSHDs) are a compromise between a magnetic HDD
and an SSD.
⚬ They are faster than an HDD but less expensive than an SSD.
⚬ They combine a magnetic HDD with onboard flash memory serving as a non-volatile
cache.

© 2016 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Cisco Confidential 10
PC Components
Types of Optical Storage Devices
• Optical drives are removable media storage devices that use lasers to read
and
write data on optical media.
• They were developed to overcome the storage capacity limitations of
removable magnetic media such as floppy discs.

⚬ There are three types of optical drives:

￭ Compact Disc (CD) - audio and data
￭ Digital Versatile Disc (DVD) - digital
video and data
￭ Blu-ray Disc (BD) - HD digital video and data

© 2016 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Cisco Confidential 10
PC Components
Types of Optical Storage Devices (Cont.)
• CD, DVD, and BD media can be pre-recorded (read only), recordable (write
once), or re-recordable (read and write multiple times).
• DVD and BD media can also be single layer (SL) or dual layer (DL). Dual layer
media roughly doubles the capacity of a single disc.

© 2016 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Cisco Confidential 10
PC Components
Video Ports and Cables
• A video port connects a monitor to a computer using a cable.
• Video ports and monitor cables transfer analog signals, digital signals, or
both.

⚬ Video ports and cables include:

￭ Digital Visual Interface (DVI)
￭ DisplayPort
￭ High-Definition Multimedia Interface (HDMI)
￭ Thunderbolt 1 or 2
￭ Thunderbolt 3
￭ Video Graphics Array (VGA)
￭ Radio Corporation of America (RCA)

© 2016 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Cisco Confidential 10
PC Components
Other Ports and Cables
• Input/output (I/O) ports on a computer connect peripheral devices, such as
printers,
scanners, and portable drives.

⚬ A computer may have other ports:

￭ Personal System 2 (PS/2)
￭ Audio and game port
￭ Network
￭ Serial AT Attachment (SATA)
￭ Integrated Drive Electronics (IDE)
￭ The Universal Serial Bus (USB)

© 2016 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Cisco Confidential 10
PC Components
Adapters and Converters
• There are many connection standards in use today. These components are
called
adapters and converters:
⚬ Converter – performing the same function as an adapter but also translates the signals
from one technology to the other.
⚬ Adapter – physically connecting one technology to another

￭ Example of adapters include:

• DVI to VGA Adapter
• USB to Ethernet adapter
• USB to PS/2 adapter
• DVI to HDMI adapter
• Molex to SATA adapter
• HDMI to VGA converter

© 2016 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Cisco Confidential 10
PC Components
The Original Input Devices
• Input devices all the user to communicate with a computer.
• Some of the first input devices include:
⚬ Keyboard and Mouse – these are the two most commonly used input devices
⚬ ADF / Flatbed Scanner – these devices digitize an image or document
⚬ Joystick and Gamepad – these devices are used for playing games
⚬ KVM Switch – a hardware device that can be used to control more than one
computer while using a single keyboard, monitor, and mouse

© 2016 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Cisco Confidential 10
PC Components
New Input Devices
• Some new input devices include touch screen, stylus, magnetic strip reader, and
barcode scanner:
⚬ Touch screen – input devices with touch or pressure sensitive screens
⚬ Stylus – a type of digitizer that allows a designer or artist to create artwork by using a pen-
like tool
⚬ Magnetic strip reader – a device that reads information magnetically encoded on the back
of plastic cards
⚬ Barcode scanner – a device that reads the information contained in the barcodes affixed to
products

© 2016 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Cisco Confidential 10
PC Components
More New Input Devices
• A few newer input devices:
⚬ Digital camera – devices that capture digital images and videos
⚬ Webcams – video cameras that can be integrated into a computer
⚬ Signature pad– a device that electronically captures a person’s signature
⚬ Smart card reader – a device used on a computer to authenticate the user. A smart card
may be the size of a credit card with an embedded microprocessor that is typically under a
gold contact pad on one side of the card.
⚬ Microphone – a device that allows a user to speak into a computer and have their voice
digitized

© 2016 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Cisco Confidential 10
PC Components
Most Recent Input Devices
• The newest input devices include NFC devices and terminals, facial recognition
scanners, fingerprint scanners, voice recognition scanners, and virtual reality
headsets:
⚬ NFC devices and terminals – Near Field Communication (NFC) tap to pay devices
⚬ Facial recognition scanners – devices identifying a user based on unique facial
features
⚬ Fingerprint scanners – devices identifying a user based on unique fingerprint
⚬ Voice recognition scanners – devices identifying a user based on unique voice
⚬ Virtual reality headset – used with computer games, simulators, and training
applications
with virtual reality functionalities.

© 2016 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Cisco Confidential 10
PC Components
What are Output Devices?
• An output device takes binary information from the computer and converts it
into a
form that is easily understood by the user.
• Examples of output devices include monitors, projectors, VR headsets, printers,
speakers, and headphones.

© 2016 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Cisco Confidential 10
PC Components
Monitors and Projectors
• Most monitors use one of three types of
technology:
⚬ Liquid crystal display (LCD)
⚬ Light-emitting diode (LED)
⚬ Organic LED (OLED)

• Most video projectors use LCD or DLP technology.

⚬ DLP stands for Digital Light Processing
⚬ Different projectors have different numbers of lumens, which affects
the level of brightness of the projected image.

© 2016 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Cisco Confidential 10
PC Components
VR and AR Headsets
• Virtual Reality (VR) uses computer technology to create
a
simulated, three-dimensional environment.
• A VR headset completely encases the upper portion of
users’ faces, not allowing in any ambient light from their
surroundings.
• Augmented Reality (AR) uses similar technology but
superimposes images and audio over the real world in real
time.
• AR can provide users with immediate access to
information
about their real surroundings.
• An AR headset usually does not close off ambient light to
users, allowing them to see their real life surroundings.

© 2016 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Cisco Confidential 10
PC Components
Printers
• Printers are output devices that create hard
copies of files.
• A hard copy might be a on a sheet of paper.
It could also be a plastic form created from
a 3D printer.

• Different types of printers:

⚬ Inkjet, impact, thermal, laser, and 3D printers
⚬ Printers use wired or wireless connections
⚬ All printers require printing material (such as
ink, toner, liquid plastic, etc.)
⚬ Printers use a driver to communicate with OS

© 2016 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Cisco Confidential 10
PC Components
Speakers and Headphones

• Speakers are a type of auditory output device.

• Most computers and mobile devices have audio support either
integrated into the motherboard or on an adapter card.
• Headphones, earbuds, and the earphones found in headsets are all
auditory output devices.
• These may be wired or wireless. Some are Wi-Fi or Bluetooth-enabled.

© 2016 Cisco and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. Cisco Confidential 10