Inside your computer, everything probably
looks the same to you, or maybe you've never looked. It's really not all
that confusing, once you understand what components make up a computer.
Motherboard - The mainboard, or Motherboard, is a large flat circuit board
that everything plugs into. The Motherboard also holds your RAM, or Random
Access Memory, and your chip, or CPU which stands for Central Processing
Unit. Other things that are connected by cables to your motherboard are
your floppy drive, your CD Rom drive, and your hard drive.
RAM - Your RAM is like your desk. With a small amount of desk space, or
RAM, you can only work on one or two projects or applications at a time.
If you try to do more, you get bogged down and become inefficient. If you
have a larger desk, or more RAM, you can easily keep your work separated,
and remain productive without searching through one big pile. The more RAM
you have, the faster programs will open and close. This is one of the most
affordable ways to speed up an old system, since the cost of RAM is now at
an all time low. Ram is measured in megabytes, Typical amounts of Ram
would be 4, 8, 16, 32 or even 64 megs.
CPU - Your CPU is actually the silicon wafer, or processor that makes
everything work together. If you have a Pentium 90, you have a CPU that
runs at 90 megahertz. The higher your processor speed, the faster
everything will work.
Floppy Drive - The floppy drive holds your floppy disk - the medium that
software used to come on. Floppy disks have evolved from a 7+ inch to a 5
1/4 inch cardboard sleeve to the current plastic encased 3 1/2 inch disk.
Even though all software now comes on CD, most computers still have a
floppy drive since this is an inexpensive and easy way to backup, copy,
and transfer files.
CD ROM Drive - This is another standard item on all computers. Speeds
range from 12x to 32x in today's modern systems. The faster your CD ROM
(Read Only Memory) the faster your software will load. Innovations have
recently become available that allow the user to write to, as well as read
from a CD.
Hard Drive - Your hard drive is basically your file cabinet. All of your
files are stored in your hard drive, and you can set up your filing system
any way you like. The bigger your hard drive is, the more files, games, or
software you can load. Hard drives are measured in "Gigabytes". Typical
hard drive sizes now are 2.5, and 4.3 gigs. Look for these to get up to at
least 20 gigs before the turn of the century, and keep on growing.
Plugged into your motherboard directly are other components that allow
your computer to function the way you need it to. Things like the sound
card, video card, modem, and network card, let your computer make sound,
show pictures, connect to the Internet, and connect to other computers.
There are many other components available for computers now besides the
ones I've mentioned here. Technology is moving so fast that it's sometimes
hard to keep up with. Things like scanners, Zip drives, Jazz drives,
writeable CD's, rewriteable CD's, DVD ROMS, and other cryptic sounding
devices are all designed to make your life easier, and when they work,
they work well. |
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