Computer Basics: Hardware

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Hardware Guide
This page will give you all your hardware basics, what each part does, why it’s important, and how it effects your computer overall.
The main components we’ll be covering are the following

CPU (Central Processing Unit)
Motherboard
RAM (Random Access Memory)
HDD / SSD (Hard Disk Drive / Solid State Drive)
PSU (Power Supply Unit)
GPU (Graphics Processing Unit)
Computer Tower / Case
Computer Monitor
Optical Drive CD / Blu-Ray
Central Processing Unit (CPU)

The CPU of your computer is very much like your brain, it is the part of the computer that gives out all basic instructions to every other component on your computer. The CPU is one of the main components that will effect the performance of your computer, generally a powerful CPU will let a computer perform tasks faster and can perform more intensive tasks on your computer as well. The two main brands of desktop CPU manufacturers are AMD and Intel, both of which have certain advantages and disadvantages in their hardware. You’ll want to do your own research on what CPU works for you, depending on what your other components are and your budget, each brand will have something it will excel in. Overall, you should come away from this understanding that your CPU will be the part of your computer that tells all your other components what to do and will determine how fast your computer will carry out its tasks.

The motherboard of your PC is your inner body, it connects all the different parts of your PC together, your motherboard is another critical component that may not effect your performance exactly, but it will effect what parts you can use. Every motherboard will list in its specifications what it is compatible with, this isn't too big of an issue if you are buying a laptop or computer that is already pre-built, however when building a computer this will be extremely important and determine what parts you can use. Your motherboard is the component that will also decide what inputs and outputs your computer has. An example of these inputs and outputs are your audio outputs, video outputs, usb ports, ethernet ports, firewire ports, and your mouse and keyboard. Most motherboards now come with a video card that is very basic, it won't be useful for high performance gaming and will cause rendering to be slower when video-editing, that will allow you to playback video files and see your computer on a monitor of course.

Random Access Memory (RAM)

RAM isn’t easy to compare to a part of your body, but better to explain through example. Whenever you open a new program in your computer and it takes a minute to load the program, the computer is accessing your RAM, temporary memory/information in the computer. When you close your program, that data goes away and stops taking up part of your RAM. This is the reason RAM is necessary for a computer, any temporary data that you access will use your RAM. Most programs such as a web browser or word processor will not use a large amount of RAM, however programs like high end games, photo editors, and video editors can use a large amount of RAM in your computer, especially if you’re running multiple applications at once. RAM will come in the form of sticks that you insert into your motherboard. RAM can be upgraded at any time to a desktop assuming it is compatible with your motherboard, however be careful and check to see if your motherboard requires 1,2, or 3 sticks of RAM to run. Overall RAM will effect how quickly programs will run, how quickly they will boot up, and how many can be running at a time making it extremely important to having a faster and more efficient computer.

Hard Disk Drive/Solid State Drive (HDD/SSD)

The next two items share the same function but are built differently. A Hard Drive uses a disk and magnets to write data on to the disk that will permanently store information, assuming the disk itself does not get damaged for other reasons. Hard Drives are older compared to Solid State Drives and are significantly cheaper than SSDs. Solid State Drives work off of flash memory, unlike a hard drive they have no moving parts and everything works electronically. Examples of devices that work on flash memory that you are possibly familiar with are your usb storage devices / “flash drives”, video game memory cards, or an SD card that most cameras use. SSDs read data much faster but due to the technology being newer are more expensive. If you’re building a computer that will not require a lot of storage you it would be prefferable to buy an SSD, however Hard Drives are much less expensive if you plan on storing more than 250Gigabytes of information.

Now that we’ve talked about the differences between these two items, let me bring the focus back on the main purpose of them. Both of these devices are used to store information, your photos, word documents, videos, etc. that you save to your computer, all the files that appear every time you turn on computer. Hard drives come in the storage sizes of “Gigabytes”, 1024Megabytes. An example of how large a file can be, a 1080p high quality movie that is around 2-3 hours long can be 3-6Gigabytes of data. Larger storage devices would be needed for someone who works with a lot of video, gaming, or possibly sound editing. Basic word documents, power points, and images are immensely smaller than video.

If you are using a desktop you can always add more hard drives or Solid State Drives to your computer, they connected to the motherboard on the inside of the computer. Your operating system, which I will get into more detail later, is installed into your hard drive and is necessary to run a computer. If you’re using a laptop, your hard drive will be installed into the laptop from the start and there will be no way to add any new hard drives as there’s no space inside the laptop. Should want to add more storage to your laptop, you can buy external storage devices that connect via usb or firewire to your laptop and will store your data.