McGraw-Hill/Irwin Copyright 2002 by the McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved BUYING A COMPUTER SELECTING HARDWARE SELECTING SOFTWARE

McGraw-Hill/Irwin Copyright 2002 by the McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved BUYING A COMPUTER DETERMING YOUR NEEDS What do you need? Why do you need it? What are you going to do with it?

McGraw-Hill/Irwin Copyright 2002 by the McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved BUYING A COMPUTER Set spending limit and stick to it! Try to get the most for your money. Determine what is most important to you.

McGraw-Hill/Irwin Copyright 2002 by the McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved BUYING A COMPUTER Determine requirements: Present needs Future needs

McGraw-Hill/Irwin Copyright 2002 by the McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved BUYING A COMPUTER DETERMINE SOFTWARE REQUIREMENTS Word processing Educational s/w Business Games WWW

McGraw-Hill/Irwin Copyright 2002 by the McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved BUYING A COMPUTER DETERMINE THE OPERATING SYSTEM OR

McGraw-Hill/Irwin Copyright 2002 by the McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved HARDWARE COMPONENTS CPU MONITOR KEYBOARD MOUSE SPEAKERS SURGE PROTECTOR

McGraw-Hill/Irwin Copyright 2002 by the McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved BUYING A COMPUTER DETERMINE SIZE OF COMPUTER DESKTOP PORTABLE DOCKING STATION

McGraw-Hill/Irwin Copyright 2002 by the McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved BUYING A COMPUTER MICROPROCESSOR Manufacturers INTEL CYRIX AMD SPEED 450 MHz – 2 GHz

McGraw-Hill/Irwin Copyright 2002 by the McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved BUYING A COMPUTER MEMORY RAM MB CACHE – 128 KB

McGraw-Hill/Irwin Copyright 2002 by the McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved BUYING A COMPUTER SECONDARY STORAGE HARD DRIVE (10 GB) FLOPPY DISK CD ROM CD-RW DVD

McGraw-Hill/Irwin Copyright 2002 by the McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved Inside the Box System unit –Case or box where motherboard and system units are housed Motherboard –Large circuit board inside the system unit –Holds the CPU, memory, and other electronic components –Also called the mainboard or system board

McGraw-Hill/Irwin Copyright 2002 by the McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. X - 13 Motherboard

McGraw-Hill/Irwin Copyright 2002 by the McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved The Basic System CPU & memory largely determine the power level or speed of your computer To run multimedia software, you will need a more powerful computer To get a more powerful computer, you pay a higher price

McGraw-Hill/Irwin Copyright 2002 by the McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved The Central Processing Unit A chip that carries out instructions it receives from system & application software Called CPU, microprocessor, processor, or chip Comes in various types or speed –Speeds quoted in megahertz or gigahertz - # of cycles per second

McGraw-Hill/Irwin Copyright 2002 by the McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved Memory Called RAM ( random access memory) Temporary memory that holds –Software instructions –Information for the CPU Shortage of memory will slow down processing time The more complex the software, the more memory you’ll need

McGraw-Hill/Irwin Copyright 2002 by the McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. X - 17 Computer Memory

McGraw-Hill/Irwin Copyright 2002 by the McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved Capacity and Type of RAM A kilobyte (KB or K) is about 1,000 bytes –A kilobyte is exactly 1,024 bytes A megabyte (MB or M or Meg) is roughly 1 million bytes A gigabyte (GB or Gig) is about 1 billion bytes A terabyte (TB) is approximately 1 trillion bytes

McGraw-Hill/Irwin Copyright 2002 by the McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved Bays For Storage Units A place in the system unit reserved for storage Types –Internal For hard disks Have a least one –External Floppy disk drives CD-ROMs & DVDs Zip drives Three 5.25 " external bays One 3.25” drive

McGraw-Hill/Irwin Copyright 2002 by the McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved Hard Drives Long term storage for the operating system and application software Operating system and application software are copied from the hard disk to memory Capacity measured in gigabytes

McGraw-Hill/Irwin Copyright 2002 by the McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved Removable Storage Two varieties –Magnetic –Optical

McGraw-Hill/Irwin Copyright 2002 by the McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved Removable Magnetic Storage Floppy Mylar disk –Housed inside a hard plastic casing –Thin, flexible plastic disk 3.5 inch floppy disks –also called floppies, diskettes, floppy disks High-capacity disks –Zip® disk

McGraw-Hill/Irwin Copyright 2002 by the McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved Optical Storage CDs DVDs Both are optical storage and have three formats: –Read only –Write once –Rewrite

McGraw-Hill/Irwin Copyright 2002 by the McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved Optical Storage Read-Only  CD-ROM  DVD-ROM One-Time Writable  CD-R  DVD-R Fully Read-and- Write  CD-RW  DVD-RW or DVD+RW or DVD-RAM

McGraw-Hill/Irwin Copyright 2002 by the McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved Outside the Box Basic output devices –Monitors –Printers Basic input devices –Keyboard –Mouse

McGraw-Hill/Irwin Copyright 2002 by the McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved Point-and-Click Devices Touchpad Mouse –Standard mouse –Trackball –Optical mouse –Wireless mouse

McGraw-Hill/Irwin Copyright 2002 by the McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved Ergonomics Computer work can lead to physical problems Ergonomics – deals with reducing discomfort Should sit up straight at your computer

McGraw-Hill/Irwin Copyright 2002 by the McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved Monitors CRTs Flat-panel displays –Gas plasma –LCD (liquid crystal display) Passive matrix Active matrix –Called TFT (thin film transistor) –Separate transistor for every pixel

McGraw-Hill/Irwin Copyright 2002 by the McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved Evaluating Monitors Screen size –Measured from corner to opposite corner –In a CRT, picture does not fill the screen Resolution –Number of pixels –Pixel (picture element) – dots that make up the image on the screen Dot Pitch – distance between the centers of a pair of like-colored pixels

McGraw-Hill/Irwin Copyright 2002 by the McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved Printers Inkjet – most popular –Make images by forcing droplets through nozzles –Top speed is 20 pages per minute Laser –Forms images using an electronic process –Prints between 3 and 30 pages per minute

McGraw-Hill/Irwin Copyright 2002 by the McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved Printers cont. Multifunction printers –Will scan, copy, fax, and print –Cheaper than buying all individual units –Can be inkjet or laser –Take up less desk space than separate devices

McGraw-Hill/Irwin Copyright 2002 by the McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved Connecting Devices to the System Unit USB (universal serial bus) connector – allows hot-swap Plug and Play Firewire – faster than USB Serial connector –some have 9 holes –some have 25 holes Parallel connector – –has 25 pins –generally used to connect printers IrDA (infrared data association) – for wireless devices

McGraw-Hill/Irwin Copyright 2002 by the McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved. X - 33 Types of Connectors Parallel Connector used with printers, CD drives, Zip drives. Serial connector used with a modem or a mouse USB connector used with modems, keyboards, scanners, and a variety of other devices

McGraw-Hill/Irwin Copyright 2002 by the McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved Ports Connectors plug into ports Ports correspond to connectors –USB ports fit USB connectors –Serial ports have 9 or 25 pins –Parallel ports have 25 holes

McGraw-Hill/Irwin Copyright 2002 by the McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved Notebook Computers Small, light weight, and portable Can run on a battery Monitor or screen is usually an LCD screen Pointing devices are usually touchpads or trackballs built into the keyboard

McGraw-Hill/Irwin Copyright 2002 by the McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved Consumer Issues Gaming enthusiast –Joystick –Speakers –Speed for processing Photography enthusiasts –Digital cameras for input –Printers –Speed for processing

McGraw-Hill/Irwin Copyright 2002 by the McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved COMPUTER RESOURCES Books & Magazines Consumer Report Computer Buyer’s Guide & Handbook PC Magazine Computer Shopper

McGraw-Hill/Irwin Copyright 2002 by the McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved BUYING A COMPUTER Procurement Method Purchase verses Lease Short term rental Computer stores Mail order Local computer store Build it

McGraw-Hill/Irwin Copyright 2002 by the McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved BUYING A COMPUTER LEARN TO USE IT READ THE MANUAL TAKE A COURSE READ TRADE BOOKS & MAGAZINES

McGraw-Hill/Irwin Copyright 2002 by the McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. All rights reserved BUYING A COMPUTER CARE & MAINTENANCE OF YOUR NEW COMPUTER. Location Warranties Treatment