1. C OMPUTERS AND C OMPUTER S YSTEMS Computing Fundamentals Lesson 1, Part 2 Computer Literacy Basics Morrison & Wells

2. I DENTIFYING S YSTEM C OMPONENTS Motherboard—system board mounted inside the computer case A circuit board (thin plate or board that contains electronic components) Contains integral computer components such as... Central Processing Unit Memory Basic Controllers Expansion ports and expansion slots

3. I DENTIFYING S YSTEM C OMPONENTS Central Processing Unit (CPU) Also called the microprocessor, is the brains of the computer Contains millions of switches and pathways that help your computer make important decisions Two primary sections: Arithmetic/Logic Unit—performs arithmetic computations and logical operations Control Unit—the “boss”—coordinates all of the processor’s activities The computer does not understand human language; therefore, everything must be converted to computer language— binary—1’s and 0’s

4. P ROCESSOR S PEED Machine cycles are measured in... Microseconds (millionths of a second) Nanoseconds (billionths of a second) Picoseconds (trillionths of a second) The fast the machine cycle, the faster your computer processes data. MHz (megahertz) and GHz (gigahertz)—indicate the speed of the microprocessor clock—timing device that specifies the speed for executing instructions.

5. B ITS & B YTES 1—electricity is present—”on” 0—electricity is not present—”off” Bit—single 1 or 0 Byte—one character—8 bits Kilobyte—approx. 1000 bytes Megabyte—approx. 1 million bytes Gigabyte—approx. 1 billion bytes Terabyte—approx. 1 trillion bytes ***1 GB of data is equal to 450 digital songs

6. M EMORY Found on the motherboard Short-term or long-term RAM—Random Access Memory Also called main memory and primary memory Short-term, volatile Electricity goes off—your research paper is gone (unless you have saved it!) Want more speed—buy more RAM

7. M EMORY ROM—Read Only Memory Non-volatile, permanent even when the power if off Found on the motherboard ROM chips—found throughout a computer system BIOS ROM—stores instructions that tell the computer what to do when it is turned on Cannot write or store data to a ROM Chip

8. T YPES OF S TORAGE D EVICES Magnetic technology hard drives, magnetic tape, floppy disks, and zip disks oxide-coated plastic storage media electromagnetic read/write head stores or retrieves data in circles called tracks

9. T YPES OF S TORAGE D EVICES Optical Storage Devices Use laser technology to read and write data on silver platters CDs CD-DA—digital audio format CD-R—disc-recordable format. Once written, can’t be changed CD-ROM—read-only memory format can store large amounts of data—700 floppy diskettes of data CD-RW—rewritable multiple times DVDs DVD-ROM—much larger capacity than CD-R DVD-RW—larger capacity than CD-RW Blu-ray—large storage capacity (5 times a DVD) and enables recording and playback of high-def video

10. T YPES OF S TORAGE D EVICES Solid-state storage Removal media Nonvolatile Processed electronically so no mechanical parts Miniature mobile storage media USB Flash drive Also known as key drive, thumb drive, jump drive, USB flash memory, and USB stick

11. T YPES OF S TORAGE D EVICES Network Drives can be a hard drive or tape drive located on a computer other than the user’s local system Remote Storage—can be on the same network, a separate network, or the Internet

12. C ARING FOR S TORAGE M EDIA Keep away from magnetic fields such as those contained in televisions and computer monitors (magnetic media) Avoid extreme temperatures Remove media and store when not in use Hold optical discs such as DVDs by the edges Never remove when the drive light is on Keep discs in a sturdy case when transporting