Computer Terminology
List 2
Personal Computer = Hardware & Software
Hardware Computer
machinery Peripherals: Any
computer part, component or accessory
Software Computer
programs Any program
written for the computer
CPU: Brains of the computer
The CPU is housed on a tiny silcon chip which contains millions of switches and pathways that help your computer make decisions. The switches control the flow of electricity through the pathways; receives instruction from programs.
Central Processing Unit
The CPU is the brain of the computerIt processes all the information that runs through the computer.Runs the operating system, software and device peripherals.The speed of the processor is a hertz--a cycle per second.
Common CPU processing speeds: Intel Celeron:
500-800 MHz Intel Pentium II
& III: 233-450 Mhz
Intel Pentium III Xeon: 450 Mhz – 1Ghz
Motherboard
A circuit board that mounts into the PC case which houses all the main components. It contains many integral components on a thin plate.
Wafer or Chip
A thin, round slice of semiconductor material, typically silicon, from which microchips are made. Silicon is processed into large cylindrical ingots, sliced into ultra-thin wafers and then implanted with transistors before being cut into smaller semiconductor chips
RAM & ROM--Memory Terms
Random Access Memory is the computer’s temporary memory. Volatile: only exists
while you are using the program.
When you exit the program all RAM is erased
RAM is measured in bytes--megabytes; usually 16 or 32 MB.
Input & Output Devices
Input: Keyboard,
scanner, modem, mouse
Output Printers, monitors,
plotters, speakers, modem.
MonitorsMonitors are video devices made up of PIXELSA pixel is equal to one dot on the video screenAre there more pixels per square inch on a monitor or a TV?
Answer: Monitor
Monitors
The quality of monitors are determined by the screen size, resolution and dot pitch. Dot pitch is the
measurement between pixels; the lower the number, the better the resolution.
Mouse
A point and click device Select and object
on the screen and click or double click to activate the selected object
Web Site AddressesUniform Resource Locator (URL) the unique address of each Web page
Composed of three parts Protocol
set of rules computers follow HTTP
hypertext transport protocol
Http://Http://www.whitehouse.govwww.whitehouse.gov
Web Site Address--URL
Domain Name address where the Web page is
locatedHttp://www.whitehouse.govHttp://www.whitehouse.gov
• File Specification– filename and folder name called a path
Http://www.whitehouse.gov/Http://www.whitehouse.gov/vicepresidentvicepresident
Domain Names
Organized by computer groups .gov stands for government .edu stands for education .com stands for commercial .mil stands for military .org stands for organization
Http://www.whitehouse.Http://www.whitehouse.govgov//vicepresidentvicepresident
The End