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What are Computers and Networks?
Definitions
• (Collins English Dictionary): 'A device, usually electronic, that
processes data according to a set of instructions'
• (Que’s Computer Users Dictionary): 'A machine capable of
following instructions to alter data in a desirable way and to
perform at least some of these operations without human
intervention'.
• (Microsoft Press Computer Dictionary, 3rd Ed.: 'Any machine
that does three things: accepts structured input, processes it
according to prescribed rules, and produces the results as output'.
1. Type of data
2. Use
3. Size and complexity
4. Function
Types of Computer Systems
(Based on the type of data)
1. General Purpose
o Perform a wide variety of processing tasks
o These are the most common
Notes:
• Since mid 80s the distinction between micro and mini has become
blurred
• Now microcomputers (PCs and Workstations) are more powerful
than older mainframes (see below)
Personal Digital Assistants
Terminology:
• A Bit is short for Binary Digit.
(2n -1)
where
n = # of bits
Decimal Number System
(base10)
1
10
100
1000
etc…..
Example
Consider the following decimal number:
136.25.
total = 136.25
Binary Number System
(base2)
With the binary numbering system, we use a base of 2 instead of a base
of 10.
1
2
4
8
16
32
64
128
256
512
etc…..
Example:
Consider the binary number
1101.01.
23 * 1 = 1000.0 (8 in decimal)
22 * 1 = 100.0 (4 in decimal)
21 * 0 = 00.0 (0 in decimal)
20 * 1 = 1.0 (1 in decimal)
2-1 * 0 = 0.0 (0.0 in decimal)
2-2 * 1 = 0.01 (0.25 in decimal)
decimal binary
0 0000 (0 * 23 + 0 * 22 + 0 * 21 + 0 * 20)
1 0001 (0 * 23 + 0 * 22 + 0 * 21 + 1 * 20)
2 0010 (0 * 23 + 0 * 22 + 1 * 21 + 0 * 20)
3 0011 (0 * 23 + 0 * 22 + 1 * 21 + 1 * 20)
4 0100 (0 * 23 + 1 * 22 + 0 * 21 + 0 * 20)
5 0101 (0 * 23 + 1 * 22 + 0 * 21 + 1 * 20)
6 0110 (0 * 23 + 1 * 22 + 1 * 21 + 0 * 20)
7 0111 (0 * 23 + 1 * 22 + 1 * 21 + 1 * 20)
8 1000 (1 * 23 + 0 * 22 + 0 * 21 + 0 * 20)
9 1001 (1 * 23 + 0 * 22 + 0 * 21 + 1 * 20)
Octal Number System
(base8)
With the octal numbering system, we use a base of 8 instead of a base of
10 or 2.
Example:
Consider the binary number
110101010
6 5 2
6528
42610
Hexadecimal Number System
(base16 or baseH)
Although it is very convenient for computers to use 0 and 1 it is difficult
for humans to readily identify binary numbers.
100101110100
9 7 4
97416 = 974H
A table providing decimal, binary, and hex equivalents for the first 16
integers is:
decimal binary Hex
0 0000 0
1 0001 1
2 0010 2
3 0011 3
4 0100 4
5 0101 5
6 0110 6
7 0111 7
8 1000 8
9 1001 9
10 1010 A
11 1011 B
12 1100 C
13 1101 D
14 1110 E
15 1111 F
Processing
Output Device
Storage Device
Communication
Storage Device Device
Input Device
open bay
ports and
connectors open bay
open bay
expansion
board
hard disk
memory
mother expansion
board slots CPU
Terminology of Components "Inside" the Box
Power Supply:
A power supply regulates the supply of electricity to the various
components of the computer.
Motherboard:
The motherboard is the most important part of the system. It acts as the
foundation of your computer and supplies all of the electrical connections
between components.
Floppy Drives:
Floppy drives allow you to write information to, and read, floppy
diskettes.
Add-on Boards:
Add-on boards, that extend the abilities of your computer. These boards
are inserted into the computer’s expansion slots. The slots allow you to
add boards such as serial and parallel prots, modems, video cards, mice
and fax boards.
Disk Controler:
The disk controller connects the disk drives, floppy or hard, to the CPU.
Without this card, the CPU would not be able to communicate with the
drives, and the computer would have no way to save or retrieve
information.
Processing Unit
The processing unit is made up of the Central Processing Unit and
memory.
1. Central Processing Unit
Has 3 different parts:
a) Arithmetic/Logic Unit (ALU)
* Performs arithmetic and logic operations
b) Instruction Control Unit (ICU)
* Coordinates the machine's activities
c) Memory (Registers)
* Special memory cells in the CPU that is used
as temporary holding places.
* Certain registers are assigned special tasks
(e.g. instruction register, storage register,
accumulator etc)
2. Main Memory
* Stores data and program instructions
* each physical storage unit is assigned a unique address
* a location in main memory is accessed by its address
Communication
Main Memory
There are two parts to the main memory - ROM and RAM
Registers
• Part of control unit, not memory
• Very high speed storage locations.
• Used only in low level programming.
The Motherboard
All processing unit components are placed on the motherboard and are
connected by something called a bus.
So, how does a Computer's CPU actually do something?
Secondary Storage Units
Disk Block
Sector
Tracks
• QIC records data in narrow tracks along the length of the tape.
When the end is reached, the tape reverses direction and data is
recorded on the next track in the opposite direction. This is called
longitudinal or serpentine recording.
• DAT drives use helical scan technology to record data across the
width of the tape at a 6-degree angle.
• Older reel-to-reel tape drives record data across the width of the
tape on 9 tracks.
Floppy Disks
• Consists of magnetic "platter" that rotates at speeds of
approximately 360 rpm
• Read and Write heads is in close contact with the surface of the
disk or platter
• Usually very low capacity storage (usually around 1.44 MB)
Shutter
Paper Liner
Metal Hub
Plastic Disk
Magnetic Coating
Hard Disks
• Consists of magnetic "platter" that rotates at speeds of 3600+
rpm
• Read and Write heads 'floats' over the surface of these platters
• Usually high capacity storage (range from 40MB to 10GB+)
Two types:
1. Fixed
• What we think of as hard drives inside the computer box
2. Removable (disk cartridges such as Zip or Jazz disks)
• Zip disks:
o Stores 100 - 250 MB;
o This has become a kind of standard because so
many have been sold.
• JAZZ disks:
o Stores 1 or 2 GB.
Disk Cartridge
Key differences between floppy disks and hard disks:
Floppy disk: Head is in close contact with surface of the disk
Hard disk: Heads "fly" on a film of air a fraction of a mm above
the disk's surface.
• CD-ROM:
o store 650 MB, or 74 minutes of CD quality music (so about
9 MB/minute)
• CD-R (CD-Recordable):
o these can be “burned” once. The media cost about $1 each
for 650 MB, so media cost is negligible.
• CD-RW (CD-Rewrite):
o these can be written over. They cost $10 or so each, and
thus are a lot more costly than plain CD-R.
• DVD:
o store the equivalent of 5-6 CD-ROMs.
Magnetic-Optical drive
• Very small
• Most often used with portable computers
• Can store more than 300 MB of data
Smart Cards
• Credit card-sized devices that contain a microprocessor in the
center left section.
• Microprocessor can store up to 8,000 bytes of information.
• Examples of uses -
o Prepaid telephone card
o Employee time and attendance tracking.
Input Units
Input devices: These are peripheral equipment that allows data and
instructions to be entered into the computer.
1. Direct
• Machine data input
• Machines make better input devices
2. Non-direct
• Human data entry
• Most often used method
o Keyboard
o Mouse
o Joystick
o Touch sensitive screens
o Light pens
o Others????
Output Units
Output devices: These are peripheral equipment that allows data from
the computer to be converted to human readable
forms.
Impact printers
Impact a solid image of a character onto an inked ribbon up
against the paper.
Non-impact printers
No physical contact between paper and printing device
Dot matrix concept used to form characters
i. Laser
iii. Thermal
Types of Video Display Units (VDU's):
Types of screens:
Another screen
liquid crystal display(LCD)
Gas Plasma
Most CRT screens use a technology called raster-scan technology.
Color
Monitor
Communication Units
Communication devices: These are peripheral equipment that
allows data from one computer to be
transferred to another computer.
Parallel port: used for the printer, external ZIP drives, scanners,
and cameras. These use a 25-pin connector on the
PC.
Serial port: used for external modems, mice, and connecting
instruments. Most new ports use a 9-pin connector,
but some older ones have a 25-pin connector.
USB: (Universal Serial Bus) a faster and better connection
that lets you changes components on the fly. The
computer should recognize the peripheral and not
require re-booting. The connectors are small
rectangular plugs.
SCSI: (Small Computer System Interface) less common
standard for computers that requires interface cards
that look like large printer connectors.
• GIF images are often only 8 bit colour rather than 24 bit bit.
• Can be animations, i.e. contain several images that are displayed in sequence.
HTTP
HyperText Transfer Protocol
IC
Integrated Circuit
JPEG
Joint Photographic Experts Group
Acronym for Joint Photographic Experts Group. An ISO/ITU standard for storing images in
compressed form using a discrete cosine transform. JPEG trades off compression against loss; it
can achieve a compression ratio of 100:1 with significant loss and possibly 20:1 with little
noticeable loss.
LAN
Local Area Network
LSI
Large Scale Integration
MIPS
Millions of Instructions Per Second
MPEG
Acronym for Moving Pictures Experts Group.
A set of standards for audio and video compression established by the Joint ISO/IEC Technical
Committee on Information Technology. The MPEG standard has different types that have been
designed to work in different situations.
MSB
Most Significant Bit
NFS
Network Filing System
OCR
Optical Character Recognition
PCMCIA
Personal Computer Memory Card International Association
PDA
Personal Digital Assistant
PNG
Portable Network Graphics
A file format for bit mapped graphic images, designed to be a replacement for the GIF format,
without the legal restrictions associated with GIF
RAM
Random Access Memory
RISC
Reduced Instruction Set Computer
ROM
Read Only Memory
SVGA
Super Video Graphic Adapter
.tif or .tiff
Identifies bit map images in Tagged Image File Format
A standard file format commonly used for scanning, storage, and interchange of gray-scale
graphic images. TIFF may be the only format available for older programs (such as older versions
of MacPaint), but most modern programs are able to save images in a variety of other formats,
such as GIF or JPEG.
URL
Uniform Resource Location
VDU
Video Display Unit
VGA
Video Graphic Adapter
VRAM
Video RAM
WORM
Write Once, Read Many
WWW
World Wide Web