A Brief Introduction to Computer Hardware Components
Computer hardware comprises the internal components of a personal computer, including the motherboard, hard disk, processor, video card, hard drive, input devices, optical drive, printer, CPU socket, motherboard drivers and sound card. Motherboards provide the interface for connecting the computer hardware and software components. In addition to providing the interface, they also control the computer hardware. The optical drive stores media content such as pictures, documents, music, videos and others.
The computer system hardware components are soldered to a circuit board or a discrete components. Computer systems use different types of hardware. They can be desktop, notebook and mainframe computers. Desktop uses different types of hardware such as hard disk, sound card and graphics card while notebook uses different types of hardware such as hard drive, optical drive and CPU. Mainframe uses a single type of hardware for both notebooks and desktops. Based on the system architecture, various computer hardware components are available in the market.
The operating system is the software that controls the hardware. It controls the functions of the hardware and it is installed on the computer at the time of purchase or installation. Microsoft Windows operating system, Linux, Unix, Mac OS, Motorola, SunOS and others are some of the popular operating systems in the market. The operating system controls the execution of software programs and enables the user to control the hardware.
Central processing unit (CPU) is the most important computer hardware component. The CPU controls the execution of software programs and it is also responsible for managing the execution of data instructions. The tasks executed by the CPU include reading and writing the information from the hard drive. The hard drive is the storage media for storing the files. The computer memory acts as the base of the CPU.
Motherboard is the peripheral component that connects the CPU to the hard drive and to the other internal peripherals of the computer. The main function of the motherboard is to connect the internal peripherals to the CPU. The video card is the most important component of the computer that produces images for the display monitor or the output to the output port of the CPU. Computer monitors also use video cards.
System unit includes many components like microprocessor, microcontroller, Random Access Memory (RAM), Secure Digital Filter (RAS), Analog Devices and more. The central processing unit controls the execution of software programs and it is also responsible for managing the execution of data instructions. The microprocessor can execute instructions on the basis of an instruction list stored in the central processing unit. The Random Access Memory is used to store data that is accessed by the CPU.