Hardware
CPU
It stands for Central Processing Unit. Many users erroneously refer to the whole computer box as the CPU. In fact, the CPU itself is only about 1.5 inches square. The CPU does exactly what it stands for. It is the control unit that processes all* of the instructions for the computer. Consider it to be the “brain” of the computer. It does all the thinking. So, would you like to have a fast or slow brain? Obviously, the answer to this question makes the CPU the most important part of the computer. The speed here is the most significant. The processor’s (CPU’s) speed is given in a MHz or GHz rating (see Glossary). 3 GHz is roughly 3,000 MHz.
Motherboard
The best way to describe the motherboard goes along well with my human body analogy that I used for the CPU. The CPU is the brain, and the motherboard is the nervous system. Therefore, just as a person would want to have fast communication to the body parts, you want fast communication between the parts of your computer. Fast communication isn’t as important as reliable communication though. If your brain wanted to move your arm, you want to be sure the nervous system can accurately and consistently carry the signals to do that! Thus, in my opinion, the motherboard is the second most important part of the computer.
The motherboard is the circuit board to which all the other components of the computer connect in some way. The video card, sound card, IDE hard drive, etc. all plug into the motherboard’s various slots and connectors. The CPU also plugs into the motherboard via a Socket or a Slot.
Hard Drive
As the primary communication device to the rest of the computer, the hard drive is very important. The hard drive stores most of a computer’s information including the operating system and all of your programs. Having a fast CPU is not of much use if you have a slow hard drive. The reason for this is because the CPU will just spend time waiting for information from the hard drive. During this time, the CPU is just twiddling it’s thumbs…
The hard drive stores all the data on your computer - your text documents, pictures, programs, etc. If something goes wrong with your hard drive, it is possible that all your data could be lost forever. Today’s hard drives have become much more reliable, but hard drives are still one of the components most likely to fail because they are one of the few components with moving parts. The hard drive has round discs that store information as 1s and 0s very densely packed around the disc.
Memory
All programs, instructions, and data must be stored in system memory before the computer can use it. It will hold recently used programs, instructions, and data in memory if there is room. This provides quick access (much faster than hard drives) to information. The more memory you have, the more information you will have fast access to and the better your computer will perform.
Memory is much like the short term memory in your brain. It holds your most recent information for quick access. Just as you want to accurately remember this information in your head, you want your computer’s memory to have the correct information as well, or problems will obviously occur. Bad memory is one of the more common causes of computer crashes, and also the most difficult problem to diagnose. Because of this, making sure you get good RAM the first time around is very important. My Recommendations will help you get the fastest, highest quality RAM you can.
There are many, many different types of memory for different tasks. The main ones today are DDR PCxx00 SDRAM DIMMs (this includes PC2700, PC3200, etc.) and Direct RDRAM RIMMs
CDROM-DVDROM
CD-ROM drives are necessary today for most programs. A single CD can store up to 650 MB of data (newer CD-Rs allow for 700 MB of data, perhaps more with “overburn”). Fast CD-ROM drives have been a big topic in the past, but all of today’s CD-ROM drives are sufficiently fast. Of course, it’s nice to have the little bits of extra speed. However, when you consider CD-ROM drives are generally used just to install a program or copy CDs, both of which are usually done rarely on most users’ computers, the extra speed isn’t usually very important. The speed can play a big role if you do a lot of CD burning at high speeds or some audio extraction from audio CDs (i.e. converting CDs to MP3s).
CD-R/RW (which stands for Recordable / ReWritable) drives (aka burners, writers) allow a user to create their own CDs of audio and/or data. These drives are great for backup purposes (backup your computer’s hard drive or backup your purchased CDs) and for creating your own audio CD compilations (not to mention other things like home movies, multimedia presentations, etc.).
DVD-ROM drives can store up to 4 GB of data or about 6 times the size of a regular CD (not sure on the exact size, but suffice to say it’s a very large storage medium). DVDs look about the same and are the same size as a CD-ROM. DVD drives can also read CD-ROM drives, so you don’t usually need a separate CD-ROM drive. DVD drives have become low enough inprice that there isn’t much point in purchasing a CD-ROM drive instead of a DVD-ROM drive. Some companies even make CD burner drives that will also read DVDs (all in one). DVD’s most practical use is movies. The DVD format allows for much higher resolution digital recording that looks much clearer than VCR recordings.
DVD recordable drives are available in a couple of different formats - DVD-R or DVD+R with a RW version of each. These are slightly different discs and drives (although some drives support writing to both formats). One is not much better than the other, so it really boils down to price of the media (and also availability of the media).
