Computer Hardware 101

Introduction of Computer Hardware

The computer hardware is normally known as hardware which is the physical elements collection that comprises of a computer system. It is the computer components or physical parts like mouse, monitor, keyboard, hard disk drive, sound cards, data storage, motherboard, and memory etc. These are all the physical things which are tangible with each other. Whereas the software is all about instructions which can stored and run by the computer hardware. To form a usable computing system, the hardware and software are collaborated with each other.

What are the components involved in computer hardware?

You can find various types of computing systems which are used in today’s era.

Personal computer:

The personal computer is actually known as PC which is used by many of the people in their homes. Many of them use these computing systems due to their versatility and low cost. 

Power supply:

computer power supply

The power supply converts electric power of alternating current into low voltage DC power for the computer’s internal components. The laptops are able to run from a battery which is built in for some couple of hours or longer times.

Case of the computer:

computer case

It is a metal or plastic house which encloses the components of the computer. The parts which are available in desktop systems are little enough to fit under a desk. In recent days, many of the compact designs became common like all in one design. Although a case seems bigger or smaller, the thing matters is motherboard design. Laptops comes without any case as every spare part is included inside it. 

Mother board:

The major part of the computer is motherboard which is a rectangular board included with a circuitry which joins another part. The other parts are like RAM, disk drives, CPU, and ROM etc. The peripherals and expansion slots are also connected to the computer. 

The parts connected directly to the mother board involve –

  • The central processing unit which does many of calculation and enable the computer to operate. It is referred to as brain of the computer. It is actually cooled by the integrated fan and heat sink. Many of the CPU’s nowadays involve with a graphics processing unit.
  • The random-access memory stores the data and code which are accessed by the central processing unit. 
  • The chipset is the mediator to offer interaction among other system components and CPU even involving main memory.
  • The read only memory actually stores the BIOs which runs when you power on the system. If not, it starts execution of procedure called as booting or bootstrapping.
  • There are buses which are connected to the CPU with different internal components and to the cards of expansion for sound and graphics.
  • There is a presence of CMOS battery which is connected to the motherboard. 

Thus, you can also find input and output peripherals, expansion cards, storage devices, and mainframe computer. These all compromise or integrate with each other and called as computer hardware. This computer hardware collaborates with software to perform main projects or operations.