Beginners Guide to Computer Hardware

On below page you shall find Beginners Guide to Computer Hardware Components. I will describe and introduce the basic hardware components you will find in your computer furthermore I will give some personal recommendations about which Computer Hardware Components to choose in order to put together an Awesome Gaming PC.

What is a computer? – Beginners Guide to Computer Hardware

In short computer is an electronic device that takes some data in digital format and processes it. Computer uses a set of rules and instructions to do that work. These rules and instructions are located in the Program to whom computer is doing that work for. Computer also facilitates that Program. So it is a very efficient and resourceful combination of physical components and digital data. In a more basic level the software can be either built into the physical computer hardware components or it can be installed onto the storage device of the computer.

As a result you can watch movies, read books, play games, chat with your friends, listen to music and even more – whatever your mind can come up with.

So in summary a computer is a device that as a combination of Hardware + Software + Human Operator can achieve whatever. I suppose even the Sky is not the limit. 

More Detailed information about Computers and history behind them can be found in Wikipedia

What hides inside a computer? – Beginners Guide to Computer Hardware

What makes a Computer? What is hiding inside it and what difference does it make?

Computer consists of many different more or less vital components. It usually is that some components are a bit more crucial than the others but I will talk about that in more detail in the future.

On the Left you can see a Diagram of a Computer inside and its components.

These are all the main components that you can find in your Computer.

List of Computer Components:

• Computer Case
• MOBO – Motherboard
• PSU – Power Supply Unit
• CPU – Central processing unit or Processor
• RAM – Random access memory or Memory
• HDD Drive – Hard Disk Drive or Hard Disk
• GPU – Graphics Processing Unit or Video Card
• SSD Drive – Solid State Drive or just SSD
• Cooling (vent + Radiator)
• Water Cooling

What is Computer Case? – Beginners Guide to Computer Hardware

Computer Case is one of the simplest yet most customised component of a Computer. Technically it is just a box that holds all the important parts of your computer together. There are however reasons why having a Good Computer Case is recommended.

Computer Case will:  

• Keep your Computer Components safe when just standing or while being moved around
• Look good (compared to all the loose computer parts in a cardboard box somewhere :))
• Minimise the amount of dust that gets into your Computer Components

All in all a good Computer Case depends of different needs. Personally I usually prefer a bit bigger cases so that all my Computer Components fit nicely and I have some room to actually move things around. Then again this has given me Big problems as well. Jokes aside, if the case is too big and you actually go to LAN parties (gathering of Gamers to play games together in the same physical location while eating junk food and enjoying some good drinks) it is a major headache to carry that thing around. Sure carrying the case itself is not that much of a problem but you also have to take your Monitor, gaming devices such as Keyboard, Mouse, Controller, cables, and everything else you might need during a weekend with friends.

So yeah – my advice to you: If you move around take a more compact case if mobility is not needed take a nice and large case.

What is Motherboard? – Beginners Guide to Computer Hardware

When Computer Case held all your Computer Components together then Motherboard is technically the centre of your Computer. All the devices that you can see in the Computer 

Components diagram above, physically connect to the Motherboard. Without a Motherboard there will be no Computer. It is as simple as that :). All in all there are 2 different technological paths for Motherboards it depends of your CPU choice. You might ask: What do you mean?

Well since dawn of time (computer history that is), there have been Intel and AMD. Both corporations researched their own technologies and therefor came up with two different technologies for CPU‘s. Currently Intel has their i3, i5, i7 and i9 and AMD has their Razen series CPU‘s. What is the difference you may wonder still? Well i will not go into deep technical description instead the main difference is the Socket ie the connector the CPU connects to the Motherboard. Currently Intel has Socket LGA 2066 and AMD has Socket AM4. 

As I am not a big fan of AMD Components I will concentrate more on Intel.

What is PSU – Power Supply Unit? – Beginners Guide to Computer Hardware

Power Supply Unit or Power Supply or PSU in short is what powers the whole Computer. It does that by converting the high voltage AC power to low voltage regulated DC power. As there are different voltages used around the world, most of the PSU‘s support 220v and 110v mode. Some recognise the input voltage automatically and therefor switch to the correct mode, some however have a manual switch to change the mode manually.

Warning: connecting PSU with input mode set manually to 110v  to power circuit running 220v WILL RUIN your PSU. That I am saying from my own experience – We usually had all the PSU‘s set to 220v input (Europe – Estonia), but I received some from US and did not notice they had input set to 110v). As soon as I connected it to power circuit – BOOM no more PSU.

There are different types and versions of PSU‘s so do check out the below

What is CPU – Central Processing Unit? – Beginners Guide to Computer Hardware

What is CPU on a Computer? CPU or Central Processing Unit is the brain of the Computer. Similarly to human brain, CPU calculates and commands different parts of the Computer to do something. CPU‘s have evolved a lot over time.

There are different types of CPU‘s available. As I explained under Motherboards post, there are 2 different types of CPU‘s. Firstly there is INTEL and secondly there is AMD. However as i explained before I will be concentrating on INTEL related technology only. Therefor I will be talking about different types of INTEL i series CPU‘s.

Below you can find out what are the components of CPU and their functions, I will shortly talk on topic: the CPU consists of which two parts? What does CPU stand for in games, and much more.

What is RAM – Random Access Memory? – Beginners Guide to Computer Hardware

RAM or Random Access Memory is a type of Computer storage for temporary program data. RAM offers much faster read and write speeds than usual HDD and SSD do. The main purpose of RAM is to keep temporary Program data, while the program is working. As the read and write speed of RAM is quite fast, the programs can access the temporary data faster and therefor perform better. The more data the program has to process the more RAM is required.   

Water Cooling vs Air Cooling vs AIO Cooler – Beginners Guide to Computer Hardware

The More powerful your gaming PC gets the more better cooling it will require. From Beginning you will probably start with the default CPU Cooler, but as time goes on you might consider changing it into something Cooler are more efficient. In general there are 3 different types of CPU cooling:

• Air Cooling
• Water Cooling
• AIO Cooler Cooling

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