Components of a Personal Computer (PC) Adapted from Region IV TIFF Training

Cables

FireWire High Speed Data cable Used to connect video cameras to computers Also used to connect other peripherals like external drives Hot – swappable

DV Cable New connector used to connect video cameras to computers Usually paired with FireWire

USB High speed data cable Used to connect keyboards and mice Connects other peripherals including printers and scanners Hot – swappable

CAT 6 and CAT 5 Data cable used to connect computers together Called a phone line on steroids

RCA Used to connect legacy appliances such as DVD and CD players, to TV’s. Used in some audio systems

S-Video Used to connect video devices such as cameras, VCR’s, and DVD players Does NOT transmit audio

Phono Older type of connector that has either mono or stereo capabilities Used to connect microphones, headphones, and other audio products ¼ and 1/8

XLR Industry standard connection for audio products including microphones and some electronic equipment Provides more balance to alternating current- cleaner sound

Coaxial Industry standard for connecting cable tv signals to a TV or a cable modem Used to connect VCR’s to TV’s

Cable Gender and other Issues Cables can be male or female. You cannot connect male to male or female to female. Need adapters When connecting cables ALWAYS go OUT-to-IN or IN-to-OUT. NEVER THE SAME- damage may occur!

External Parts

Internal Parts CPU Motherboard that includes: RAM Processor PCI slots Sound Card Video Graphics card Hard Drives (system boot drive and storage- C: V: E:)

Hard Drive Types SCSI  Small computer System Interface  Relatively fast and is usually added IDE  Intelligent (Integrated) Drive Electronics  Slower than SCSI and less expensive  Comes with most desktop computers

RAM – Computer Memory Random access memory Types:  Dynamic (DRAM)  Static (SRAM) Both types lose their contents when the power is turned off.

ROM - Memory Read Only Memory  Computer memory on which data has been prerecorded  Once written, it cannot be removed, only read  It retains itself after the computer is turned off

Port Connectors Serial  9 pin or 24 pin  Usually slower  Examples: keyboard, mouse Parallel  Interface to connect an external device like a printer  25 pin connector  Most PCs have one serial port and two parallel ports

New Connections ® Universal Serial Bus (USB) ® Supports “plug and play” installations ® Will soon replace all serial and parallel ports IEEE 1394 (Firewire) Fastest on the market but more expensive Both are “hot swappable”

Video Adaptors Board/card that plugs into a PC to give it display capabilities Three Main Types:  VGA / SVGA (Video Graphics Array) 800x600  XGA / UXGA (eXtended graphics array) 1600x1200  Digital DVI (digital visual interface) HDTV quality compatible Monitor and video card must be compatible

Other Computer Additions CD-RW or ROM DVD player (ROM)/ RW Speakers Zip/ Jazz drives Capture cards/ game cards

Conversion Rates for Hardware 8 bits = 1 byte 1024 bytes = 1 Kilobyte 1000 KB = 1 Megabyte 1000 MB = 1 Gigabyte 1000 GB = 1 Terabyte  This is system size/ capacity for the computer hardware  Important for compatibility issues when upgrading computers.

Our Components : How do they connect together? In Out

Components Intel Pentium IV processor (dual) PCI Firewire card (rear) RAM (1 Gig) DVD-RW drive VGA- NVIDIA 128m AGP video card (through the accelerated graphics port-AGP) Boot drive (hard drive) C: drive (system) Video drive (hard drive) V: drive (capture) Export drive (hard drive) E: drive (export) TV, DVD player, Breakout box, speakers, headphones

Local Area Networks (LANs) Group of computers, servers, and printers connected by wiring and other hardware Allows users to share information and communicate. Uses CAT 5 cable, sometimes fiber TCP/IP protocol (10, 100, gigabit)

Wide Area Network (WANs) Use of CAT 5 cable or fiber optics to connect several LAN’s together to share and communicate information World Wide Web (www) PISD has LANS and WANS

Troubleshooting Basic Computer Issues Understand how to use it properly Don’t panic if something goes wrong What EXACTLY were you doing when the error occurred? WRITE IT DOWN What EXACTLY was the error message? WRITE IT DOWN What does work? What doesn’t work? What did you try? Check the physical cable connections Try rebooting the computer Get someone to help.

Components of a Editing Station Activity Based on what you have learned, what are the components in our computer editing stations? On your own paper, diagram out the various parts of the station and how they are connected. Turn in when complete.