Computer System Hardware

Computer System Hardware
By Czarina Isabelle Villa

Input

Input
An input device is any peripheral (piece of computer hardware equipment) used to provide data and control signals to an information processing system (such as a computer). Input andoutput devices make up the hardware interface between a computer as a scanner or 6DOF controller.
A hardware device that sends information into the CPU. Without any input devices a computer would simply be a display device and not allow users to interact with it, much like a TV. Below is a listing of different types of computer input devices.

Digital Camera

A type of camera that stores the pictures or video it takes in electronic format instead of to film. There are several features that make digital cameras a popular choice when compared to film cameras. First, the feature often enjoyed the most is the LCD display on the digital camera. This display allows users to view photos or video after the picture or video has been taken, which means if you take a picture and don't like the results, you can delete it; or if you do like the picture, you can easily show it to other people. Another nice feature with digital cameras is the ability to take dozens, sometimes hundreds of different pictures.

Joystick

A peripheral input device that looks similar to a control device you would find on an arcade game at your local arcades. A computer joystick allows an individual to easily navigate an object in a game such as navigating a plane in a flight simulator.

Keyboard

One of the main input devices used on a computer, a PC's keyboard looks very similar to the keyboards of electric typewriters, with some additional keys.

Microphone

Sometimes abbreviated as mic, a microphone is a hardware peripheral that allows computer users to input audio into their computers.

Mouse

A hardware input device that was invented by Douglas Engelbart in 1963, who at the time was working at the Stanford Research Institute, which was a think tank sponsored by Stanford University. The mouse allows an individual to control a pointer in a graphical user interface (GUI). Utilizing a mouse a user has the ability to perform various functions such as opening a program or file and does not require the user to memorize commands, like those used in a text-based command line environment such as MS-DOS.

Scanner

Hardware input device that allows a user to take an image and/or text and convert it into a digital file, allowing the computer to read and/or display the scanned object. A scanner is commonly connected to a computer USB, Firewire,Parallel or SCSI port.

Web Cam

A camera connected to a computer or server that allows anyone connected to the Internet to view still pictures or motion video of a user. The majority of webcam web sites are still pictures that are frequently refreshed every few seconds, minutes, hours, or days. However, there are some sites and personal pages that can supply streaming video for users withbroadband.

STORAGE

Storage
A term used to describe any location where information can be held permanently or temporarily for later use. A computer commonly has two types of storage: internal and external. For example, an internal storage is a device such as a hard disk drive and an external / removable storage is a device such as a floppy disk drive.

Floppy Diskette

A Floppy Disk Drive, or FDD for short, is a computer disk drive that enables a user to easily save data to removable diskettes. Although 8" disk drives were the first real disk drives, the first widely used an floppy disk drives were the 5 1/4" floppy disk drives, which were later replaced with 3 1/2" floppy disk drives. However, today because of the limited capacity and reliability of floppy diskettes many computers no longer come equipped with floppy disk drives and are being replaced with CD-R and other writable disc drives and flash drives.

CD-ROM disc

Short for Compact Disc-Read Only Memory, CD-ROM drives are CD players inside computers that can have speeds in the range from 1x and beyond, and have the capability of playing audio CDs and computer data CDs.

Hard Drive

A computer's main storage media device, also called a hard disk drive or abbreviated as HD or HDD. The hard drivewas first introduced on September 13, 1956 and consists of one or more hard disk platters inside of air sealed casing. Most hard drives are permanently stored in an internal drive bay at the front of the computer and are connected with either ATA, SCSI, or a SATA cable and power cable.

USB Flash drive/ Jump Drive

Also known as a USB flash drive and thumb drive, a jump drive is a portable drive that is often the size of your thumb that connects to the computer USB port. Today flash drives are available in various sizes including but not limited to 256MB, 512MB, 1GB, 5GB, 16GB, and beyond and are widely used as an easy and small way to transfer AND store information from their computer.

Output

Any peripheral that receives and/or displays output from a computer. Below are some examples of different types of output devices commonly found on a computer.

Monitor

Also called a video display terminal (VDT) a monitor is a video display screen and the hard shell that holds it. In its most common usage, monitor refers only to devices that contain no electronic equipment other than what is essentially needed to display and adjust the characteristics of an image.

Printer

An external hardware device responsible for taking computer data and generating ahard copy of that data. Printers are one of the most used peripherals on computers and are commonly used to print text, images, and/or photos.

Projector

A hardware device that enables an image, such as a computer screen, to be projected onto a flat surface. These devices are commonly used in meetings and presentations as they allow for a large image to be shown so everyone in a room can see.

Sound Card

Also known as a sound board or an audio card, a sound card is an expansion card or integrated circuit that provides a computer with the ability to produce sound that can be heard by the user either over speakers and/or headphones.

Speakers

A hardware device connected to a computer's sound card that outputs sounds generated by the card.

Video Card

Also known as a graphics card, video card, video board, or a video controller, a video adapter is an internal circuit board that allows a display device such as a monitor to display a picture from the computer. Today video cards are most commonly connected to the AGP slot or PCIe slot on the motherboard, however, can also be found on-board or in a PCIslot.

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