Chapter 1 thru 3 Review Topic
Ch 1 - Overview
Computers are ubiquitous
Used in home, education, work, on the go
Smart appliances
Data – text, sound, image, video
All data maintained in files
File systems have folders (directories) and files
Hierarchical structure
NTFS – recommended for XP, Vista, Win 8
FAT32 – still used on some external devices
Computers process binary data
Convert data to information
Computer System: input -> process -> output with storage and communication
Input converts data to binary to be processed by computer
Output converts binary to be processed by human beings
Input devices – keyboard, mouse, microphone, digital camera, webcam
Output devices – monitor, printer, projector, speaker via sound card
System box contains
motherboard, and motherboard holds processor, memory slots,
expansion slots, buses, control circuitry
internal hard drives, optical drives, power system unit, connectors
Software – system vs application
Computers need Oss – used to supervise the running of programs
Modern OSs – Windows XP, Vista, 7, soon Windows 8; Apple OS X; Linux; IBM mainframe zOS
Mobile OSs – iOS and Android
System programs help manage computer devices and resources
OSs and utilities
User interface of OS often uses a desktop paradigm
Application programs do something useful for the user
Games still dominant application sector
Productivity software – word processing, spreadsheet; image editing, video editing;
Browsers, media players; personal finance
Written in high level programming languages – C++, Java, C#, VB, Python
Computers always follows instructions laid out in the software
Different sizes of computers
Embedded
Mobile
Personal – handheld (ultra mobile PC),tablet, netbook, ultrabook,
laptop, desktop, workstation, all-in-one
Mid-range – 100s of users, small and medium businesses
Mainframe – 1000s of users, schools, large businesses & corporations, web search sites
Supercomputer – few users, extremely high processing
Modeling applications – weather, new product, genome
Large numbers of processors tied together through high speed bus
High end super computers process in the peta flops;
considered supercomputer at 1 T flop
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Chapter 1 thru 3 Review Topic
Grid computing
Computer users
Programmers, analysts, operators, administrators, end users
Networking
Nodes
Wired and wireless
Ethernet
Hot spots
Sharing – data, printing, communication
Internet considered largest network
Internet and Web
Internet uses TCP/IP protocol
Different protocols
http – transmits hypertext
smtp & pop – handles emails
asynchronous communication
xmpp – IM
synchronous communication
ftp – file transfers
Web sites
Home page
Web pages
.html, .asp, .jsp, .php, .cgi – static vs dynamic web pages
Hyperlinks
Favorites / bookmarks
Browser software used to process HTML (display language for Web pages)
Address bar
Search sites
Addressing
IP address:
225.129.30.18
Domain name: www.google.com
Domain name server
URL: protocol, domain, directory(s), webpage name
http://home.clcillinois.edu/bdv603/CIT120/Projects/CIT120Proj1.html
Email addresses: username@domain.name
Society Issues with Computing
Malware – viruses, worms
Identity Theft
Scams
Privacy
Addiction
Changing personal and work habits / procedures
Higher productivity
Availability of answers
Opening up new solutions
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Chapter 1 thru 3 Review Topic
Ch 2 - Processing
CPU
Arithmetic and Logic Unit
Control Unit
Address Register – next instruction
Instruction Register – decodes instruction
Registers – manipulates the binary data
Instruction steps – fetch, decode, execute, store
Prefetch unit
Decoder unit
Cache memory levels
Most cache memory has been moved onto the processor chip rather than external
Pipelining used to do concurrent steps for instructions; used to speed up process
Main CPU manufacturers
Intel, AMD, ARM, IBM (PowerPC, Cell)
Common desktop processors have 4 cores
High end desktop and workstation processors have 6 and 8 cores
AMD FX processors
Intel Haswell e-series
Apple’s new Mac Pro uses Intel’s Xeon 12-core processor
Mid priced laptops have 2 cores
Processors capable of giga ops
Main GPU
Nvidia, ATI
Newer APU (Accelerated Processing Unit) integrates CPU and GPU functionality
Used for lower end desktops, laptops, not as powerful as $100 graphic cards
System clock – crystal on mother board
Multipliers for processor, memory, front side bus (data)
Synchronizes operations between components
Memory
ROM – boot
Flash – non-volatile
RAM – volatile (needed for fast changes of state from 0 to 1 and back), also called main memory
NVDIMM – currently combination of RAM and Flash with supercapacitors – primarily for servers
Physical memory vs virtual memory (implemented on hard drive)
Physical memory (RAM) is a million times faster than virtual memory (disk drive)
Number systems
Decimal – based on powers of 10; has range of 0 – 9
Binary – based on powers of 2; has range of 0 – 1
Hexadecimal – based on powers of 16; based on range of 0 – 9, a, b, c, d, e, f
Types of data – all must be represented in binary for computer to manipulate
Text – encoding standards – ANSI (8-bit), EBCDIC (8-bit), Unicode (16 or 32-bit)
Sound or audio– frequency represented in 16-bits; sampled 44,100 times/second
Image – pixels represented by 24 or 32 bits typically
Video – Images at 24 or 30 frames per second; usually includes sound
Bits, Bytes, and Nibbles
Buses on mother board
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Data
Address
Control
Power
External buses
USB: 2.0 speed 480 Mbps; 3.0 speed 5 Gbps
Firewire: 400 Mbps, 800 Mbps – used often for video esp by Apple
Intel Thunderbolt: 10 Gbps; Apple uses it in newer PCs; finally available on Win PC
motherboards
SCSI
Wireless connections: WiFi, WiMax, Bluetooth
Important numbers
Kilobytes
milliseconds
Megabytes
microseconds
Gigabytes
nanoseconds
Terabytes
Petabytes
Exabytes
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Chapter 1 thru 3 Review Topic
Ch 3 – Storage – persistant, non-volatile storage
Files on the storage system contain the stream of bits necessary for processing information we need
These include programs, text data, photos, songs, videos
Folders, which hold the files, organize them into a hierarchical structure for ease of use
Most data is stored as random access data
Removable media vs fixed media
Medium vs device
Magnetic
HD, floppy, zip/jazz drives, portable drives, external hard drives
Data stored as polarity
Tracks, sectors, cylinders, clusters
Low cost, high density
HD capacity – 3 to 4 TB
HD speed – 166 MBps
Tape – sequential storage
Backup and logging
Optical
CD, DVD, BluRay
Uses lasers
ROM – lands and pits
R, RW – reflective and non-reflective
Removable
Cheap media
Dual layer – two different lasers
Solid State
RAM disk
RAM memory, hard drive, UPS
Expensive, but extremely fast
Solid State Drives (SSDs)
Based on using flash memory
5th generation
Extremely fast – 550 MBps
Primary use laptops, tablets
Other
Smart cards – has memory and possibly processor
Potentially add biometric data for security purposes
Holographic storage – vaporware device?
Storage drives usually given letters in Windows – C: drive most often hard drive and contains OS
Physical drives can be partitioned into logical drives
Vendor systems often come with a small partition called the recovery partition
Often used for dual-booting systems – Linux and Windows, Mac and Windows (boot camp)
NAS vs SAN
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Chapter 1 thru 3 Review Topic
RAID disk implementation
Striping, mirroring, striping with redundancy
Hot-swappable
Microsoft Word
Word processor
Word wrap
Paragraphs and paragraph styles
Formatting
Fonts
Alignment
Indents – special, left, right
Spacing – line, paragraph before/after
Tabs
Short-cut key
Header / Footer sections
Body section
Tables
Table styles
Normal.dotm
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