IT ESSENTIALS V. 4.1
Module 1
INTRODUCTION TO THE PERSONAL COMPUTER
1.0 Introduction
1.
What is information technology?
1.1 Explain IT Industry Certifications
1.1.1 Identify education and certifications
1.1.2 Describe the A+ Certification
2.
Who developed the A+ certification
program?
3.
What does A+ certification signify?
4.
What does the A+ Essentials exam
measure?
Worksheet – Job Opportunities
1.1.3 Describe the EUCIP certificate
5.
What are the five modules of the EUCIP IT
Administrator Certificate?
1.2 Describe a Computer System
6.
What makes up a computer system?
7.
What is hardware?
8.
What are examples of hardware?
9.
What is software?
10.
What does the operating system do?
1.3 Identify the names, purposes, and characteristics of cases and power supplies
11.
What does the computer case do?
12.
What determines the size and shape of the
computer case?
13.
How large should the compute case be?
14.
How large should the power supply be?
1.3.1 Describe cases
15.
What does a computer case contain?
16.
What are computer cases made of?
17.
What are the size and layout of a case
called?
18.
What are the basic form factors for
computer cases?
19.
What factors must be considered when
choosing a case?
20.
How are internal components grounded?
1.3.2 Describe Power Supplies
21.
What does a power supply do?
22.
What can protect a computer from
problems caused by a change in power?
23.
What does a power invertor do?
24.
What is a keyed connector?
25.
What is a molex connector used to
connect?
What does a berg connector connect?
26.
27.
What kind of connection is used to connect
the motherboard?
28.
What is the voltage of the yellow wire?
29.
What is the voltage of the blue wire?
30.
What is the voltage of the orange wire?
31.
What is the voltage of the red wire?
32.
What is the voltage of the white wire?
33.
What color is the ground wire?
34.
What are the four basic units of electricity?
35.
What is voltage?
36.
What is current?
37.
How is current measured?
38.
What is power?
39.
What is the measurement of power?
40.
What is resistance?
41.
How is resistance measured?
42.
Lower resistance allows _______ current
43.
What is Ohm’s Law?
44.
What will result in higher power?
1.4 Identify the names, purposes, and characteristics of internal components
1.4.1 Identify the names, purposes, and characteristics of motherboards
45.
What is the motherboard?
46.
What is a bus?
47.
What are other names for the
motherboard?
48.
What items are on the motherboard?
49.
What does form factor refer to?
50.
What does the form factor determine?
51.
What is the most common form factor in
desktop computers?
What is the newer motherboard form
factor?
What is the chipset?
52.
53.
54.
What determines the type of CPU that can
be installed?
55.
What are the two components that make
up the chipset?
56.
Which component controls access to the
Ram, video card and the speeds at which
the CPU can communicate with them?
57.
Which component allows the CPU to
communicate with the hard drives, sound
card, USP ports and other I/O ports?
1.4.2 Identify the names, purposes, and characteristics of CPUs
58.
What is the brain of the computer?
59.
60.
Who are the most common CPU
manufacturers?
What is the connector that interfaces
between the motherboard and the
61.
processor?
What is PGA?
62.
What is ZIF?
63.
What does ZIF refer to?
64.
What is PGA architecture?
65.
What is a program?
66.
67.
What are the two major CPU architecture
instruction sets?
What does RISC stand for?
68.
What does CISC stand for?
69.
Which architecture takes fewer steps per
operation?
70.
What is hyperthreading?
71.
How is the power of a CPU measured?
72.
How the speed of a CPU rated?
73.
What determines the amount of data that a
CPU can process at one time?
74.
The wider the processor bus, the more
______ the processor.
75.
What size processor data bus do current
processors have?
76.
What is overclocking?
77.
Is overclocking a reliable way to improve
computer performance?
What is CPU throttling?
78.
79.
What is MMX?
80.
What has replaced MMX?
81.
What is a single core CPU?
82.
What are the most common multiple core
processors?
Why would you use a Quad Core CPU?
83.
1.4.3 Identify the names, purposes, and characteristics of Cooling Systems
84.
What causes heat?
85.
How can you remove heat?
86.
What makes the cooling process more
efficient?
How does a water-cooling system work?
87.
1.4.4.Identify the names, purposes, and characteristics of ROM and RAM
88.
What does ROM stand for?
89.
What is stored in ROM?
90.
What is another name for ROM?
91.
92.
Do ROM chips retain their contents when
the computer is powered down?
What are the different types of ROM?
93.
Can a PROM chip be erased or rewritten?
94.
95.
Which h type of PROM can be erased and
rewritten without having the remove the
chip from the computer?
What does RAM stand for?
96.
What is meant by volatile memory?
97.
Why would you want to have more RAM in
a computer?
98.
What are the different types of RAM?
99.
100.
101.
102.
103.
Which type of RAM speeds up the access
time to retrieve data from memory
because the CPU does not have to wait for
one data access cycle to end before
another begins?
What are the different types of memory
modules?
What are the two configurations of SIMM
chips?
What type of DIMM chips are there?
104.
What is the configuration of the RIMM
modules?
What is SODIMM used for?
105.
What does the speed of memory impact?
106.
What does DDR technology do?
107.
What is cache memory used for?
108.
What are the three types of cache
memory?
When do memory errors occur?
109.
110.
What are the three methods of error
checking?
1.4.5 Identify the names, purposes, and characteristics of adapter cards
111.
What do adapter cards do?
112.
Why would you use adapter cards?
113.
What does SCSI stand for?
114.
What does RAID stand for?
115.
What does USB stand for?
116.
What expansion slot is used for video
adapters?
What expansion slot is an IBM proprietary
117.
32-bit expansion slot?
118.
What was used in computer systems with e
LPX form factor to allow adapter cards to
be installed horizontally?
1.4.6 Identify the names, purposes, and characteristics of storage drives
119.
What do storage drives do?
120.
What are some common types of storage
devices?
121.
What does a floppy drive used for storage?
122.
What is the storage capacity of a floppy
disk?
What does the hard drive contain?
123.
124.
How is the storage capacity of a hard drive
measured?
125.
129.
How is the speed of a hard drive
measured?
How do magnetic hard drives spin magnetic
platters and drive heads?
Do solid state drives (SSDs) have moving
parts?
How do optical drives read data on optical
media?
What are three types of optical drives?
130.
What is the storage capacity of a CD?
131.
What is the storage capacity of a DVD?
132.
What is the storage capacity of a BD?
133.
Which optical media is a CD that can be
recorded, erased, and re-recorded?
Which optical media is a DVD that can be
recorded one time?
Which optical media contains pre-recorded
movies, games, or software?
126.
127.
128.
134.
135.
136.
137.
138.
Which optical media can record HD video
and PC data storage one time?
What is another name for an external flash
drive?
Which type of hard drive interface uses a
40-pin connector?
139.
What size connector does the SATA
interface use?
140.
Which cable can be up to 2 meters in
length?
How many devices can a SCSI controller
connect?
What type of connector do SCSI interfaces
use?
141.
142.
143.
What is RAID used for?
144.
What are the terms that describe how RAID
stores data on various disks?
145.
What is the advantage of RAID 0?
146.
What are the advantages of RAID 5?
147.
How many drive are required for RAID 5?
1.4.7 Identify the names, purposes, and characteristics of internal cables
148.
What kind of power connector is needed
for PATA drives?
149.
What kind of power connector is needed
for floppy drive?
150.
How many types of SCSI data cables are
there?
151.
What are the types of SCSI data cables?
152.
What does a colored stripe on a cable
indicate?
Worksheet: Research Computer Components
1.5 Identify the names, purposes, and characteristics of ports and cables
153.
Describe a serial port.
154.
155.
156.
What is the maximum length of a serial
cable?
What type of connector is used for a
telephone cable?
How many devices can a single USB port in
157.
a computer support?
What is the transmission speed of USB 2.0?
158.
What is Firewire?
159.
How many devices can a single Firewire
port support?
What standard does Firewire us?
160.
161.
What is the difference between 1394A and
1394B?
162.
What type of parallel connector is used for
a printer?
How much data can a parallel cable
transport at one time?
What is the standard for parallel cable?
163.
164.
165.
167.
What is the maximum length of a parallel
cable?
If a single SCSI device is connected to a SCSI
port, how long can the cable be?
Where should SCSI devices be terminated?
168.
What is another name for a network port?
169.
What is the maximum length of a network
cable?
What does a PS/2 port connect?
166.
170.
171.
172.
173.
174.
175.
What kind of a connector does a PS/2 port
use?
What are three common video ports?
Which video port provides analog output to
a monitor?
Which video port provides an
uncompressed digital output to a monitor?
How many cables does a RGB cable have?
1.6 Identify the names, purposes, and characteristics of input devices
176.
What is an input device used for?
177.
178.
What are the two most commonly used
input devices?
What is a hardware device that can be used
to control more than one computer using a
179.
single keyboard, monitor, and mouse
What is used for biometric identification?
180.
What causes a touch screen to work?
181.
What does a scanner do?
182.
What type of scanner reads UPC bar codes?
1.7 Identify the names, purposes, and characteristics of output devices
183.
What is an output device used for?
184.
What are the primary output devices for a
computer?
185.
What are the three types of monitors?
186.
What is the important difference between
monitor types?
187.
How is the image created on the screen in
CRT technology?
188.
Which technology is commonly used in flat
panel monitors and laptops?
189.
What is the difference between active
matrix and passive matrix?
190.
How does DLP technology work?
191.
What does monitor resolution refer to?
192.
What is a pixel?
193.
What is dot pitch?
194.
Which dot pitch produces a better image?
195.
What is the contrast ratio?
196.
What is the refresh rate?
197.
198.
Does a higher or lower refresh rate produce
a better image?
What is the horizontal resolution?
199.
What is the vertical resolution?
200.
What is color resolution?
201.
What is aspect ratio?
202.
What is native resolution?
203.
What is a printer?
204.
What is an all-in-one type printer?
1.8 Explain System Resources and Their Purposes
205.
What are the three common resources?
206.
207.
208.
What does IRQ stand for?
What does DMA stand for?
What is an IRQ used for?
209.
210.
211.
How man IRQS are there?
How is the priority of the request
determined?
Fill in the IRQ Chart
212.
What are I/O port addresses used for?
213.
214.
How many I/O ports are in a computer?
Fill in the I/O Port Chart
215.
What devices use DMA channels?
216.
217.
How many DMA channels are there?
Fill in the DMA Channel Chart