(BQ) Part 1 book "The indispensable PC hardware book" has contents: Main components, logical memory adressing and memory access, basics logical gates and microprogramming, the pentium pro proc, processor and memory,.and other contents. | The Indispensable PC Hardware Book Your Hardware Questions Answered THIRD EDITION Hans-Peter Messmer UNIVERSITAT JAUME BIBLIOTECA I (iti+ ADDISON-WESLEY . 6 T p. ,,, I;‘ .2 i’” ;. ~ P ‘? ‘_,I Harlow, England l Reading, Massachusetts l Menlo Park, California l New York 6 ,._ -1. Don Mills, Ontario l Amsterdam l Bonn l Sydney l Singapore 0 L,‘, Tokyo l Madrid l San Juan l Milan l Mexico City l Seoul l Taipei C’O , ,:;t;;r ?+ ,, * I ?’ I Part 1 Basics This chapter outlines the basic components of a personal computer and various related peripherals as an introduction to the PC world. Though this chapter is intended for beginners, advanced users would also be better prepared for the later and more technically demanding parts of the book. 1 Main Components The Computer and Peripherals Personal computer (PC), by definition, means that users actually work with their own apersonaln computer. This usually means IBM-compatible computers using the DOS, OS/2 or Windows (NT) operating system. Mainframe users may wonder what the difference is between a PC and a terminal: after all, a terminal also has a monitor, a keyboard and a small case like the PC, and looks much the same as that shown in Figure . Where there is a difference is that the PC contains a small but complete computer, with a processor (hidden behind the names 8086/SOSS, 80286 or i486, for example) and a floppy disk drive. This computer carries out data processing on its own: that is, it can process files, do mathematical calculations, and much more besides. On the other hand, a terminal only establishes a connection to the actual computer (the mainframe). The terminal can’t carry out data processing on its own, being more a monitor with poor input and output capabilities that can be located up to a few kilometres away from the actual computer. That a small PC is less powerful than a mainframe occupying a whole building seems obvious (although this has changed with the introduction of
