A Simple Guide To Your Computer (Please Read First)

[Guest Jordan]

As some people have previously asked how to find their computer specs, I thought i'd make a little thread explaining how you'de find out all the neccessary information.

 

Glossary

CPU: This stands for "central processing unit". This is the brain of your computer so to speak. CPU's speeds are measured mostly by their clock speed or in lamemens terms how many MHZ/GHZ you have in your system.

 

Memory: This is another name for RAM (random access memory). Memory or RAM is the place where your computer puts programs or information till it is required. However since it is volitile, it will be deleted when ever you reset or turn off your computer. Memory is measured in two ways, the amount and the speed. The amount is very important, the more the better. Most computers have at least 512mb of ram. The speed is also important, it tells us how fast your computer can transfer the data between your motherboard to your RAM and to your CPU.

 

Hard Drives: The hard drive is where all the information in your computer is stored. It keeps all your files, programs, documents and porn in one place. Hard drives, like RAM are measured by size (in gigabytes) and by speed (RPM or revolutions per minute) and type of drive such as (ATA, UDMA, IDE, SATA and SCSI which is pronounced "Skuz-i" by the way). The more space the better, as you can store more and more on a hard drive. If you have very little space left on a drive, your computer can slow down alot leading to proformance problems and a frustrated user.

 

Motherboards and Chipsets: A motherboard is what controls everything within the system. Everything has a connection to it or is inserted into it. Without a motherboard, you simply wouldn't have a system. Motherboards are specifically designed for certain CPU types or a type of job such as a server motherboard which holds two or more CPU instead of one.

 

Your motherboard will have several expansion slots on it such as:

• ISA - Now obsolete
  
• PCI - for old graphics cards, sound cards, network cards
  
• AGP - the 'Advanced Graphics Port' which is quickly going the way of the ISA
  
• and PCI-E or PCI Extended, running far faster than AGP and replacing it now.
  

 

A chipset is what controls the major parts of the motherboard such as its expansion slots and onboard devices such as onboard sound or LAN.

 

Soundcards: Your soundcard plays any sound information sent to it. It can either come as a seperate expansion card or it can in alot of cases these days be built into the motherboard itself. Soundcards these days come with RAM on such as the Creative X-Fi range meaning that more complex and different sounds maybe played all at once.

 

Graphics cards: Graphics cards display things on your monitor. There are two major manufactuers. ATi and nVIDIA with their Radeon and GeForce series respectivly. For years they have been in combat for the market. A graphics card is very complex but the easy way to see what the best graphics card is if its a high number or if it has alot of X's in it (trust me on that). The best ATi graphics card currently is the "X1900 XTX" and the best nVIDIA card is the "7900 GTX" or "7800 GX2".

 

Graphics cards can also be put together, in twos or even fours. This is called SLi or Crossfire for nVIDIA and ATi respectivly. Doubling or even quadruapling your graphical capability.

 

Operating System: An OS for most people is simply "Windows". However, your computer may also run on Mac OSX or Linux. Most people use Windows XP (XP stands for eXPerience by the way!). Its important to always keep your OS up to date with the latest patches and upgrades as you may become vunerable to attacks, spyware or viruses.

 

So... how do I find out what I have?

 

Now that you know what stuff is, it probably helps to know what you have.

By following these simple steps you can easily find out your computers specifications.

 

CPU/Memory/Operating System

 

Click the start menu, and right click my computer then select properties.

 

 

Here is the information.

 

 

Hard Drives:

 

Open My Computer.

 

 

Left click the Hard drive that you want to find information for, then look on the far left on that Window, you should see this box tell you the information about it:

 

 

Motherboards and Chipsets:

 

This is a tricky one, one way is to find any manuals you may have or you could simply open up your PC to find out. Most computers will have their maker and motherboard number somewhere on the motherboard.

 

Soundcards/Graphics Cards:

 

Open your start menu, go to control panel then open System.

 

 

Then click the hardware tab and click Device Manager.

 

 

Then collapse the "Display adapters" for graphics and "Sound, video and game controllers" for sound cards.

 

 

Now that you know how to find out about your computer, please mention it in any thread you may post with this information. It is very helpful to know. If you have any thing you want me to add, please post.

[Charlie]

Nice one, now do it all again for Windows 98/2000 and Mac OS X

[triforce_keeper]

or for graphics and sound card click run and type dxdiag to bring up the direct x page.

 

anyway this is great for newbs at computing!

[AshMat]

Great thread, makes me realsie how i have still a lot to learn..

[RoadKill]

PCI-E doesn't mean anything, PCIe is the official abbrevation, and it means PCI Express not PCI Extended

 

Not to be confused with PCI-X which is PCI Extended, and is basically PCI with a physical extension to make it have more bandwidth, and is only found on high end server motherboards.

 

Also you can view most of the basic info about your PC by going start>run>dxdiag

[Letty]

 

you love it...

[Twozzok]

The french definitely adds a nice touch

[uncle_buckman]

I am looking to update my soundcard drivers because i'm having problems with playback. I have an oldie; Compaq Presario 6150UK and a soundmax digital integrated audio soundcard.

 

I can't find the drivers on the Compaq/HP website so I decided to open up my motherboard. I found loads of numbers and codes but I felt these were the most useful ones;

 

Microstar

MS-6553 Ver 1

 

N1996

V3.00/0010

 

Useful? I have an AMD Athlon processor but a Intel celeron sticker on the tower case? Confused.

[=NukeBlaze=]

Or take the easy way out and download and run:

 

http://www.cpuid.com/pcwizard.php

 

 

Tells you much more info than windows ever will, and everything is in one place. Highly useful/.

 

So easy, even a caveman can do it.

[the_villa]

Great Thread

[Mr_Odwin]

Great Thread

 

Great Post.

[the_villa]

sarcasm is the lowest form of wit

[Mr_Odwin]

Great Comeback.