Basics of Computer Hardware

Computer Basics

A computer is an electronic device that manipulates information, or "data." It has the ability to store, retrieve, and process data. You can use a computer to type documents, send email, and browse the internet. You can also use it to handle spreadsheets, accounting, database management, presentations, games, and more. 

All types of computers consist of two basic parts: 

Hardware is any part of your computer that has a physical structure, such as the computer monitor or keyboard. 

 

 

 

Software is any set of instructions that tells the hardware what to do. It is what guides the hardware and tells it how to accomplish each task. Some examples of software are web browsers, games, and word processors such as Microsoft Word.

 

 

What are the Different Types of Computers?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Understanding Operating Systems

An operating system is the most important software that runs on a computer. It manages the computer's memory, processes, and all of its software and hardware. It also allows you to communicate with the computer without knowing how to speak the computer's "language." Without an operating system, a computer is useless.

 

The Operating System's Job

You've probably heard the phrase boot your computer, but do you know what that means? Booting is the process that occurs when you press the power button to turn your computer on. During this process (which may take a minute or two), the computer does several things:

• It runs tests to make sure everything is working correctly.
• It checks for new hardware.
• It then starts up the operating system.

 

 Once the operating system has started up, it manages all of the software and hardware on the computer. Most of the time, there are many different programs running at the same time, and they all need to access your computer's Central Processing Unit (CPU), memory, and storage. The operating system coordinates all of this to make sure that each program gets what it needs. Without the operating system, the software wouldn't even be able to talk to the hardware, and the computer would be useless.

 

 

 

Microsoft Windows

Microsoft created the Windows operating system in the mid-1980s. Over the years, there have been many different versions of Windows, but the most recent ones are Windows 8 (released in 2012), Windows 7 (2009), and Windows Vista (2007). Windows comes preloaded on most new PCs, which helps to make it the most popular operating system in the world.

 

 

 

Linux

Linux (pronounce LINN-ux) is a family of open source operating systems, which means that they can be modified and distributed by anyone around the world. This is very different from proprietary software like Windows, which can only be modified by the company that owns it (Microsoft). The advantages of Linux are that it is free, and there are many different distributions (or versions) that you can choose from. Each distribution has a different look and feel, and the most popular ones include Ubuntu, Mint, and Fedora.

 

 

 

Operating Systems for Mobile Devices

The operating systems that we've been talking about were designed to run on desktop or laptop computers. Mobile devices such as phones, tablet computers, and mp3 players are very different from desktop and laptop computers, so they run operating systems that are designed specifically for mobile devices. Examples of mobile operating systems include Apple iOS, Windows Phone, and Google Android.

 

 

Computer Information Representation:

 Internal Electronic circuits(Transistor) works like our electrical circuit in our home as below. 

 

 

 

 

 

In the below transistor illustration, there is no power supply pass through into this transistor, which means it is in OFF state.  if we switch on the power supply then it will be ON state

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Computer needs transistor for below operations

 

 

 

 Human decimal system uses below number system to identify numbers

 

 

  Computer used below BINARY system to recognize numbers

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The reason why computer scientist groups all the bits as a byte (8 bit) is to avoid false start and finish problem during storage representation of data in memory.  So solution is grouping bits as a byte like below.

  How computer stores Colors, images, Audio and video

 

  Computer stores everything as a numbers inside of its memory

 

 

 

  Computer represents TEXT data in ASCII or UNICODE format which is universal standards

 

 

 

 

 

Computation of Computer

 

  Logic gates are used to perform calculations in computer through CPU...All the logic gates are formed based on the alignments of transistors.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Below is Adder Logic gates to add two bits

 

 

 

 

 

 Carry bit problem

Carry bit problem in BINARY addition

 

 

  

Carry bit problem in DECIMAL addition

 

 

Logic gates handle Carry bit problem as below

 

 

 

Below logic gate circuits joint together to perform large numbers calculation

 

 

 Lot of logic gates circuit are formed to perform below works in computer CPU

 

 

 

 

 Microprocessor executes program from memory with FETCH commands as below

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Computer Programming

 

Below instructions are human readable program but computer only understands Machine language.

 

 

 

 Programmer only writes program with Mnemonic keyword, but computer decodes these Mnemonic word as Microprocessor execute code to process instructions

 

 Even today computer programs are sequence of bits and bytes and stored in computer memory for execution.  In early days, programmer had to insert these sequence of bits into memory to execute simple program.  As it was very tedious process, computer scientist invented High Level programming language.

 

 

 

 Operation system is set of programs and library which helps user interact with computer through keyboard, mouse and Screen.  This will stand in between hardware and users' programs to facilitate user to execute their instructions without any difficulties.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Introduction to Arduino Hardward Board

Why We need Arduino?

 

 

 

 

 

Demo Arduino: Hello World

Programming Arduino

Demo: Programming 

The Arduino IDE

Arduino Hardware

Demo Analog Pins

Using BreadBoard:

Demo BreadBoard

Working with Sensors and Shields

Demo Arduino LCD Screen:

Building a Real Application With Kinect

 

 

 

After installation while running connect toolkit

Creating Windows application for Kinect

Capturing Image Data

Creating WPF Application for Image capturing

Drawing a Shape via Kinect

Capturing Depth Data

Detecting Humans

Tracking Gestures

 

Adding Audio Commands

Understanding Server Hardware

 

Hardware Identification

Hardware Evaluation

Hardware Selection

Hardware Maintenance