System Unit

System Unit

The system unit is also know as the system chassis, it is a container that houses most of the electronic components that make up a computer systems. The most important part of our system unit is the system board as we call it as mother board.

Inside the mother board, there few things which we call it as sockets, chips, slots, bus lines.

Sockets are a key part of Unix and Windows-based operating systems. They make it easy for software developers to create network-enabled programs. Instead of constructing network connections from scratch for each program they write, developers can just include sockets in their programs. The sockets allow the programs to use the operating system's built-in commands to handle networking functions. Because they are used for a number of different network protocols (i.e. HTTP, FTP, telnet, and e-mail), many sockets can be open at one time. And it is a connection between the electricity and the computers.

A chip is a small piece of semi conducting material (usually silicon) on which an integrated circuit is embedded. A typical chip is less than ¼-square inches and can contain millions of electronic components (transistors). Computers consist of many chips placed on electronic boards called printed circuit boards. There are different types of chips. For example, CPU chips (also called microprocessors) contain an entire processing unit, whereas memory chips contain blank memory.

A slots is an opening in a computer where you can insert a printed circuit board. Slots are often called expansion slots because they allow you to expand the capabilities of a computer. The boards you insert in expansion slots are called expansion boards or add-on boards.

The bus lines are the collection of wires through which data is transmitted from one part of a computer to another. You can think of a bus as a highway on which data travels within a computer. When used in reference to personal computers, the term bus usually refers to internal bus. This is a bus that connects all the internal computer components to the CPU and main memory. There's also an expansion bus that enables expansion boards to access the CPU and memory.

Actually, the slot from the System unit as mention above provided the connection to the cards like the graphics card, sound card, modem card Network Interface Card, and also the plug and play.

A graphics card is just same as the video adapter which is A board that plugs into a personal computer to give it display capabilities. The display capabilities of a computer, however, depend on both the logical circuitry (provided in the video adapter) and the display monitor.

A sound card is an expansion board that enables a computer to manipulate and output sounds. Sound cards are necessary for nearly all CD-ROMs and have become commonplace on modern personal computers. Sound cards enable the computer to output sound through speakers connected to the board, to record sound input from a microphone connected to the computer, and manipulate sound stored on a disk.

A modem card allows users to connect to the Internet using a network. It is designed to work in laptops or desktops. A modem card can be wireless, or it can be installed inside of a user's PC. Most manufacturers provide installation guides and technical support with their modem cards, rendering them quite easy to use.

A computer network interface card (NIC) is the hardware added to the machine that allows it to communicate with the network. The hardware is now normally included with computers, especially in laptops that require wireless technology for network access. A network card is bound to an IP address, which is the address of the computer on the network. When deciding to create a large or small network, the NIC is a necessary component to consider.

Plug and Play, sometimes, abbreviated PnP, is a catchy phrase used to describe devices that work with a computer system as soon as they are connected. The user does not have to manually install drivers for the device or even tell the computer that a new device has been added. Instead the computer automatically recognizes the device, loads new drivers for the hardware if needed, and begins to work with the newly connected device.

A serial port, or interface, that can be used for serial communication, it is like a connecter for some hardware into the computer in which only 1 bit is transmitted at a time. Most serial ports on personal computers conform to the RS-232C or RS-422 standards. A serial port is a general-purpose interface that can be used for almost any type of device, including modems, mice, and printers (although most printers are connected to a parallel port).

A parallel port is a type of interface found on computers (personal and otherwise) for connecting various peripherals. In computing, a parallel port is a parallel communication physical interface. It is also known as a printer port or Centronics port. It is another head of the serial port. Which means that one is plug into the computer, another one will be plug into the hardware.

USB (Universal Serial Bus) is a hardware that common use to save the data, pictures, information and etc. Now in the market you can get it any where, and now it had a minimum of 1 gb memory, it is invented by a Malaysian. It is commonly use at office work, student work and lots of stuff need to count on USB to transfer the data and information.

Firewire port is a high-speed interface has become a hot new standard for connecting peripherals (no pun intended). Created by Apple Computer in the mid-1990's, Firewire can be used to connect devices such as digital video cameras, hard drives, audio interfaces, and MP3 players, such as the Apple iPod, to your computer. A standard Firewire connection can transfer data at 400 Mbps, which is roughly 30 times faster than USB 1.1. This blazing speed allows for quick transfers of large video files, which is great for video-editing professionals. If 400 Mbps is still not fast enough, Apple Computer released new PowerMacs with Firewire 800 ports in early 2003. These ports support data transfer rates of 800 Mbps -- twice the speed of the original Firewire standard.