Common peripheral components

for computers
Here are some common peripherals that connect to a computer and
extend their usefulness.

Printer

A printer can take an image sent by a computer and deliver it onto a

sheet of paper.
Computer Speakers
It does this by using the information from the computer, and by either
using toner or ink, it deposits one of these in a controlled and
accurate manner to form the image.

Computer speakers can connect to the sound card at the rear of the
computer.

Another way they can be connected is by a monitor that already has

built-in speakers.

Generally, the sound quality is poor from a monitor’s speakers.

That’s why most people buy a set of computer speakers for their
desks.

You can even connect up a 7.1 surround speaker system to certain

sound cards for a computer.

This can add a nicer experience to gaming, playing music, or

watching a film.
Scanner

A scanner can take anything on paper, and it functions by scanning it

to produce a replicated digital image for a computer to save.

This is also handy for saving physical photos you want to preserve.

Once the photo is stored digitally, it won’t decay as a physical photo

does over time.

The flatbed scanner is the most commonly used today.

Many all-in-one devices, also known as multifunction devices, have

printer and scanning capabilities in one reasonably compact product.
12. Mouse

A mouse is an input device that allows the user to move a pointer

displayed on the monitor and experience a more intuitive interaction
with computer systems.

These days mice have more buttons than the common three and offer
way more functions than mice in the early days.

However, the three main buttons allow the user to select, grab, scroll
and access extra menus and options.

A computer mouse is a handy pointing device that can be wired or

wireless. The latter obviously requires batteries.

Optical mice of today allow for very accurate precision and smooth
movement.
11. Keyboard

with a computer. Typing a key from the keyboard sends a small

portion of information to tell the computer which key was pressed.

Once the computer receives input from the keyboard, it can use the
keystrokes in digital form to produce a specific task in any software
that’s being used.

The computer system can use this information in many ways. An

example could be a command or a character that can be used in a
document.

There are two main different types of keyboards. Mechanical and

membrane types.
10. Monitor or Visual Display
Unit (VDU)

A monitor is an output device used to visualize the graphics

information sent from the computer’s GPU.

There are various types of monitors on the market. A LED (Light

Emitting Diode) backlit LCD (Liquid Crystal Display) monitor is the
most commonly used with a modern PC.

There are also various computer screen sizes with different aspect
ratios. The aspect ratio is simply the ratio between height and width.

For example, a 16:9 aspect ratio computer screen will have 16 parts
wide to 9 parts in height.

There are also curved computer monitors, but they are more
expensive computer screens.
Monitors also have a fast response time to keep up with the high
demands required to eliminate delays with user input for gaming.

9. Power Supply Unit (PSU)

A power supply unit mounts inside the computer case. It converts the
AC mains supply from the power cord from a wall socket and supplies
the correct DC voltages to all the components inside the computer.

A computer power supply supplies the following voltages:

 +3.3v: This voltage is supplied to the motherboard.

 +5V: This voltage is supplied to the motherboard and other
computer hardware.
 +12V: This voltage is supplied to the motherboard and other
components.
 -12V: This voltage is supplied to the motherboard.

It plays an important role in keeping a computer running reliably.

You get different wattage ratings for power supplies. The higher the
wattage, the higher the electrical current that can be made available
to everything that needs it to function properly.

The higher you go in Watts, the more the power supply will likely cost.

A power supply usually also comes with a cooling fan. This helps all
the internal components in your computer to stay cool when the
power supply is subjected to bigger loads.

You read more about a power supply and its lifespan if you want to
know how long it lasts
8. Solid State Drive (SSD)

An SSD is also a type of hard drive, but it doesn’t have any moving
bits. It consists of a bank of flash memory that can hold a reasonable
amount of information.

While SSDs are increasing in size all the time, they aren’t cost-effective
for storing large amounts.

A mechanical drive has a cheaper gigabyte-to-dollar ratio.

However, the SSD is a high-performance drive. It’s fast and cannot be

as easily damaged by dropping it or taking a few bumps.

SSDs are available as 2.5-inch laptop encapsulated drives, and an M.2

SDD is the most commonly used kind on the market.

That’s why I always recommend SSDs for portable-type computers

where possible. In our other article, you can read more about whether
or not SSD’s are worth it.
7. Hard Disk Drive (HDD)
A hard drive is still found in many PCs to this day. A mechanical drive’s
purpose is to store all your information for retrieval at any time.

Apart from storing information for your computer, it also functions as

a boot drive to run the operating system (OS) from it. You can install
operating systems of many different kinds depending on your needs.

An OS is a software program that’s installed, making a computer

useable, like Microsoft Windows, for example. The biggest
vulnerability of a mechanical drive is its physically fragile nature.

One bump the wrong way can destroy a whole drive. A mechanical
hard drive contains one or more platters that spin anywhere between
5200 to 10000 RPM (revolutions per minute).

The read and write heads are spaced only about 0.002 (51 micro M)
inches from the platter.

This gives you an idea about the physical limitations of its fragile
nature.

Small areas on the platter can be arranged to represent a 1 or a 0. It

can be changed using the drive head to alter the material to represent
the correct value magnetically. This is how to write data to the drive
for storage.

There are various categories of hard drives made for various real-
world applications.

Some examples include:

 General use for desktops or laptops.

 Gaming optimized for desktops or laptops.
  General high-capacity storage.
 NAS Devices.
 Servers.
 Video recording.

They can also be purchased as an external drive that usually connects

to your computer by USB cable.

An uninterruptible power supply is sometimes used to prevent data

loss with mechanical drives where a sudden power outage is
experienced, or the power cord is accidentally disconnected while the
computer is running.

This allows proper shutdowns for desktop systems that have

experienced sudden power loss.
6. Sound Card

Most of the time, the sound chip built into the motherboard is used
for audio output.
But, if you are a sound enthusiast or prefer high-quality audio output
while playing a game, you might be inclined to use a sound card.

Sound cards plug into a computer in multiple ways. It can be through

USB, PCI slot, or PCI Express x 1 slot.

External DACs have gained much more popularity and help deliver
clearer and more defined audio or high-definition sound output.

They connect up using an IO cable like a USB cable to your computer

or laptop and provide a line out for your speakers or headphones.

A sound processing chip on the card does all of the audio processing
and is usually not a very powerful processor.

A sound card can offer a wide range of connectivity with various audio
equipment.

A few examples could be optical audio, a 1/4 inch jack, or RCA

connectors.
5. Graphics Card or Graphics
Processing Unit (GPU)

A graphics card is an output device that processes the data from the
motherboard and sends the appropriate information to the
computer’s screen for display.

You can connect monitors to it using HDMI, DisplayPort, DVI, or VGA

connectors.

It can also be referred to as a video or display card.

A video card takes the burden of all the video processing from the
main CPU. This gives a computer a big boost in performance.

Because of the large processing requirements for a gaming

GPU, fans are almost a given.
A video card plugs into a PCI Express (Peripheral Component
Interconnect Express) slot on the motherboard. It is a serial expansion
bus slot capable of high bandwidth in two directions.

A graphics card has a GPU (Graphics Processing Unit), the main part of
a computer system that requires cooling.

A GPU is slower than a CPU but is designed to deal with mathematical

operations required for video rendering.

The card’s memory amount varies depending on the manufacturer’s

design.

Video cards use GDDR (Graphics Double Data Rate) SDRAM, which is
specially designed to optimize graphics performance.

GDDR is built to handle a higher bandwidth compared to plain DDR

ram.
4. Random Access Memory
(RAM)

RAM is a data storage device that can provide fast read and write
access. RAM is volatile memory, meaning it loses all the stored data
when power is lost.

The RAM keeps data ready for the CPU to process. The RAM speed is
a big contributor to the overall speed of a computer system.

It plugs directly into a long slot that has contacts on either side of the
slot.

It, too, has a clock speed, just like a processor. So, it can also be
overclocked to deliver increased performance beyond the intended
specification.

Certain RAM modules are sold with a heat spreader. It helps dissipate
the heat from the individual memory ICs, keeping them cooler.
RAM has evolved like any other component. RAM used on the
motherboard often uses DDR (Double Data Rate) SDRAM
(Synchronous Dynamic Random Access Memory) type memory.

RAM Amount always comes in powers of 2, so you will always see

numbers like 16GB, 32GB, or 64GB of RAM, to mention some
examples of memory units.
3. Central Processing Unit (CPU)

The CPU or central processing unit is basically like the brain of

computer systems. It processes all the information on a computational
level.

It takes all the processes from the RAM and processes them to
perform the tasks required by the computer system.

The central processing unit is usually seated in a socket that utilizes a

lever or a latch with a hinged plate with a cut-out in the center to
secure the CPU onto the motherboard.

It has many copper pads underneath it for the socket contacts to push
up against them to make electrical contact.

There are other ways CPUs can be attached to the motherboard.

Here are some common examples:
 ZIF (Zero Insertion Force): Although this is a more desirable
socket, they are mostly found on older computer motherboards.
A lever-operated mechanism to clamp the pins of the processor.
 PGA (Pin Grid Array): It is also a ZIF socket but has a different
pin pitch and contains a different pin count.
 LGA (Land Grid Array): More commonly found on
motherboards today. A levered hinged plate with a center cut-
out clamps down on the processor.
 BGA (Ball Grid Array): The CPU is soldered directly onto the
motherboard. This makes it a non-user-swappable component. It
is susceptible to bad connectivity.

A processor generates a decent amount of heat, especially when it is

working under high loads.

It will run even hotter when it is set to a higher clock speed to make it
run faster. This is called overclocking.

This is why a heatsink and fan assembly are required to draw the heat
away from the central processing unit and distribute it to thin sheets
or fins of metal for the fan to cool down.

There are so many different types of computer processors. The top

manufacturers of processors are Intel, AMD, and NVidia.
2. Motherboard

The motherboard is the main board that is screwed directly inside the
computer case. All other cards and everything else plugs directly into
the motherboard, hence its name.

The CPU, RAM, drives, power supply, and more are connected to it.

Its function involves integrating all the physical components to

communicate and operate together.

A good motherboard offers a wide amount of connectivity options. It

also has the least amount of bottlenecks possible.

This allows all the components to operate efficiently and to fulfill their
maximum potential as they were designed to do.

Obviously, as the physical size is reduced, it begins to limit

connectivity options and functionality.

Motherboards come in the following sizes:

Motherboard Dimensions

Pico-ITX 3.9 inch x 2.9 inch | 100mm x 72mm

Nano-ITX 4.7 inch x 4.7 inch | 120mm x 120mm

Mini-ITX 6.7 inch x 6.7 inch | 170mm x 170mm

Micro-ATX 9.6 inch x 9.6 inch | 244mm x 244mm

Standard-ATX 12 inch x 9.6 inch | 305mm x 244mm

EVGA: 13.5 inch x 10.3 inch | 343mm x 262mm

XL-ATX Gigabyte: 13.58 inch x 10.31 inch | 345mm x 262mm
Micro-Star: 13.6 inch x 10.4 inch | 345mm x 264mm
 PARTS OF THE COMPUTER AND
ITS FUNCTIONS
1. The computer case or system
unit

This is the component that holds all of the parts to make up the
computer system.

It is usually designed in such a manner to make fitting a motherboard,

wiring, and drives as easy as possible. Some are designed so well that
it is easy to make everything look tidy and presentable.

Cases come in all different sizes and shapes to accommodate various

types of computer components and satisfy the consumer’s needs.
Design elements can vary from plain to highly elaborate. You can get
a plain grey desktop case or one with colored lighting everywhere to
make it look spectacular.

Computer cases rely on computer fans inside them to create proper

airflow to keep all the internals cool and working reliably.

A computer case, like most things, varies in quality. You can get them
made from cheap metals or good quality materials that provide you
with a sturdy design.

List of computer case sizes (known as

form factor):
 Very small form factor: Supports Mini ITX motherboards
 Small form factor: Supports micro ATX motherboards.
 Standard form factor: Supports standard ATX motherboards.
 Larger form factors: Supports ATX and XL-ATX motherboards.
Conclusion
That covers all the components of a computer system. All of these
play a vital function in a computer to make it work.

Once you understand these basic parts to a memorable level, it

probably won’t be long until you repair or build desktops yourself.
 Project in
EPP-iv
Submitted to:

Mr. Raymond Magbanua

Teacher/EPP IV

Submitted by:

Angel Anne A. Flores

Grade IV-SSC-Darwin