PC Component Specications

Anthony Farrell

14th April 2019

Contents

1 The Complete Computer 3

2 OS - Operating system 4
3 Motherboard 5
4 CPU - Central Processing Unit 6
5 RAM - Random Access Memory 7
6 Storage: HDDs and SSDs 9

1
About this Guide

Modern devices are usually made up of lots of dierent components attached and held to-
gether with the intention that they all communicate or function together in order to perform
the complete suite of required tasks.

For example a typical car is not simply a large, heavy thing that works by magic.
No: Instead a car has a fuel tank for the fuel, which connects to the engines, which uses that
fuel to produce kinetic rotation of the prop shaft which in turn rotates the wheels, and this
is all held together with a rigid structure and covered with panels to help protect and isolate
the driver from harm and the elements, and so on and so on...
(I apologise to any mechanics for this analogy, as well as anybody who has an electric car...)

In the same way that a car is made up or lots of dierent components that all work together
to perform a single function, so too is a computer made up of lots of parts that all work
together to make the system as a whole function.
Putting completely inappropriate parts in a car will make it slow, or have a low range, or
bad fuel economy, or have a high centre of mass that gives it a risk of rolling over, or just
at out can't be used together at all.
Computers can also have a wide variety of parts put in them, many of which are simply at
out incompatible with each other, and whilst for many basic tasks the Anything will do"
idea might not be that far o the truth, understanding what each part does, and what parts
are or are not appropriate for what you want to use them for will allow you to end up with
a computer that is much more suitable for its intended task, as well as potentially cheaper,
quieter, cooler, or with other benets.
The point of this document is to explain what these main constituent parts are, how they
interact with each other, and what they actually do.

This is a short document that only goes over the basics of what each component does, there
is a separate document that goes over a wider range of more complicated specications in
much more detail.

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Chapter 1

The Complete Computer

Given the blurb in the previous section, it's a good idea to start with an explanation of the
task that all of these components are working together to achieve.

The short answer is: Maths.

The longer answer would be this:

The computer is used to run code - programs, operating systems, or rmware.
This code is in essence performing mathematical calculations, running the computer program
given to it to produce a xed output for xed inputs.
The various parts of the computer are all basically just there to help out with either storing
these programs, either for short term immediate use, or long term storage, to process the
code, to perform the complex calculations of the code itself, or to display the output of the
code to the user.

Computers are just big maths boxes, at the end of the day.
Each part of the computer varies in how it helps with doing the maths, or which type of
maths it does, but computers really are designed to just do maths.
In the author's experience it is true that most average" people do not like maths (to put it
very nicely), the end result is that because maths is deterministic and can be rigid in how
it is manipulated this means that there are not that many constituent parts of a modern
computer that the user needs to worry about, and they all have pretty segregated roles.
This has the advantage of making them easy to list and describe, which can actually make
it pretty easy for non tech-literate people to understand.

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Chapter 2

OS - Operating system
Whilst it is not a hardware component (and is indeed the only non-hardware component
in this guide), the OS is by far the most important piece of software that the end-user will
run on their computer, and all computers require some form of OS in order to actually do
anything useful at all.
An OS is therefore probably the only piece of software that an end-user would be required
to have in order to use a computer.

An Operating System is a piece of software that runs on the computer that provides a base
layer that other programs can use to easily interact with the hardware of the system or
important or useful software functions, without dealing with the hassle of dealing with such
things themselves, allowing for much computer programs to be smaller, simpler, and easier
to write and maintain.
The OS will typically provide basic services that the programs can use, as well as a base
foundation system for what can be displayed to the user.

For desktop operating systems the most common and well known example are the variants of
Windows, developed by Microsoft, as well as the Open Source Linux OS, and it's numerous
numerous variants.
Apple's Mac is another alternative, and is somewhat similar to Linux in numerous ways.

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Chapter 3

Motherboard

The motherboard is the main device that all other devices in the PC are attached to, and
the device that facilitates communications between them.
Motherboards thus vary according to what components they have sockets to accept, as well
as their individual constructions that can vary, for example, how much maximum power can
be delivered to the components, or how much data can be transferred between them.

More advanced motherboards will generally have:

• More ports
More ports allows for more peripherals, or a wider variety of them to be connected to
the PC by default.

• More advanced ports

More than just having more ports is that the ports the motherboard has are more
advanced, allowing them more advanced features or better transmission options.
For example: Higher versions of the well-known USB standard, which allow higher
data throughput and more power output to connected devices.

• More advanced features

This can include an output for the integrated graphics of a processor, or allowing
overclocking of certain components for faster performance above the base of what that
device oers.

• Better chipsets
A chipset is a specic set of methods and instructions that allow features of current
technology to work.
More advanced chipsets will allow the use of an increased amount of more advanced
technologies to be used, with less advanced chipsets have fewer, less advanced features.

A more expensive motherboard is often better in numerous ways that many users do not
typically see as much as the other components in their computer, however remember that a
motherboard that does actually t the components the user wants to use is useless.

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Chapter 4

CPU - Central Processing Unit

The CPU is often called the Brain" of the computer, since it is the one that actually per-
forms all of the actual mathematical calculations and logic needed to for the computer to do
anything useful.
The CPU will also handle interactions with memory, and for modern CPUs; other external
devices as well, such as storage devices.

Thus a CPU will perform calculations and actually run the programs, thus doing the work
the end-user nds useful.

A more advanced CPU will generally have:

• More cores : CPU cores are the complete sets of hardware that run computer code.
Each core can all run code independently of each other.
Thus more cores potentially allows more to be done simultaneously.

• A higher clock speed , allowing each of the CPUs cores to perform more sets of
calculations in a given unit of time, potentially allowing for quicker results or more
total work done in a given time.

• A higher eciency , allowing calculations to be performed more eciently, allowing

more instructions to be calculated per clock [speed, above].

• More advanced design, allowing the CPU to use less power , which in turn generates
less heat, and thus requires less fan noise to cool.

• More advanced instruction sets, such as AVX512 which allow complex calculations to
be performed orders of magnitude quicker that they would on regular CPU cores.

Since a CPU is the thing that actually performs the calculations of the computer, in essence
running the programs, it can be the most noticeable bottleneck to a system if insucient.
CPUs are thus often considered one of the most important parts of a PC, although how true
this is in practice depends on the task being done.

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Chapter 5

RAM - Random Access Memory

CPUs execute program code from RAM, and can not execute code that is located on storage
devices like hard disks - even if they were able, such devices are vastly too slow to keep up
with the extreme speed at which a CPU can process instructions.
RAM is several orders of magnitude faster than hard disks or even SSDs, and is installed to
allow programs to be stored (a.k.a loaded) in a quick storage that the CPU can very quickly
read and write, as needed.
Having enough RAM to actually hold all the programs desired by the user is therefore
important, as an insucient amount will mean that the computers operating system will be
forever having to transfer programs back to the slower external storage in order to actually
put programs that need to run into RAM so the CPU can actually run them.
Running out of RAM can therefore cripple a computers performance, as the system will have
to wait before a new program to be run can be loaded into RAM.
RAM typically has four main characteristics:

• Socket
RAM has used many dierent physical sockets to connect with over the years.
In order to prevent RAM being used in a system that it is not designed for, RAM uses
dierent sockets, which physically prevent a system from using incompatible RAM.
Desktop computers use RAM DIMMs (Dual In-Line Memory Modules), whereas lap-
tops will use SO-DIMMs (Small Outline DIMMs).

• Type
Current RAM is built on the DDR (Double Data Rate ) principle, with newer tech-
nologies using higher, more advanced, and more complex versions of this, which for
example includes the current DDR4 type.
Newer RAM technologies are typically better in all performance metrics.

• Speed
RAM modules each have a given base speed, which is their data rate.
This speed dictates how many transfers of data the RAM is able to perform in a given
time, thus higher numbers indicate that the RAM is able to transfer more data in a
given time, or alternatively: the RAM can transfer a xed amount of data in less time.
Higher speeds are thus advantageous to performance.

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Component Specications Anthony Farrell

• ECC (Error Correcting Code)

ECC is a specic type of RAM that includes specic algorithms and hardware to detect
if the contents of the RAM have changed, in addition to containing algorithms to be
able to recover the original data in case of a minor error.
In case of a major error in which the original data cannot be recovered, the ECC RAM
can at least report that an error has occurred and inform the end-user so they are
aware of that and can take corrective action.
ECC RAM is often slower than non-ECC memory, and is typically considerably more
expensive. As such, consumer PCs typically use non-ECC memory.
Not all computers support the use of ECC memory.
ECC memory is not typically used for the average users computer, instead being com-
monly found on computers used for scientic or industrial workloads, where errors can
cause signicant problems and thus need to be xed or at least accounted for.

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Chapter 6

Storage: HDDs and SSDs

Hard Disk Drives (HDDs) are rotating magnetic disks with an arm containing a read/write
head that moves over their surface.
This read/write head can modify the surface of the disk directly under it, and the dierences
in the surface of the disk this creates is a magnetic pattern that can be used to store data.

Solid State Drives SSDs are a much newer type of technology to the consumer market, and
instead use ash based technology, which has no moving parts, instead storing electrical
charge in xed areas, the patterns of charge forming the data stored.

Both SSDs and Hard Drives are used for long-term storage in computer systems.
For a quick comparison:

• Hard disks are have a much higher latency - the time between requesting data and
it being delivered. This is because an HDD must spin up the disk and move the
read/write head over the area of the disk containing the data, which takes time.
SSDs have dramatically less latency as they have no moving parts to wait for, and are
thus much faster to react to user requests.

• HDDs have a much lower speed - the maximum rate at which data can be transferred.
This is true for both reading and writing
This is because HDDs can only read/write data on the area of the disk that is directly
below the read/write head, and is unable to access any other data, limiting how fast
data can be accessed.
SSDs can read from many dierent areas of storage simultaneously, and thus have a
dramatically increased maximum speed - this is true for both reading and writing data.

• HDDs are reliable , having been around for decades, and most people will be at least
somewhat familiar with them.
They have thus proven themselves to be able to store data for longer periods of time.
SSDs are much newer to the consumer market, and whilst they are ne for general
computer usage and are not unreliable, they have not had as long to prove they are
capable of storing data safely for extended periods of time for archival purposes.
It is believed that SSDs will lose the electrical charge in their cells over time, resulting

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Component Specications Anthony Farrell

in data loss after extended time in storage, however the extent of this over prolonged
periods of time is not well studied, as SSDs are still relatively new to the market, and
the manufacturing techniques change over time.

• HDDs have a considerably lower price for a given capacity, whereas SSDs are still
considerably more expensive in this regard.

• HDDs have numerous moving parts inside, which makes them less resistant to shock
as this can damage the moving parts.
SSDs do not use moving parts, and are thus much more resistant to shock and vibra-
tions than HDDs.

• HDDs use spinning disks and moving read/write arms, whereas SSDs have no moving
parts, this means that HDDs are considerably louder than SSDs when in operation,
which are typically silent or near-silent.

A HDD is ne for almost all users - the industry has been using them for decades, and their
technology has only gotten more advanced with time.
However SSDs have a much lower latency and a higher read/write speed that means that an
SSD can be perhaps the biggest performance improvement a sluggish and slow PC can have
- if the user can aord one big enough for their needs, that is.

Many users combine an HDD and an SSD for their system.

The SSD provides the Operating System and commonly used programs a very fast and reson-
sive storage that will allow them to load quickly and allow the system to feel responsive,
whilst using a hard disk for larger collections of les that do not need to be accessed as of-
ten, or would not benet much from increased speed, such as family photos, lms, or music
collections.

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