【文章內(nèi)容簡(jiǎn)介】 licking on the buttons on the mouse, you give the puter directions on what to do. Other types of input devices allow you to put images into the puter. A scanner copies a picture or document into the puter. There are several types of scanners and some look very different, but most look like a flat tray with a glass pane and a lid to cover it. You can input photographs into a puter with a digital camera. The most mon output device is a monitor. It looks a lot a like a TV and houses the puter screen. The monitor allows you to 39。see39。 what you and the puter are doing together. Speakers are output devices that allow you to hear sound from your printer is another mon part of a puter system. It takes what you see on the puter screen and prints it on paper. Hardware on the Inside Computers are made of many electronic ponents or parts. These ponents each have a special job and they all work together to make your puter operate. Some ponents are hidden inside the puter, where you can39。t see them. Others can be seen partly from the outside. Power It Up! Every puter needs a power supply, to take electricity from your house and convert it into a current that works for your puter. When it is plugged into the wall, electricity travels from the electrical wires in your house into the puter39。s power supply. When your puter is turned on, the power supply allows the converted electricity to travel to other ponents inside the puter. The motherboard gets its name because it is like a mother to all of the other circuit boards. Found at the bottom of a desktop case or the side of a tower case, the motherboard is the largest circuit board and has many smaller boards plugged into it. It holds all of the most important parts of the the motherboard, you will find several expansion cards. Each of these cards has a special purpose. The sound card contains special circuits for operating the puter39。s sound. The video card handles graphics that are displayed on the monitor. There are also expansion cards for other puter ponents including the drives and ports. The modem is an expansion card that allows puters to talk to each modems can run up to 56,000 bits per second. The brain of a puter is the CPU or Central Processing Unit. Like a brain, it controls information and tells other parts what to do. The type of CPU in a puter also determines how fast that puter can operate. A CPU generates lots of heat, so there is usually a small fan nearby to cool it down. A very important puter ponent is the BIOS chip. BIOS stands for Basic Input Output System. In very simple terms, the BIOS chip wakes up the puter when you turn it on and reminds it what parts it has and what they do. RAM amp。 ROM Have you ever heard the terms RAM and ROM? These two terms sound very similar and can easily be confused by beginners. However, understanding what they mean and what they do can help you to remember. RAM stands for Random Access Memory. RAM chips will remember what you tell them and can even change to remember new information. But, when the puter is turned off, RAM fets everything you told it. This is why it is so important to save your work on a puter if the puter gets turned off, RAM will lose all of your work! ROM stands for Read Only Memory. ROM is good at remembering, but cannot change it39。s mind. It holds information that is built into it. ROM is like reading a library book lots of information is there, but you can39。t change it (because you never write in a library book). RAM, on the other hand, is more like a journal you can write information into the journal. But if you change your mind, you can erase and write in new information. Operating Systems In puter science, the operating system (OS) is to control the puter39。s basic has three main functions: coordination and operation of puter hardware, such as puter memory, printer, disk, keyboard, mouse and monitor。 in a variety of storage media presentation documents, such as a floppy disk, hard disk, CDROM and tape。 and processing hardware errorand data loss. What is an Operating System? The most important program on any puter is the Operating System or OS. The OS is a large program made up of many smaller programs that control how the CPU municates with other hardware ponents. It also makes puters easier to operate by people who don39。t understand programming languages. In other words, operating systems make puters user friendly. Types of Operating Systems Different puter manufacturers use different operating systems. Apple has specific operating systems for its line of Macintosh puters. When IBM released their Personal Computer or PC back in the early 198039。s, they did not get a copyright on it, which allowed many other panies to build similar puters that were IBMpatible。 in other words, they used the same operating system as the IBM PC. There are different operating systems available for PCs, but the most mon is Windows, which was developed by a pany named Microsoft. Windows is similar to the Macintosh operating system, because it also uses a mouse and a GUI (Graphical User Interface) that uses graphics or pictures to help the user navigate within the puter system. The Computer Revolution The introduction of the Macintosh OS and the later introduction of Windows played a large part in making puters accessible to so many people. The userfriendly interfaces of both operating systems made it easier for people with no puter training to learn to use these amazing machines. Other machines, such as typewriters and payroll calculators quickly became a thing of the past, as puters became so easy to use and so affordable. Programming Language In puter science, programming language that can be used to write the puter is running a series of instructions