how can i learn more about hardware?

[adarw]

ive learnt a lot on this fourm and probably will continue to learn, so i want to thank you everyone, but i want other ways i can learn about computers/tech im taking a bunch of courses in school but it isnt enough. im currently learing coding but i also want to learn more about the hardware side. what should i do?

[adarw]

Just now, NZgamer said:

You won't learn everything from this, but it does contribute quite a bit. The way I got into hardware when I was a kid was by taking apart an old computer I had lying around. I learned how all the parts go in, and the modules on the motherboard.

the thing is i already do that, its just that i need more, and me doesnt know where to get more.

[TheBean]

ngl the way I learnt was just subscribing to YT channels and just watching all of them no matter what.. a lot of them are repeated, but most of them will have some off hand comment about something that might help you learn.. also, a lot of the newer videos from most channels are a lot less educational than the older videos.. if you go to people like LTT, jaystwocents, bitwit, pauls harware, techquickie, battle(non)sense, boot sequence, computerphile, gamersnexus (GN is more advanced), hardware canucks, and of course MKBHD. these i think is a pretty good list of the more well known people and some smaller ones i think are good. 

 

for smaller channels, any video is fine, but i have noticed that newer videos on larger channels are much less educational than before. 

[BlueChinchillaEatingDorito]

31 minutes ago, adarw said:

ive learnt a lot on this fourm and probably will continue to learn, so i want to thank you everyone, but i want other ways i can learn about computers/tech im taking a bunch of courses in school but it isnt enough. im currently learing coding but i also want to learn more about the hardware side. what should i do?

Which side of hardware are you getting at? Like the nitty gritty of how the logic in CPUs and memory work? 

[adarw]

2 minutes ago, BlueChinchillaEatingDorito said:

nitty gritty

huh?

[mariushm]

Anandtech has in-depth articles where they explain how some things are designed, for example NAND memory (in SSDs), difference between slc, mlc, tlc etc 

They also do a lot of explanations when they review new processors, they show how the processor is made inside and why that makes it different or better than previous processors.

 

If you want to learn more about hardware, you have to be curious and research on your own, you won't find "tutorials" ready made for you out there.

 

I personally started when I was in high school (around 14-15 years old) when we had 486 computers and pentium 133-166 at most, started buying each month a computer magazine and reading the articles, reading about hardware as new things were released, learning the terms, reading about differences between x86 and IBM and other processors, it was something I was very passionate about. 

I didn't have any computer at home, my parents were too poor to buy one, and even if I did have back then most people had dial-up internet using fax modems, and waited until 9-10 pm to get cheap phone time - my parents wouldn't have accepted dial up internet ever in my house.

 

Nowadays there's Internet and SO MUCH resources available... it's difficult to filter and get good quality information to learn.

 

For example as so much resources, you could go on Internet Archive and get access to lots of computer magazines, you could start from older editions and learn about x86, 386, 486, pentium,  about ibm power pc, about apple cpus, risc vs rest, x86 vs mips, learn about pci and how it's better than isa, then go through agp, then pci-e, learn about ram types as they're introduced/invented, see reviews of things like pentium 3, pentium 4, atom, amd athlon 64, 64 bit instructions vs intel's 64 bit stuff in itanium, as they're released and they get excited about them and explain the innovations in articles...

.

The old BYTE magazine is here  : https://archive.org/download/BYTE-MAGAZINE-COMPLETE

or PC Magazine : https://archive.org/details/pc_magazine

 

Or here's collections of computer magazines : https://archive.org/details/computermagazines?&sort=-week&page=1

and another collection of periodicals, magazines, not just it related (but has a lot of it magazines) : https://archive.org/details/magazine_rack

 

[BlueChinchillaEatingDorito]

40 minutes ago, adarw said:

huh?

mhmm do people not use that saying anymore? Like the specific details on what makes a CPU tick.

 

For instance... logic gates (yay).

.

[Spindel]

Try to learn to code in assembly or machine code, basically any low level programing. 
 

You learn a shit ton about how the hardware actually works. 
 

Since modern hardware might be a bit overwhelming an idea migh be to start, to get a hang of it, on an old vintage system like a C64. 

[FruitOfTheLum]

On 9/21/2021 at 6:08 AM, adarw said:

ive learnt a lot on this fourm and probably will continue to learn, so i want to thank you everyone, but i want other ways i can learn about computers/tech im taking a bunch of courses in school but it isnt enough. im currently learing coding but i also want to learn more about the hardware side. what should i do?

Taking them apart and putting them back together is a good start, but it'll only teach you so much. 

 

The next time you take apart/put together a PC, look closely at the hardware pieces. Study them closely, and you'll notice that each 'part' is actually a bunch of parts. Start Googling what each part of a part does. Take a motherboard, for instance - it's one thing to know that it's what everything else plugs into, but another to understand why and how. The motherboard is actually a series of complicated components all working together - see if you can figure out what each part of the motherboard does, and why! 

 

Do something similar with all of the other PC parts. What are those chips on the RAM module for? What do all the different parts of the GPU do? How do they communicate with the motherboard? How does the motherboard communicate all of that to the CPU? What does the CPU do with that information? How does it do it? 

 

Does that make sense? Gradually break the whole system down (not literally - unless you're prepared to sacrifice some parts!) into its absolute base components. As soon as you've found the answer to one question, ask another question and research that too. You need to become a toddler, basically - ask "why?" every time you find the answer. Ask questions about what each thing is, and research them online until you 'get it'. Then ask "why?" again!

 

Start at the top and work your way down. Be inquisitive about every single aspect of the hardware. Eventually you'll have a reasonably good understanding of all of it. You can go as deep as you want - right down to the quantum mechanics that make it all work in the first place, if you want!

 

Another good way is to read-up on some more historical components. That way you can start from scratch and learn why things changed the way they did and how we got here.

[Middcore]

Watch YouTube channels dedicated specifically to computer service and repair rather than just enthusiast entertainer/review channels like LTT. One I like is called Adamant IT, hosted by a guy named Graham who runs a repair shop in the UK.

 

Take a course on Udemy or similar sites for the CompTIA A+ certification, if you're an enthusiast a lot of it will be stuff you know but there will be detail/functional stuff that's on the exam which hobbyist content doesn't tend to get into.

[Jtalk4456]

Pretty much any piece of hardware has specs available and if you're really needing to dig in, you can go the boring route and just read thru product pages.

[da na]

Get your hands on some HW. Mess around with it. Find PCs by the side of the road, see what's wrong with them. 

[Sauron]

On 9/21/2021 at 7:08 AM, adarw said:

i also want to learn more about the hardware side

that's quite vague, what exactly do you want to learn?

[adarw]

4 minutes ago, Sauron said:

that's quite vague, what exactly do you want to learn?

everything and anything.... but im really interested in how it works, like the small stuff.... ive been doing way more research and looking into things since i started the thread : )

[Moonzy]

7 minutes ago, adarw said:

everything and anything.... but im really interested in how it works, like the small stuff.... ive been doing way more research and looking into things since i started the thread : )

So you're looking into logic gates and stuffs??

[Sauron]

7 minutes ago, adarw said:

everything and anything.... but im really interested in how it works, like the small stuff.... ive been doing way more research and looking into things since i started the thread : )

I think you're going to need an electronics engineering degree then, maybe one in physics as well

[adarw]

1 minute ago, Moonzy said:

So you're looking into logic gates and stuffs??

im trying... but its hard. im going to try my best, im not going to go way to deep into just yet, im thinking of studing more software atm since im kinda struggling in my HS cs course. 

 

3 minutes ago, Sauron said:

physics

yea i havent taken physics just yet sadly : (

[Moonzy]

8 minutes ago, adarw said:

im trying... but its hard. im going to try my best, im not going to go way to deep into just yet, im thinking of studing more software atm since im kinda struggling in my HS cs course. 

Logic gates are pretty simple, but you gotta know where to start learning

 

Start by learning what each gate does first before diving into what a combination of them does

[Biohazard777]

21 minutes ago, adarw said:

m trying... but its hard. im going to try my best, im not going to go way to deep into just yet, im thinking of studing more software atm since im kinda struggling in my HS cs course. 

Before you start looking at logic gates you should learn binary math. It is not hard IMHO and you might have learned about it in school already, but if you haven't then you really should learn that 1st.

If you want to have "fun" with logic gates I suggest you give Fallout 4 a try. There is a building mode in which you can use logic gates to make lots of different of contraptions for your settlement.

A bit more "serious" software to get started with logic gates would be Logisim-evolution:
https://github.com/logisim-evolution/logisim-evolution/releases
 

[Jtalk4456]

https://www.humblebundle.com/books/charles-platt-make-community-books 
this humble bundle is there for 3 more days, not sure if any of the books in here have what you're looking for, but 32 books for 18 isn't bad either way

[2plash6]

I personally learned a lot when I was trying to build my own PC. 

 

If you wonder how other people learn about hardware on this website, then it's probably because of their first build.

 

When I was building my PC, I learnt a lot by looking to see which parts are compatible and which aren't, and also which parts work well together.

I also read MaximumPC.

[IkeaGnome]

Want a quick crash course in logic gates?

 

[8tg]

On 9/21/2021 at 12:18 AM, adarw said:

the thing is i already do that, its just that i need more, and me doesnt know where to get more.

Wikipedia.

Focus on a component and go down the rabbit hole of what makes it work.

Look at your gpu, learn about its interface and how it works, the display outputs, pcie power delivery, the on board power delivery circuitry, learn what the components are.

Repeat the same for every part, the history of the technologies used and what changes over time.

The market side of things can also be interesting, how competition and development cycles affect the products we see, the reception of them and the capabilities we get as a result.

 

Youre not gonna know just out of nowhere about what pcie lanes are and how they work across the CPU and chipset bridges, and what even the different bridges are and what they do. These are things you learn by researching them or passively over time as you involve yourself more with the hobby.

[WhitetailAni]

I learned what I know because family/friends gave me old computers. I wanted to fix them, so I did, and I learned a LOT.
So I built more computers and worked on fixing more and I upgraded them and I messed around with overclocking CPU and RAM and hosting a Minecraft server and now I know a decent bit. I'm not an uber-genius on any particular subject by any means, though I do like casual overclocking and tweaking with my non-daily machines.

There's something about squeezing every hertz, every bit per second, every frame, etc. you can out of hardware that's fun, and I don't know why.

 

Additionally, I like retroish tech and since it's not too hard to get that stuff in a not fully working condition, I've had to learn some about what makes a motherboard tick, what can be replaced, what are common causes of failure, etc. I know the most about Slot 1/Socket 478 stuff because @BrianTheElectrician and @Bitter gave me some stuff, though I'm not ignorant of Socket 462 and the like.

 

There's also some random bits of information that I know from watching LTT videos from between 2015-2017 (when they were both informative and entertaining, rather than just entertaining if that).

If that's what you're looking for, I should be able to direct you.