Help with future IT test

[threadysparrow]

Ok guys, I know I post a lot on here and I thank you for being polite and always answering. I would like some help with some concepts because in October I am taking a hardware and software support class that is going towards a network engineering degree that I would like to achieve in the next 2 years. So here are some concepts and my understanding of these concepts. I would like corrections and explanations if you guys feel up to it. While I consider myself very familiar with computers, the very specific and complicated topics always confused me.

 

North and South Bridge: These basically control the components in a computer. The North Bridge controls the fast things like the CPU and RAM while the South Bridge controls the slower stuff like PCI and USB. They name it this way because the North Bridge is usually at the top of the motherboard and the South Bridge is at the bottom.

 

bus: the road that the information travels on among components in a bridge.

 

chipset: I read the first part of the Wikipedia's description and what I understand it to be is the component that allows parts of the computer to communicate together.

 

iops: how many computations something can run per second.

 

flops: this is where I get confused between iops and flops. flops is floating point (whatever that means) and iops is input output.

 

controller: something that controls a peripheral device for the computer itself. For example, there is a memory controller that allows the computer to access the RAM when needed.

 

These things are what I had the most trouble with so far. I am sure there are going to be more things I need help on so I hope you guys will stick around and help me when the time comes.

 

EDIT: I almost forgot I need help with some speed memorization. Like the speeds of SATA, SATA II, SATA III, PCI, PCIe (x1, x2, x4, x8, x16) USB, USB 2.0, USB 3.0, and if you can think of a few more that might be important please feel free to add those.

[Samdb]

You're descriptions are a little... lacking. A quick Google can give you a much better answer.
 
NBSB: The northbridge or host bridge was one of the two chips in the core logic chipset on a computer motherboard, used to manage data communications between a CPU and a motherboard. The southbridge is one of the two chips in the core logic chipset on a personal computer (PC) motherboard, the other being the northbridge. The southbridge typically implements the slower capabilities of the motherboard in a northbridge/southbridge chipset computer architecture.

 

Bus: In computer architecture, a bus (from the Latin omnibus, meaning 'for all') is a communication system that transfers data between components inside a computer, or between computers. This expression covers all related hardware components (wire, optical fiber, etc.) and software, including communication protocol.

 

And so on and so forth.

 

Source: Wikipedia.org

[threadysparrow]

You're descriptions are a little... lacking. A quick Google can give you a much better answer.

 

NBSB: The northbridge or host bridge was one of the two chips in the core logic chipset on a computer motherboard, used to manage data communications between a CPU and a motherboard. The southbridge is one of the two chips in the core logic chipset on a personal computer (PC) motherboard, the other being the northbridge. The southbridge typically implements the slower capabilities of the motherboard in a northbridge/southbridge chipset computer architecture.

 

Bus: In computer architecture, a bus (from the Latin omnibus, meaning 'for all') is a communication system that transfers data between components inside a computer, or between computers. This expression covers all related hardware components (wire, optical fiber, etc.) and software, including communication protocol.

 

And so on and so forth.

 

Source: Wikipedia.org

 

Do you think this is a good starting point though? I have never taken a computer class other than intro to MS office and intro to Visual Basic about 10 years ago when I was a freshman in high school. I am pretty much self taught for the most part and a lot of Wikipedia's definitions with computer hardware and software confuse me because I do not have the base education to follow what the article is talking about.

[Kayn]

As Sam said above it's probably easier to do a google search and find the specifics.

 

Do you think this is a good starting point though? I have never taken a computer class other than intro to MS office and intro to Visual Basic about 10 years ago when I was a freshman in high school. I am pretty much self taught for the most part and a lot of Wikipedia's definitions with computer hardware and software confuse me because I do not have the base education to follow what the article is talking about.

Well if you don't understand something while reading then might as well and read about that subject and continue.

[dalekphalm]

Ok guys, I know I post a lot on here and I thank you for being polite and always answering. I would like some help with some concepts because in October I am taking a hardware and software support class that is going towards a network engineering degree that I would like to achieve in the next 2 years. So here are some concepts and my understanding of these concepts. I would like corrections and explanations if you guys feel up to it. While I consider myself very familiar with computers, the very specific and complicated topics always confused me.

 

North and South Bridge: These basically control the components in a computer. The North Bridge controls the fast things like the CPU and RAM while the South Bridge controls the slower stuff like PCI and USB. They name it this way because the North Bridge is usually at the top of the motherboard and the South Bridge is at the bottom.

 

bus: the road that the information travels on among components in a bridge.

 

chipset: I read the first part of the Wikipedia's description and what I understand it to be is the component that allows parts of the computer to communicate together.

 

iops: how many computations something can run per second.

 

flops: this is where I get confused between iops and flops. flops is floating point (whatever that means) and iops is input output.

 

controller: something that controls a peripheral device for the computer itself. For example, there is a memory controller that allows the computer to access the RAM when needed.

 

These things are what I had the most trouble with so far. I am sure there are going to be more things I need help on so I hope you guys will stick around and help me when the time comes.

 

EDIT: I almost forgot I need help with some speed memorization. Like the speeds of SATA, SATA II, SATA III, PCI, PCIe (x1, x2, x4, x8, x16) USB, USB 2.0, USB 3.0, and if you can think of a few more that might be important please feel free to add those.

Some of these "explanations" are a bit off, and definitely out-dated.

 

As an example, most modern motherboard architecture has only one chipset (also, North and South bridge chips ARE the chipsets. There used to be two). The chipset is like an interconnect/control device that does two main things:

 

1. Controls and communicates various sub-devices such as USB, SATA controller, PCIe lanes, etc.

2. Acts as a gateway and middleman between the CPU and the rest of the motherboard.

 

Again, even these answers are highly simplified. If you're going to encounter questions about legacy hardware, then you should read up about the specific roles the North and South chipsets had.

 

Your explanation of Bus is more or less right, though highly simplified. The Bus is basically the data interconnect between various parts. Mainly the CPU and the motherboard/chipsets/PCIe lanes (AKA the FSB: Front Side Bus).

 

IOPS: Input/Output Operations Per Second - basically exactly what it sounds like. How many operations, or "things" something can do per second. This is often mostly used when referring to SSD's or larger data arrays (SAN's, RAID arrays, etc) these days, but can also refer to any kind of communications controller/device/chipset/cpu.

 

Flops (as you rightly mentioned) is Floating Point Operations Per Second: This specifically refers to some sort of compute device, such as a CPU or a GPU. Floating Point calculations are used in specific application environments like Simulations, Physics calculations, etc. CPU's don't do very much FP crunching anymore because GPU architecture is just so much more efficient at it. The "FLOP" measurement is a very basic (and often not necessarily accurate) way of measuring speed. You see Supercomputer comparisons using Flops. You also see GPU's being measured in Flops (especially when looking at OpenGL or Cuda calculations - which are used in graphically accelerated programs like Adobe, or simulations like BOINC/Protein folding, etc).

 

As for memorizing speed specs for SATA, PCIe, etc. SATA is easy enough: SATA 1 - 1.5 Gbps; SATA 2 - 3 Gbps; SATA 3 - 6 Gbps (Note: These are Gbits, not gigabytes - an important distinction, always remember small b is bit, Big B is Byte, and 8 bits per Byte).

 

You may also encounter the kibi/mibi/gibi/tibibyte (Noted as GiB) - this is a standardized way of avoiding confusion between base 2 (1KB (or KiB) = 1024 Bytes) vs standard SI base 10 (1KB = 1000 Bytes). The problem is that most people grew up with KB meaning 1024 in computer speak, and not everyone uses the KiB standard *cough*Microsoft*cough*.