APEX TUTORS

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Computer Technology An Introduction

Installation, Configuration, Connection, Troubleshooting

Kwesi Antwi ©
2012

A guide to configuring, installing, connecting and troubleshooting

computer systems
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Contents
Contents..........................................................................................................................2
Preface............................................................................................................................4
Introduction....................................................................................................................5
CHAPTER 1 CPU..........................................................................................................7
CPU Packages................................................................................................................7
CHAPTER 2 RAM......................................................................................................19
RAM Variations...........................................................................................................22
CHAPTER 3 Hard Drive Technologies.......................................................................24
RAID............................................................................................................................31
Implementing RAID.....................................................................................................33
Solid State Disks..........................................................................................................33
Implementing Hard Drives...........................................................................................35
Maintaining and Troubleshooting Hard Drives...........................................................39
CHAPTER 4 Removable Media..................................................................................41
Optical Drives..............................................................................................................45
DVD Media..................................................................................................................48
Blu-ray Considerations.................................................................................................53
CHAPTER 5 Motherboard...........................................................................................55
Installation....................................................................................................................58
Expansion Bus..............................................................................................................61
CHAPTER 6 BIOS and CMOS...................................................................................63
CHAPTER 7 The BOOT process................................................................................65
CHAPTER 8 Troubleshooting Theory.........................................................................66
CHAPTER 9 NETWORKS.........................................................................................67
Windows Internet Connection Sharing........................................................................67
Virtual Private Networks..............................................................................................69
The Internet..................................................................................................................70
Local Area Networking................................................................................................75
Network Operating Systems........................................................................................82
Installing and Configuring a Wired Network...............................................................84
Configuring TCP/IP.....................................................................................................84
Troubleshooting Networks...........................................................................................87
CHAPTER 10 Printing.................................................................................................88
Laser Printers...............................................................................................................91
Laser Printer Steps.......................................................................................................97
Installing a Printer in Windows....................................................................................98
Troubleshooting Printers..............................................................................................99
Troubleshooting Inkjet Printers..................................................................................100
Troubleshooting Laser Printers..................................................................................100
CHAPTER 11 Portable Computing...........................................................................102 Page | 3
Laptop Display Resolutions.......................................................................................102
Software Support for PC Cards..................................................................................106
Managing and Maintaining Portable Computers.......................................................107
CHAPTER 12 Power Management...........................................................................110
CHAPTER 13 Multimedia.........................................................................................113
Sound Card Standards................................................................................................115
Troubleshooting Sound..............................................................................................118
CHAPTER 14 DISPLAYS........................................................................................121
CRT Monitors............................................................................................................121
Projectors....................................................................................................................125
Monitors.....................................................................................................................127
Motherboard Connection...........................................................................................131
Graphics Processors...................................................................................................132
Installing and Configuring Video...............................................................................135
3-D Graphics..............................................................................................................136
Troubleshooting Video...............................................................................................139
Troubleshooting Monitors..........................................................................................140
Troubleshooting CRT.................................................................................................140
Troubleshooting LCD................................................................................................140
Input/Output...............................................................................................................142
Web Cameras.............................................................................................................147
Specialty I/O Devices.................................................................................................148
CHAPTER 15 Performance Options.........................................................................151
Backup Utility............................................................................................................151
Troubleshooting Windows.........................................................................................152
CHAPTER 16 INSTALLATION..............................................................................155
Installation Problems..................................................................................................155
Compatibility..............................................................................................................155
Vista Commands........................................................................................................155
Securing Windows Resources....................................................................................156
User Account Control................................................................................................157
Working with the Command Line Interface..............................................................161
Commands..................................................................................................................161
Troubleshooting Installation Problems......................................................................168
Role of System Files..................................................................................................169
CHAPTER 17 Power Supply.....................................................................................171
CHAPTER 18 Security..............................................................................................179
Security on Network..................................................................................................179
Malicious Software....................................................................................................179
Authentication............................................................................................................181
Wireless......................................................................................................................182
Preface

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This book provides an introduction to the fundamentals of
computing technology. We look at the components of the
computer. The CPU, memory, hard drive technologies, removable
media including optical drives and DVD media will be discussed.
We include detailed descriptions of motherboard installations and
the role of the expansion bus.

We consider local area networks, wide area networks and the

internet; including installing, configuring and troubleshooting
network hardware and software. Printers; including dot matrix, dye
sublimation, laser, inkjet and solid ink printers is discussed.

Our section on portable computing looks at laptops, display

resolutions and portable computer management.

We discuss power supplies, monitors, multimedia, sound cards

and video cards when we look at peripherals. We look at
configuring and installing Windows; including an exploration of
utility software such as security tools and disk management tools.

Frequent troubleshooting sections are included to provide a

practical context. We hope that these sections will enable the
reader to gain vital problem solving skills; which is essential for
working with computers.

After reading this book you will have a thorough understanding of

the fundamentals of computing technology.
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Introduction

Are you a computer or information technology student? Are you

somebody looking for a deeper understanding of computer
technology? Is your job providing technical support? Do you enjoy
building computers? Do you want to become familiar with
computing terminology? If your answer is yes to any of these
questions then this book is for you.

We aim to provide you with a thorough grounding by introducing

concepts in a way that can be easily grasped.

So what is a computer? It is a collection of components (known as

hardware) and programs (known as software) that are arranged to
perform certain functions. The input, process, output model is
fundamental here. Something (e.g. a keyboard or mouse) provides
an input. A process then transforms the input to a suitable output.
The output is sent to an output device such as a display or printer.
This book looks at computer hardware, computer software and
how communications is accomplished.
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In the following pages we will explore the PC (see above

picture) in considerable detail. We will discuss the CPU,
memory, motherboard, expansion bus, fans etc.

The CPU is a vital component. It is known as the ‘brains’ of the

computer. The next section will describe the CPU and its
evolution.

It is important that the reader engages with this book by trying

things out; experimenting where possible, where it is sensible to do
so. Learning by doing is especially applicable with computers. For
example, installing memory modules or upgrading a hard drive
should be attempted.
CHAPTER 1 CPU

Core components of the CPU are

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 registers (work bench),
 instruction set (code book),
 arithmetic logic unit (brains)
 External data bus

CPU Packages

PGA (Pin Grid Array) package is prevalent today characterised by

many pins with an orientation arrow. The CPU plugs into a socket
on the motherboard. Socket 1366 and socket 775 refers to 1366
pins and 775 pins respectively.

Overclocking occurs when the clock chip is multiplied faster than

the designed speed. Ram is arranged in byte sized rows. The
micro controller chip controls the interaction between CPU and
RAM. The CPU retrieves data from and sends data to the external
data bus and retrieves data from RAM using it’s address bus. The
amount of wires in a CPU’s address bus determines the amount of
RAM capable of being addressed. 20 wires = 2^20 = 1,048,576
bytes.

The Pentium invented in the early 90s was the 1 st CPU to contain
all the core components seen in CPUs today.

The old 8088 CPU had 16 bit registers, an 8 bit external data bus
and a 20 bit address bus. DOS and Windows 3.1 were designed to
work with these old CPUs. 32 bit CPUs contained a 32 bit address
bus meaning that 2 ^32 or 4GB of RAM could be addressed.

A CPU performs a 4 stage process to get data from the external

data bus, process that data and return it to the external data bus.
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Fetch – get the data from the external data bus
Decode – determine what type of command needs to be done
Execute – perform the calculation
Write –send the data back to the external data bus

Introducing a pipeline enables all 4 stages to be carried out

simultaneously; meaning that activity takes place at all 4 stages on
each clock tick.

Some CPUs have up to 20 (Pentium 4 has 20 stages) stages to

increase speed further. The decoding stage generally takes the
greatest amount of time so the CPU allocates more resource to
this activity.

A CPU spends most of it’s time performing integer maths. FPU

(floating point unit) deals with more complex maths involving
fractions etc. It takes longer to process numbers using the FPU
than using the integer unit. Therefore a pipeline is assigned to
activities involving the FPU and another pipeline is assigned to
activities involving the integer unit thus increasing the overall
speed of the CPU.

Most CPUs have about 8 pipelines. A main difference between

Intel and AMD CPUs is that AMD tend to have shorter pipelines
and Intel tends to have fewer, longer pipelines. CPUs are faster
than RAM and are able to execute commands more quickly than
RAM is able to supply commands. This causes delays that slow
down the CPU. Cache is able to provide a bridge between CPU
and RAM by anticipating what the CPU needs to process next and
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providing it. Cache is faster than RAM but expensive and is
therefore provided in small quantities. The CPU first accesses L1
cache, then L2 cache and so on. Small L1 and larger L2 cache is
more efficient than a large L1 cache.

All modern CPUs are clock multipliers. A Pentium 4 with an

external speed of 133MHz can have an internal speed of 3.06GHz
– 23*. CPUs report their speed via CPUID (CPU identifier) and the
speed for the motherboard is adjusted automatically. Voltage
regulator modules (VRM) are installed on motherboards to change
the CPU voltage from 5V to 3.3V. Smaller voltages equal less
heat. Modern CPUs have a 64 bit data bus, a 32 bit or larger
address bus, 32 bit or larger registers, multiple pipelines and
multiple levels of cache.

The original Pentium was discontinued in 1995. AMDs rival to the

original Pentium was the K5. The Pentium Pro

released in 1995 is considered to be the true father of the modern

CPU. Quad pipelines, on-board level 2 cache and dynamic
processing were new features not seen on previous Pentiums. The
Pentium Pro was capable of superscalar execution (or the ability
to process more than 1 instruction in any one clock cycle). Out of
order processing/speculative execution – from time to time the
CPU must access RAM for code to execute. Obviously accessing
RAM introduces delays; sometimes up to 20 clock cycles. With out
of order processing the CPU is able to run code within the
pipeline out of order and then re-order once missing data from
RAM has been accessed. Improved branch prediction enabled the
CPU to better anticipate data requirements (in cache) called
speculative execution.

The CPU, memory chip controller and RAM is collectively referred

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to as front side bus. CPU and L2 cache is called the backside bus.
The Pentium Pro was not used for desktop PCs, due to high cost,
but was used extensively on high end servers.

Other later Pentium CPUs appeared after the Pentium Pro.

Common to these CPUs were MMX (multimedia extensions),
increased multipliers/clocks and improved processing. MMX was
special circuitry for handling graphics using vector maths.

Pentium II

Pentium II used the SEC (single edge cartridge) package installed

into a special slot.

The SEC package provided more space for the level 2 cache. The
SEC package was unique and other CPU manufactures (AMD)
were forced to create their own SEC package. The Pentium II only
ran on 66 MHz motherboards initially and it lost market share to
AMD CPUs that ran on 100 MHz motherboards.

Between 1997 and 2000 AMD produced the K6 series processors.

Many considered the K6 to be superior to the Pentium II. Four
models of the K6 were produced – K6, K6-II, K6-II+ and K6-III.
These models incorporated a feature called ‘3D now!’, a graphics
capability considered superior to MMX. Improved pipelining and a
larger (64KB) cache were other enhancements. The K6-III
included 256KB L2 cache on a socket 7 PGA package.
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The Pentium III was introduced with streaming SIMD extensions

(SSE); a direct competitor to AMDs 3D now! Other improvements
included faster L2 cache, enhanced pipelines and full support for
100 and 133 MHz motherboard speeds. This CPU initially
produced using the SEC package, was later manufactured in PGA
format.
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Most modern CPUs are produced using the 45 nanometre

process. There are some CPUs using the 32 nanometre process.

AMD launched it's Athlon range in direct competition to Intel’s

chips. Athlon initially came in a SEC package using slot A. Later a
462 pin PGA package was used. The Thunderbird was launched
using a double-pumped front-side bus, increasing data throughput
without increasing clock speed. Athlon XP incorporated further
enhancements, including support for Intel’s SSE instructions.

With the Athlon range AMD attempted to ignore clock speeds;

instead a performance rating such as 1800+ was shown.
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The Duron was AMDs low cost CPU. The Semptron replaced the
Duron in 2004.

The Pentium 4 was a significant upgrade featuring a new core

called Netburst. A 20 stage pipeline was added and a quad
pumped frontline bus. SSE was enhanced with SSE2 and later
SSE3. A 423 pin PGA package was introduced, followed by a 478
pin package which was actually smaller than the 423 pin package.
The Pentium 4, codenamed Prescott had a LGA (land grid array)
775 package. Northwood and Prescott CPUs introduced
hyperthreading. Hyperthreading is the ability for each pipeline to
process more than 1 thread at a time. In task manager, 1 CPU
appears as 2 CPUs. With Northwood and Prescott Intel
abandoned the relationship between the speed of a processor
and it’s name.
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P4 LGA

Laptop CPUs normally run about 75% of the speed of its desktop
equivalent. CPUs also use less power by incorporating power
management. A feature known as throttling whereby the CPU
slows down during low demand periods or when the CPU starts to
get hot was also used. AMD’s version of this is called PowerNow;
Intel’s version is called SpeedStep.

Intel’s foray into 64 bit computing was achieved with the launch of
the Itanium. The Itanium had a unique 418 pin (pin array
cartridge) PAC to help house its 2 – 4MB L3 cache. Itanium 2 was
Intel’s serious high end 64 bit CPU using very fast caching and
massive pipelines. The Itanium was not backwards compatible and
could not use any 32 bit code.

AMDs Opteron is a 64 bit CPU aimed at the server market. It is

lower end compared to the Itanium but contains HyperTransport
connecting to other parts of the PC using a high speed (6GBps)
link. It is also designed to run both 64 bit and 32 bit code. The
Opteron comes in a micro-PGA package similar in looks to the
Pentium 4.
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The Athlon 64 heralded the 1 st 64 bit CPU for the desktop. It’s key
feature is the MCC being part of the CPU, thus eliminating the
front-side bus.

Having hit a practical speed limit of 4GHz in 2003 both AMD and
Intel introduced multi core processors to increase performance. A
dual core CPU has 2 sets of execution units and 2 sets of pipelines
but share the same cache.

The Pentium D was the 1st dual core processor. The Pentium D is
essentially 2 late generation Pentium 4s joined together. Each
processor has its own cache and has licensed AMDs 4
extensions, enabling it to run 32 and 64 bit code. AMDs dual core
offering was the Athon 64 X2.
 Page | 16

Intel’s dual core (2006) CPUs did not use NetBurst; they relied
instead on older (Pentium M) technology using a level 2 stage
pipeline and a 478 pin FCPGA package.

The Core 2 CPU uses a new architecture called core. The cache
size of 4MB and the ability to process multiple tasks on a single
clock cycle sets it ahead of the competition. Versions are Core 2
Solo, Core 2 Duo, Core 2 Quad and an enthusiast line called Core
2 Extreme. Utilising AMD’s 64 bit technology enables the Core 2
line of CPU’s to run 64 bit versions of Windows.

The AMD Phenom is a quad core CPU that has the MCC present
on the CPU. Each CPU core has it’s own L1 and L2 cache but
share L3 cache. It uses the same HyperTransport bus that the
Opteron CPU has and supports AM2+ socket and AM3 socket.
Phenom supports DDR2 RAM. Phenom II supports DDR3. It is
built using the 45-nm process instead of the 65-nm process used
on the earlier Phenom.
 Page | 17

Intel’s core i7 is a quad core CPU which uses a new

microarchitecture called Nehalem. It supports DDR3 memory and
can operate in 64 bit and 32 bit mode. It has 8MB of L3 cache and
uses a new 1366 pin socket. The MCC is present on the CPU
eliminating the front-side bus, replacing it with a technology called
(QuickPath Interconnect) QPI. QPI is similar to HyperTransport
from AMD.

High end Xeon CPUs are designed to work in groups of 2, 4 or

even 8 CPUs. There are even 32 cores enabling Xeon to enjoy
huge popularity in the high end server world.
CPUs cannot work with serial data; the CPU uses a UART
(universal asynchronous receiver/transmitter) chip to change serial
to parallel – 8 bits at a time. UART chips are found on modems.

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CHAPTER 2 RAM

The 80386 had a 32 bit wide data bus and required a 32 bit wide Page | 19
DRAM chip. Modern CPUs now has a 64 bit wide data bus.
SDRAM 1st appeared in 1996 on a DIMM stick. Desktop DIMMS
were 168-pin. Laptop DIMMs were 68-pin or 144-pin or 172-pin
micro-DIMM or 72, 144 or 200-pin (Small Outline DIMM) SO-
DIMM. All of these DIMM sticks used a 64 bit wide data bus apart
from the 32 bit, 72 pin SO-DIMM. 72-pin SO-DIMM had to be
installed in banks of two; one stick was only ½ bus width. Older
laptops using 72-pin So-Dimm needed two sticks of Ram to make
a full bank. One stick constituted ½ a bus.

SDRAM (SDRAM 66, 75, 83, 100, 133 MHz); with SDRAM RAM
speed is to match or exceed the system speed (front side bus) or
else the system won’t work.

RDRAM can run at 600, 700, 800 or 1066MHz but is expensive

compared to SDRAM and was not widely supported. It was
developed for the Pentium 4 quad pumped front-side bus. RDRAM
(called RIMMS) was 184-pin for desktop and 160-pin for laptop.
RDRAM motherboards needed all slots to be populated. RDRAM
employed dual channel architecture. This meant that data retrieval
speeds were increased provided RIMM sticks were installed in
pairs.

DDR SDRAM/DDR RAM (double data rate SDRAM) was heavily

supported by AMD to match the Athlon double-pumped front-side
bus. It could not achieve the speeds of RDRAM but was only
slightly more expensive than normal SDRAM. DDR RAM is 184-
pin for desktop and 200-pin SO-DIMMS or 172-pin micro-DIMMS
for laptop. All DDR sticks are 8 bytes (64 bits) wide. PC3200 is
3200/8=400Mhz. The speed of the RAM * 8 is the PC speed rating;
3200 MBps is PC3200. DDR400 (is another way of describing
DDR RAM) is 400 MHz running on a 200 MHz clock.
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See table below for memory speeds

Clock speed MHz DDR speed rating PC speed rating

RAM
100 MHz DDR200 PC1600
133 MHz DDR266 PC2100
166 MHz DDR333 PC2700
200 MHz DDR400 PC3200
217 MHz DDR433 PC3500
233 MHz DDR466 PC3700
250 MHz DDR500 PC4000
275 MHz DDR550 PC4400
300 MHz DDR600 PC4800

PC4800 is 4.8GB per second data throughput.

Dual channel architecture is used with DDR RAM; achieved by

having 2 identical RAM sticks in adjacent slots.

Dual channel architecture

DDR2 increases the speed by clock doubling the I/O circuits and
adding special buffers (like cache).
DDR2 speeds

Core RAM clock DDR 2 DDR I/O PC speed rating

speed Speed Speed
Rating
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100 MHz DDR2- 200MHz PC1600
400
133 MHz DDR2- 266MHz PC2100
533
166 MHz DDR2- 333MHz PC2700
667
200 MHz DDR2- 400MHz PC3200
800
250 MHz DDR2- 500MHz PC3500
1000

DDR3 uses 240-pin modules like DDR2, but uses less power than
DDR2 and quadruples the core clock speed on the I/O circuits.
DDR3 for SO-DIMMS uses 204 pins. The buffer size is double
(from 4 bits to 8 bits) that of DDR2 leading to a big increase in
bandwidth. A feature called XMP (extended memory profile)
facilitates overclocking, boosting performance even further. DDR3
uses higher density memory chips meaning that 16GB modules
are possible. Triple channel memory enabling the use of 3
identical chips to increase capability is also available.

DDR3 speeds

Core RAM clock DDR 3 DDR I/O PC speed rating

speed Speed Speed
Rating
100 MHz DDR3- 400MHz PC1600
800
133 MHz DDR3- 533MHz PC2100
1066
166 MHz DDR3- 667MHz PC2700
1333
200 MHz DDR3- 800MHz PC3200
1600
RAM Variations

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All RAM comes as either single-sided or double-sided. Some

motherboards are designed for single-sided only chips.

CL2 (clock cycle delays) waits less time than CL3. CL2 should be
more expensive; relates to delays between RAM and MCC
(memory controller chip). If an older RAM stick fails to work in a
newer machine it may be due to incorrect latency settings in
CMOS.

ECC is rare in RAM; means detects and repairs data errors. It is

slow compared to parity. ECC RAM can come with a 72 bit width.
The extra 8 bits is for error correction. You need to have a
motherboard specially designed for ECC RAM.

ECC RAM

Buffered/registered RAM sticks are used when more than 4 sticks

are needed on a motherboard. It contains special circuits that
overcome electrical difficulties associated with having more than 4
modules.

If your PC is short of RAM it accesses a page file or swap file to

compensate. www.tiler.com/freemeter is a tool that monitors
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memory usage. It is normal for a typical system to have some
page file activity. Pressing the Windows pause break combination
brings up the system properties dialogue box showing RAM size et
al. Try to match RAM technology, capacity and speed as far as
possible. You may get away with putting different speeds in the
same machine as long as they are faster than the speed
recommended for the motherboard. SPD (serial presence detect
chip is present on the DIMM) is used to detect the amount of RAM
installed.

Parity errors that occur in the same place a number of times are
indicative of faulty RAM. The ‘blue screen of death’ is sometimes
caused by bad RAM. A general protection fault can occur when an
application crashes.

A Freeware application called cpu z reports on RAM in a PC.

https://www.memtest86.com can be used to test for bad RAM.

CHAPTER 3 Hard Drive Technologies
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The hard drive is composed of individual disks or platters with

read/write heads on actuator arm(s) all contained in a sealed case.
Hard drives store data in tiny magnetic fields. When a read/write
head passes over a magnetic field or flux a tiny electrical current is
read. Hard drives started using an encoding method called RLL in
1991 (run length limited). Current drives use an advanced method
of RLL called partial response maximum likelihood encoding
PRML. PRML can handle a run length of 16 or 20 fluxes whereas
RLL can handle about 7 fluxes. Hard drives are now in the TB
range due to fluxes being packed more densely and being packed
vertically instead of horizontally. Vertical storage is called
perpendicular recording.

Moving the arms was achieved by using a stepper motor and

later by voice coil. The stepper motor caused problems due to
deterioration over time and expanding in heat and contracting in
cold. The effects were to cause damage to the disk surface if not
‘parked’ when not in use and data errors. Voice coil contained its
own circuitry to park the arm when not in use and did not suffer
from temperature problems like stepper motor.

Hard drive geometry is described using heads, cylinders and

sectors per track. Every platter/individual disk has 2 heads. A
track can be thought of in the same way that an LP track is thought
of. Each individual track of the same diameter represents a
cylinder, with a depth equal to the platters combined. A sector is
the smallest unit of a hard drive and is the equivalent of a slice of
cake. The values heads, cylinders and sectors per track are
described in most cases as CHS.

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Strictly speaking IDE refers to any HDD with a built in controller.

However in general IDE is associated with ATA drives.

ATA-1

There was BIOS support for up to 2 HDD with a capacity of

504MB. Early ATA drives had a 40-pin cable with a coloured
stripe down the side that plugged into P1 on the controller on the
motherboard. ATA1 stipulates that 2 drives can attach to a cable
and one drive is designated as master and the other as slave. The
2 drive controllers on the motherboard are 40-pin male. Methods of
communication were defined by 2 modes PIO and DMA. PIO was
the equivalent of I/O addressing.

● POI Mode 1: 3.3MBps

● POI Mode 2: 5.2MBps
● POI Mode 3: 8MBps
 ● Single word DMA mode 0: 2.1MBps
● Single word DMA mode 1: 4.2MBps
● Single word DMA mode 2: 8.3MBps
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ATA-2 otherwise known as EIDE appeared in 1990. The BIOS

routines for the original AT standard allowed for a HDD with a
maximum capacity of 504MB. 1024 cylinders * 16 heads * 63
sectors/track * 512 bytes per sector equals 504MB. This limitation
created problems that were later overcome by BIOS manufactures
changing the BIOS routines. However before alterations were
made by the BIOS manufactures various workarounds were
implemented.

LBA (logical block addressing) was contained within the ATA-2

standard. LBA overcame the 504MB limit by representing the HDD
capacity as 504MB to BIOS when the actual capacity of the HDD
exceeded 504MB. LBA used a capability called sector
translation. LBA enables support for a maximum of 1024 * 256 *
63* 512 = 8.4GB.

ATAPI (advanced technology attachment packet interface) enables

non HDD such as CDROM and ZIP drives to attach to IDE
controllers. ATAPI was defined within the ATA-2 standard. Non
HDD using IDE controllers obtain software support via drivers from
the OS whereas hard disk drives obtain software support from
system BIOS.
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ATA-2 introduced faster speeds for POI and multi-word DMA.

PIO Mode 3: 11.1MBps

PIO Mode 4: 16.6 MBps
Multi-word DMA mode 0: 4.2 MBps
Multi-word DMA mode 1: 13.3 MBps
Multi-word DMA mode 2: 16.6 MBps

ATA-3 added S.M.A.R.T (Self-monitoring analysis and reporting

technology) that helps predict when a HDD is going to fail.

smart hdd enclosure

ATA-4 introduced ultra-DMA which is now the dominant

communication channel between HDD and the PC. Ultra-DMA
uses bus mastering to achieve far greater speeds than previously.

● Ultra DMA mode 0: 16.7 MBps

● Ultra DMA mode 1: 25.0 MBps
● Ultra DMA mode 2: 33.3 MBps

INT 13 Extensions was created by Phoenix Technologies to

overcome the old 504MB BIOS limit. INT 13 (interrupt 13)
completely ignores CHS values; instead feeding LBA a stream of
addressable sectors and has a capacity of 137GB. Every system
since 2001 supports INT 13 extensions.

ATA-5 contained 80 wires within the cable improving the ability to

handle higher speeds. ATA-5 used colour codes to define
placement of drives (master and slave) and orientation. ATA/66,
for example, has the blue colour for plugging into the controller,
black for plugging into the master and grey for plugging into the
slave drive.

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ATA-6 enables drive capacities up to 144,000,000 GB (or 144

petabytes). It has 48 bit LBA addressing supplanting the 24 bit
addressing found in earlier technologies. The standard defined an
enhanced block mode enabling drives to transfer 65,536 sectors at
a time exceeding the 256 transfers on older technology. The
standard also defined ultra DMA mode 5; increasing throughput to
100MBps. Ultra DMA mode 5 is also known as ATA/100 and uses
an 80 wire cable.

ATA-7 defines an improved ultra DMA mode (133 MBps) and

serial ATA. Ultra DMA mode 6 (ATA/133) was the least adopted
ATA standard although there are plenty of ATA/133 controllers
(HBA or host bus adapter).

SATA is widely adopted and now dominates hard drive technology

on the PC. PATA has a number of disadvantages

● Flat ribbon cables impede air flow, are awkward and can be
difficult to plug in
● Not hot swappable
 ● The cables have a maximum length of 18 inches (45cm)
● Throughput limits have been reached

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SATA addresses the above disadvantages. Cables are easy to

plug in and only need 7 wires instead of 80. SATA is fully PnP and
has a cable length of 1M. It is a serial point to point connection
with far higher throughput speeds. The number of SATA devices
capable of being supported is

unlimited. Many motherboards can support 8 SATA drives out of

the box. More devices can be added by adding additional HBAs.
SATA drives come in 2 main varieties 1.5Gbps and 3Gbps
translating to 150MBps and 300MBps respectively. There is a 20%
performance hit, leaving 80% of pure bandwidth. The 3Gbps
variety is sometimes called SATA II.
 Page | 30

SATA is backwards compatible and a PATA device can be

inserted into a SATA controller using a SATA bridge. A SATA
bridge is a tiny card that plugs directly into a 40 pin connector on a
PATA drive. Within CMOS the device will display as SATA.

SATA 3 is now available with speeds of up to 6Gbps.

AHCI (Advanced Host Controller Interface) is a feature available in

Vista and later OSs that enables PnP. If AHCI is disabled the drive
will not be automatically detected. AHCI will need to be enabled
before installing the OS otherwise a blue screen of death will be
encountered. NCQ (native command queuing) is a SATA
enhancement that provides faster read and write speeds.

eSATA extends the SATA bus to external devices at full speed

which is far greater than the 50 or 60MBps available to USB or
FireWire. An eSATA express card can be added to a laptop. An
eSATA card can be snapped into a desktop motherboard.
SCSI provides for devices to be added in a chain with each device
having a SCSI ID. The ends of the SCSI chain must be
terminated. Before SATA, SCSI was the only choice for RAID
implementations. Internal SCSI devices connect to the host
adapter with a 68-pin ribbon cable. External devices connect to the
Page | 31
host adapter via a 50-pin (or 68-pin) high-density (HD) connector.
External SCSI connectors are D shaped so you can’t plug them in
backwards. SCSI chains can contain 15 devices. The host id
typically is assigned No 7 or No 15. Terminators are resistors that
prevent echo from causing electronic chaos. Always terminate at
the end of the chain. Most PC devices have built in terminators but
SCSI devices and some Network cables need to have terminators
manually activated by altering a jumper or switch on the end
device.

RAID

RAID 0 is mirroring where 2 disks share the same controller. RAID

1 is disk duplexing where each drive has its own controller;
therefore increasing the speed of writing to disk. Disk striping
without parity will write to more than 1 drive. ½ of the document will
be on drive 1 and ½ will be on drive 2. If either drive fails all data is
lost. Disk striping with parity contains parity information that
enables the data to be rebuilt if either drive fails. Disk striping with
parity requires at least 3 drives, but it is common to use 4 or 5
Page | 32
disks.

The are 7 RAID levels

RAID 0 Disk striping; no redundancy of

data. If 1 drive fails all data is
lost

RAID 1 Disk mirroring

/duplexing – requires at least 2
drives. 2 100GB drives will save
100 GB of data

RAID 2 IGNORE

RAID 3 and 4 Disk striping with dedicated

parity – did see some adoption
but quickly replaced with RAID 5

RAID 5 Disk striping with distributed

parity – parity information is
evenly distributed to all the
drives. 1 drive effectively
provides the parity information. If
you have 3, 200GB drives your
storage capacity is 400GB. If
you have 4, 200GB drives your
storage capacity is 600GB.
RAID 6 Disk striping with extra parity –
in this implementation you can
lose up to 2 drives before your
data is potentially at risk.
Implementing RAID

Hardware implementations are more expensive than software

implementations. Server OS versions of Windows are RAID
capable. Server 2003 and 2008 can support RAID 0, 1 or 5 Page | 33
through disk management. Windows XP and Vista supports RAID
0 only through disk management. Software RAID suffers from a
performance hit.

Hardware RAID is invisible to the OS and end users and uses a

SCSI RAID controller or an ATA or SATA RAID controller. Most
hardware RAID has a small configuration utility that is accessed in
CMOS. Due to a reduction in ATA RAID controller chip prices,
hardware RAID has increased in popularity; and is built into many
modern motherboards. These built in chips support RAID 0 and
RAID 1. For RAID 5 invest in a controller card.

PATA hard drives can have a setting called cable select instead
of master and slave. For cable select to work with 2 drives, both
drives must be set to cable select.

Solid State Disks

● SSD form factors are 1.8 inch, 2.5 inch and 3.5 inch.
● SSD can be PATA, SATA, eSATA, PCIe, USB, SCSI or mini-
PCI Express.
● SDRAM implementation is volatile and NAND
implementation is non- volatile.
● Less expensive SSD use multi-level cell MLC memory; more
expensive SSD use single-level cell SLC memory.
 Page | 34

When replacing a PATA/ATA drive with a SSD drive remember

that Windows XP may not have pre-installed drivers. Vista and
later OS versions should recognise and configure the SSD drive
automatically. SSDs can retrieve data more quickly than traditional
HDD but writing tends to be slower. Also SSD drives do not need
to be defragmented EVER.

To connect a SCSI drive the orientation has to be correct. Failure

to connect P1 on the drive to P1 on the controller will probably
damage the drive.

Make sure that drive controllers are enabled in CMOS. With SATA
there is only 1 device per controller. A common numbering scheme
uses channels to designate a controller. If the motherboard does
not support the hard drive either flash the BIOS or obtain a
controller and snap it into an expansion slot.

4500, 5400, 7200 and 10000 RPM are standard HDD spindle
speeds. Windows VISTA support hybrid drives, i.e. drives that
combine solid state and spinning platters, to increase speed and
reliability and reduce boot times.
Implementing Hard Drives

Page | 35

Partition

Win2000/XP and Vista/Win7 support 2 partitioning methods called

master boot record (MBR) partitioning scheme and dynamic
storage partitioning scheme. Microsoft calls a disk using MBR a
basic disk and a disk using dynamic storage partitioning scheme
a dynamic disk.

Basic Disk partitioning creates 2 very small data structures on a

drive; a master boot record and a partition table and is situated on
the 1st sector of the drive called a boot sector. The MBR’s only
role is to locate the partition table containing a valid OS. The basic
disk partition table supports up to 4 partitions (3 primary and 1
extended). Partitions can be primary (capable of booting an OS)
or extended (incapable of booting an OS).

Primary partitions are assigned a letter, generally C to Z. Extended

partitions are not assigned drive letters. Logical drives are
assigned letters within the extended partition, from D to Z. The
letter C is reserved for the OS within the primary partition. The
active partition starts the OS on system boot. The volume boot
sector contains the location of OS boot files. An extended partition
was created to overcome an ‘old’ 32MB limit. The primary partition
would be 32MB and the remainder of the disk would be in an
extended partition. Extended partitions can be used to increase the
capacity of the original HDD. This is done by mounting a logical
drive on the original HDD.
Dynamic disks were introduced on Windows 2000. Dynamic disks
are volumes and can span up to 32 physical drives. The dynamic
disk contains a unique identifier, 42, that causes Windows to point
to a hidden ‘dynamic’ area. This area cannot be interpreted by 3rd
party software and Microsoft will not release the code. There are 5
Page | 36
volume types - simple, spanned, mirrored, striped and RAID. If
any of the spanned volumes fail all data is lost. Mirrored
volumes are RAID 1 meaning that if 1 drive fails the other will keep
going.

Hidden partitions are not visible unless, for example, reinstallation

of the system is required. Hidden partitions can be accessed from
CMOS. Recovery information may be contained in a hidden
partition. A swap partition performs a role similar to a page file,
effectively providing additional RAM.

Older versions of Windows used the FDISK command to partition

a drive. Win 2000/XP/Vista use the disk management utility for this
task. Gparted is a 3rd party tool that can be used to partition
Windows and Linux systems.

Windows 2000/XP can make a partition larger but not smaller non-
destructively. Vista has the capability to resize up or down.

Formatting creates a library system and root directory. FAT is

the original method of storing and keeping track of data. Each
sector on the HHD contains up to 512MB of data. A file of 600MB
will fill the 1st sector and 88MB of the next sector with the
remainder of that sector going to waste.

FAT 16 was capable of storing 2^16 65536 sectors. During the

formatting process (high level formatting) bad sectors are identified
and given a code of FFF7 and good sectors are given a code of
0000. (65536 * 512MB =) 32MB is the limit of a partition
addressable with FAT16. So under FAT 16 drives were limited to a
maximum capacity of a very small number given that there is a
maximum of 4 partitions. An update to FAT16 enabled multiple
sectors to be treated as one contiguous unit, known as a cluster.
The new FAT16 could support drives up to 2GB.

FFFF is the end of file marker

 Page | 37
FAT32 was introduced with Windows 95 and provided a number of
improvements, including an increase in partition capacity to 2TB.

FAT 32 cluster sizes

Drive Size Cluster Size
512 MB to 1023 MB 4KB
1024 MB to 2GB 4KB
2 GB to 8GB 4KB
8 GB 16 GB 8 KB
16 GB to 32 GB 16 KB
32 GB + 32 KB

NTFS provides the following: redundancy, security, compression,

cluster sizing, encryption and disk quotas. NTFS uses an
improved file allocation table called MFT (master file table). MFT
keeps a backup copy of the most critical system files in the middle
of the disk. NTFS is object oriented and uses an access control
list (ACL) to secure each object. Encryption uses EFS (encrypting
file system). With disk quotas the amount of HDD space allocated
to a particular user can be controlled. Convert d:/fs:ntfs will convert
a FAT32 drive to NTFS.

NTFS cluster sizes

Drive Size Cluster Size No of sectors
512 MB or less 512 MB 1
513 to 1024 (1 GB) 1 KB 2
1025 to 2048 (2GB) 2 KB 4
2049 MB + 4 KB 8
Page | 38

If 3 partitions are created in XP there will be 2 partitions with 2

drive letters in the extended partition. VISTA on the other hand will
create primary partitions by default if the total number of partitions
is less than 4.

DISKMGMT.MSC will open the disk management utility. A new

disk will need to be initialised. A disk that has not been initialised
will have a status of unknown.

Foreign drive dynamic disk that has been

moved from another system
Failed disk is damaged or corrupt with
probable data loss
Formatting the disk is being formatted
Online the disk is communicating with
the system
Offline the disk is not communicating
with the system and may be
corrupt

Windows will implement NTFS by default for any partition greater

than 32 GB. Converting from a basic to a dynamic disk non-
destructively is very simple. To achieve the converse the partitions
will have to be deleted 1st. XP Home and VISTA Home does not
support dynamic disks.

After a disk is converted to a dynamic disk there are no partitions

only volumes. A simple volume can be extended to any
Page | 39
unallocated space on a dynamic disk, even to a separate disk(s).
A spanned volume does not have to be contiguous. When
expanding a basic disk in VISTA the space being expanded into
has to be contiguous with the current partition. When implementing
striping all drives have to be the same size.

The main C drive cannot be extended or spanned because it

contains the OS. However a logical drive can be mounted to
extend the C drive.

Maintaining and Troubleshooting Hard Drives

Maintaining the drive can be either

1. checking the disk for bad clusters or

2. taking steps to improve access and speed.

The error-checking utility can be scheduled to run periodically. It

will scan and attempt recovery of bad sectors and attempt to fix file
system errors. Error checking also attempts to fix invalid file
names and recover erroneous file structures. Error-checking is an
update to the CHKDSK or ScanDisk tools. Error checking should
be run once per week, defrag and disk cleanup should be run
once per month.

Disk Cleanup will remove temporary files, empty the recycle bin
and delete downloaded program files; JAVA or ActivX.

An un-partitioned drive will not show in Computer, but will show in

disk management.

A message such as ‘this application has failed to start because

libsndfile.dll was not found. Re-installing the application may fix
this problem’ can indicate a corrupted data error.

If it is suspected that data is corrupted run error-checking as a 1 st

attempt to fix.
If error-checking does not fix the problem Windows 2000/XP
Extract/Expand is available to non-VISTA/7 systems. This can
extract CAB files (from the XP CD ROM) to replace a corrupted
file. The location of the CAB file that contains the corrupted file will
Page | 40
need to be known.

The command to locate a file is

Expand e:\i386\*.CAB – F:olepro32.DLL –

will check all files on the CD for olepro32.DLL

ECC (error correction code) is contained within the hard disk and
identifies bad sectors and updates the drives internal error map.
SpinRite is a powerful utility that is more thorough than error-
checking.

If the following occurs the drive is failing

 Continued high-pitched squeal

 Series of clacks, a short pause, then more clacks
 Continuous grinding and rumbling

A 3rd party tool for re-sizing disk(s) is GParted http://source-

forge.net/.
CHAPTER 4 Removable Media

 Floppy drives Page | 41

 Flash memory

 Optical discs
 Page | 42

 External drives

zip drive

All BIOS support floppy drives. Since 2001 there has been an
intention to remove legacy devices (from PCs) including PS/2
ports, floppy drives, serial ports, parallel ports etc. When the LED
is on the floppy disc is being accessed by the system. All systems
reserve A and B for floppy drives and all floppy drives are called
either A or B in Computer.

All floppy drives connect to a 34-pin ribbon cable and if a 2 nd floppy

is used there is a twist in the cable. If a connector is installed on
the end connector it becomes A; if it is installed on the middle
connector it become B. If the power for the floppy is inserted
incorrectly it will be damaged.
 Page | 43

Once the floppy drive has been installed check CMOS to ensure it
has been configured as A or B with 1.44MB capacity and 3.5 inch.

Flash memory is either a USB thumb drive or a memory card, such

as that found in PDAs and mobile phones.

http://Gparted.sourceforge.net is a possible source for creating a

bootable USB drive.

Memory Card Formats

CF (Compact Flash) is the oldest, largest and most complex. It

measures 25mm wide and CF1 (3.3mm thick) and CFII (5mm
thick), and is based on the PCMCIA bus.

Microdrives are the same size as CF, but use platters and heads
just like a HDD. It is cheaper than CF, consumes more power and
is slower.
 Page | 44

SmartMedia, a competitor to CF was used mainly in PDAs and

digital cameras. They were superseded by SD cards.

Secure Digital (SD) is the popular card format in use currently.

They are about the size of a postage stamp. SD types are SD
(data only) and SDIO (used for GPS for example). An SDIO device
requires an SDIO slot. There are also miniSD and microSD cards
that are used mainly in mobile phones. The older, MMC
(MuliMediaCard), preceded SD cards.

Standard SD cards store 4 MB to 4GB, Secure Digital High

Capacity (SDHC) store 4 GB to 32 GB and Secure Digital
Extended SDXC can store 32 GB to 2 TB. Older cards cannot read
SDHC and SDXC but newer cards are backwards compatible.

Sony has created a proprietary flash memory called Memory

Stick. Standard, Pro, Duo, Pro Duo and Micro are the available
Page | 45
formats.

xD Picture Cards are used by Olympus and Fujifilm digital

cameras, and are available in original, Standard (Type M) and Hi-
Speed (Type H). The standard cards are slower than the original
cards but provide more capacity. The Hi-Speed is 3 times faster
than the others and is capable of capturing full-motion video.

Optical Drives

Blu-ray Disc (BD) eliminated the High-Definition DVD format.

CD producers use a power laser to burn microscopic pits into a

Page | 46

glass master CD . The master CD is

then used to create plastic copies using expensive machines. The
copies are coated with a reflective metallic covering and then
finished with lacquer for protection. The data is near the top of the
CD, close to the label. Scratching the bottom/or shiny side will not
damage the CD. Scratching the top of the CD causes the damage.
Only write on the top of the CD with a soft tipped pen and avoid
scratching it.

CD readers use a laser and mirrors to read the CD. The reader
uses the highly reflective surface to distinguish pits and translates
the same into binary code that is interpreted and produces sound.
A standard CD holds 650 million bytes of data.

The 1st CD format called CD-Digital Audio (CDDA) or CD-audio

arranges data into variable length tracks. It is excellent for storing
music but lacks error checking; file support or directory structure
making it terrible for storing data.
The CD-ROM format is capable of holding data by dividing the CD
into fixed sectors of 2353 bytes. CDROM use a file system called
ISO-9660. ISO-9660 is the equivalent of FAT or NTFS in the
Windows environment.
Page | 47
ISO-9660 extensions

 Joliet – Developed by Microsoft and supported by Macintosh

and Linux
 Rock Ridge – an open standard for the Unix file system
support that is rarely seen outside of a Unix environment
 El Torito – Enables bootable CDs – supported by all BIOS
on modern PCs
 Apple Extensions – Support Apple’s HFS file system –
cannot be read within the Windows environment without 3 rd
party tools

A reader that can read ISO-9660 may not be able to read Joliet but
will be able to read the ISO-9660 part of the file.

1* 150 KBps 10* 1500 KBps 40* 6000 KBps

2* 300 KBps 12* 1800 KBps 48* 7200 KBps
3* 450 KBps 16* 2400 KBps 52* 7800 KBps
4* 600 KBps 24* 3600 KBps 60* 9000 KBps
6* 900 KBps 32* 4800 KBps 72* 10800 KBps
8* 1200 KBps 36* 5400 KBps

The above are maximum CD-ROM speeds. Try to obtain the

fastest speed possible.

CD-R is the low cost home user alternative for producing CDs. CD-
R discs comes in either a 74 minute version holding 650 MB or an
80 minute version holing 700 MB. The 80 minute version will need
a compatible burner. CD-R discs are similar to CD-ROM, however
the recording side on CD-R is brightly coloured and the recording
side on CD-ROM is silver. CD-R technology records data by using
special organic dyes embedded into the disc. A powerful second
burn laser heats the organic dye creating the functional equivalent
of CD-ROM pits. Single-session drives can burn a CD once only
and multisession can burn a CD multiple times. CD-R has a record
speed and a read speed, expressed in multiples of 150KBps. A
drive described as 8*24* can burn at 8* and read at 24*.

CD-RW can be written to repeatedly creating the equivalent of a

650-MB floppy disc. CD-RW discs can be overwritten up to a
Page | 48
maximum of 1000 times, but most likely considerably fewer. CD-
RW drives work by using a powerful laser to heat an amorphous
substance. CD-RW drives have 3 multiplier values write, re-write
and read.

UDF (universal data format) and packet writing enables CD-RW to

be treated like a hard drive. UDF is a replacement to ISO-9660
that any drive and OS can read. All movie DVDs use this format.
Until Vista no Windows OS was able to write to UDF formatted
discs. A 3rd party utility such as Roxio’s DirectCD or Nero InCD
would have had to be used. With UDF and packet writing
rewritable CD-media is as easy to use as a hard drive. CD-RW
discs are useful for the daily and weekly backups.

A music CD burner that works with stereo systems use a special

type of disc called a music CD-R. Music CD-Rs may not work well
in a PC and are likely to cost more than a normal CD-R because a
royalty that is built into the price is paid to the record company.

cd burner

DVD Media

DVDs look the same as CDs but are very different. The lowest
capacity DVD holds 4.37 GB of data, or 2 hours of standard-
definition video. The largest DVDs have a capacity of 16 GB or 8
hours of video. This increase in capacity is achieved by
  Using smaller pits and packing them more densely

 Using single-sided and double-sided formats

Page | 49

 Using single-layer and dual-layer formats – dual layer uses 2

pitted layers on each side

To convert from .AVI to 25fps MPEG use Quick Media Converter.

The parameters to select is

1. 16.PAL DVD High Quality 16.9

2. Easy Mode

DVD Version Capacity

DVD-5 (12cm, SS/SL) 4.37 GB more than 2 hours of
video
DVD-9 (12cm, SS/DL) 7.95 GB, 4 hours of video
DVD-10 (12cm, DS/SL) 8.74 GB, 4.5 hours of video
DVD-18 (12cm, DS/DL) 15.9 GB > 8 hours of video

DVD-Video supports 4:3 TV aspect ratio and 16:9 widescreen and

relies on the MPEG-2 standard for video and audio compression.

MPEG-1, MPEG-2, MPEG-4 – Each MPEG standard provides a

different compression algorithm. The standard also incorporates
motion compensation to handle movement.

MPEG-1 is the standard on which MP3 and video is based; video

quality just below VHS video. Resolution is 352*240 at 30fps.

MPEG-2 - Resolution 720*480 and 1280*720 at 60fps – can

compress 2 hour video onto a few GB – can support HDTV and
DVD-ROM technology.

MPEG-4 is based on MPEG-1, MPEG-2 and Apple’s QuickTime

technology; Blu-ray disc standard. MPEG-4 uses wavelet
compression to create files which is more compressed than JPEG
or Quicktime. The superior compression is a popular technology
for delivering images and video over the Web. The standard
includes Intellectual Property Management and Protection (IPMP),
which supports digital rights management.

MPEG-7 compliments the previous standards as a quick and

efficient multimedia content searching tool.
Page | 50
MPEG-21 uses Rights Expression Language (REL) and Rights
Data Dictionary to protect digital material from illicit sharing.

DVD-ROM is equivalent to CD-ROM and can store up to 16 GB of

data. DVD-ROM fully supports DVD-video and tend to be installed
in PCs.

Recordable DVD standards are

DVD-R
DVD-RW
DVD+R
DVD+RW
DVD-RAM

Most DVD drives can read the above formats apart from DVD-
RAM. DVD-RAM uses a special cartridge and a special drive.
Sony and Phillips push the +R series and other manufactures push
the –R series. Any drive produced before 2003 could not write any
format other than its own. Sometimes it was not possible to even
read another format. These days most PC DVD devices read all
formats. However DVD devices connected to TVs may or may not
read a particular format.

Blu-Ray discs produce near perfect audio and image quality, can
store up to 50 GB of data and are set to replace DVD. There are 2
sizes, standard and mini. Mini-size is found in high end
camcorders and standard is the same size as DVD.

Type Size Capacity Capacity (dual

(single layer) layer)
Standard disc 12 cm 25 GB 50 GB
Mini disc 8 cm 7.8 GB 15.6 GB

Blu-Ray and HD DVD were competing formats. In 2008 Toshiba

accepted defeat and stopped supporting HD DVD.
 Page | 51

Blu-Ray Disc use Blue-violet laser with a

wavelength of 405nm (compared to DVD that uses red laser with a
wavelength of 650 nm). 405 nm is smaller and far more precise
resulting in sharper images. Blu-Ray can handle resolutions far
higher than DVD and can support many more video compression
algorithms providing greater scope for content producers.

BD-ROM (read only) is the functional equivalent of DVD-ROM. All

BD-ROM drives are fully backwards compatible.

BR-R (writeable) and BD-RE(re-writable) are available in standard

and mini formats. Blu-Ray burners are supported by all modern
versions of Windows.

Blu-Ray drives can take advantage of the fast eSATA interface.

Auto Insert Notification detects the presence of a disc and auto

plays. In windows 2000 if the CD is audio the 1 st track is played
automatically. If it is data, Windows searches the discs root
directory for a text file called AUTORUN.INF. To disable this
autorun in Win 2000 an alteration to the registry will need to be
made. In REGEDT32 access this subkey:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\C
DROM

Change Autorun 0*1 to 0*0

Alternatively Group Policy can be used; accessed by gpedit.msc

Local Computer Policy > Computer Configuration > Admin
Templates > System and locate turn off autoplay.
Autoplay in Win Vista presents options like being able to disable or
enable AutoPlay for all media and devices. Also it is possible to
stipulate that Windows Media Player launches for audio CDs.
Page | 52
Nero and Roxio Creator are the most popular CD burning software
programs. Cyberlink, PowerDVD and Corel WinDVD control the
Blu-Ray burning market. A free burner is www.cdburnerxp.se that
can also be used to create ISO files. In Win XP a file can be
dragged or dropped to a CD-R or CD-RW drive.

DVD burners come with buffers. If a buffer underrun occurs you

will fail to burn the disc successfully. Try to purchase a machine
with a 2MB buffer. Alternatively get one with burn proof
technology/burn to the hard drive first.
Blu-ray Considerations

To play Blu-ray discs the following is required

 Pentium 4, Pentium D or above Page | 53

 1 GB RAM for Win XP or 2 GB RAM Win VISTA
 HDCP-compliant (High Definition Digital Content Protection)
video card. HDCP is a standard developed by Intel to protect
copyright on behalf of the Motion Picture Association of
America. ATI and NVIDIA offer Blu-ray Disc compliant PCIe
video cards that are powerful enough.

Visit www.cyberlink.com/prog/bd-support/diagnosis.do to see if a

PC meets the requirements for Blu-ray

DVD Region Codes

REGION 0 All regions

REGION 1 USA, Canada
REGION 2 Europe, Japan, Middle East,
South Africa, Greenland

REGION 3 South Korea, Taiwan, Hong

Kong, Areas of Southeast Asia

REGION 4 Australia, New Zealand, Central

and South America

REGION 5 Eastern Europe, Russia, India,

Africa

REGION 6 China

REGION 7 Reserved for special and future

use

REGION 8 Reserved for cruise ships and

airlines
 Page | 54
Blu-ray Disc Region Codes

A East Asia (China and Mangolia excluded), Southeast Asia,

Americas and their dependencies
B Africa, Southeast Asia, Europe (except Russia), Oceana and
their dependencies
C Central Asia, East Asia (China and Mongolia only) South
Asia, central Eurasia (including Russia) and their
dependencies

Most modern optical drives have built in cleaners. Most discs can
be cleaned with a clean damp cloth. Always wipe from the centre
of the disc to the end and never wipe in a circular movement.

There are substantial differences in quality for various brands of

CR-R and CD-RW (similar issues for BD and DVD) discs. Two
items affect media quality; speed and inks. A media maker has a
quality line guaranteed to work at a particular speed and a generic
line that may not.

Buffer underrun can be avoided by using ISO (All hard drives can
keep pace with a DVD burner), or by purchasing a drive that
incorporates BURN-Proof technology.

Colour Books
Application Book
Audio CDs Red book
Data CD Yellow book
CD-I Green book
Recordable CD Orange book
Video CD White book
CD Extra Blue book
CHAPTER 5 Motherboard

Page | 55

Motherboards are defined by form factor, chipset and

components. Form factor determines physical size and general
location of components and ports. The chipset defines the type of
CPU and RAM required and built in components supported. Built in
components determine core functionality. Form factor applies to
case, motherboard and power supply and how air is moved around

in the case. AT was the original

form factor developed in the 1980s by IBM. The original AT was

12” * 13”; a very big mainboard. LPX and

LNX were smaller variations of the original AT and catered to the
slimline market by providing a central riser slot to accommodate a
daughter board. The AT range of motherboards were inflexible in
that a new video card or sound card could not be accommodated.

ATX became the new dominant form factor by 1998. It differed

from AT in a number of ways. The dedicated keyboard port,
Page | 56
present on the AT was replaced on the ATX with a back panel,
with the necessary ports built in and there was flexibility to plug in
newer video and sound cards. ATX enhancements include better
positioning of the power supply allowing better air movement,
improved placement of CPU and RAM for access and
rearrangement of components to prevent long expansion cards
from colliding with the CPU or Northbridge. Performance was
improved by placing RAM closer to the CPU and Northbridge.
Shorter wires between these components made it easier to double
and quadruple clock speeds.

ATX motherboards use a feature called ‘soft power’, meaning that

the computer receives power even when the PC is powered down.

Variations of the ATX are flexATX and microATX. MicroATX

measures about 75% of standard ATX but fits into the same case
as ATX or the micro-ATX case. FlexATX measuring 9 by 7.5
inches is the smallest ATX type and uses its own flexATX-only
power supply; although it can use standard ATX power supplies.
 Page | 57

ATX V flexATX comparison

The BTX (balanced technology extended) is the latest and greatest

standard form factor in use today. BTX defines three variations;
Standard, MicroBTX and PicoBTX replacing ATX, microATX and
picoATX respectively. BTX and ATX are incompatible and there is
no such thing as a BTX power supply. The BTX form factor is
based on cooling. BTX cases vent cool air in from the front and
warm air out the back. The CPU is positioned near the front for
cooling. There is a special heat sink and fan assembly called the
thermal unit that blows hot air outside of the unit. This can be
contrasted with ATX that just blows the air into the case. BTX is
still rarely adopted.

Proprietary form factors are used by a number of manufacturers

including Dell and Sony. The distinctive cases, motherboards and
power supplies cannot be obtained generally and force customers
to go back to the original supplier for spare parts.

The chipset is a huge factor in deciding on a particular

motherboard. Most chipsets contain 2 primary chips called the
Northbridge and the Southbridge. The Northbridge on newer
PC’s interface with the video card as the MCC is built into the
CPU. It gets quite hot so has its own heat sink and fan assembly.
The Southbridge connects to expansion cards and mass storage.
It does not get so hot so does not have a heat sink and fan
assembly. The Super I/O chip (not part of the chipset) is used to
manage floppy drives, parallel ports, infra-red ports and modems.
Page | 58
These chores were handled by the Southbridge on older systems.
Intel and NVIDIA are the dominant chipset makers. Memory
Controller Hub (MCH) is another name for Northbridge and I/O
Hub (IOH) is another name for Southbridge on Intel based
motherboards. Additional ports that are not visible may be
available as a dongle connection, for example, extra USB or
FireWire ports.

An AMR (audio modem riser) is used for specialised AMR devices

(modems, sound cards and Network cards). AMR was replaced by
the more advanced (communication and Network riser) CNR.
These slots have now largely been replaced by onboard
Networking and sound.

Installation

We need to ensure that the motherboard and CPU work together;

try to obtain a guarantee from the seller. Cases come in 6 sizes –
slimline, desktop, mini-tower, mid-tower, tower and cube.

slimline
 Page | 59
desktop case

mini tower

mid tower
 Page | 60

tower

cube

Try to obtain a case with a detachable motherboard mount and

ensure that the power supply is adequate and try to go for (upper)
front mounted USB and FireWire ports.

detachable motherboard mount

The motherboard mounts to the case by small connectors called
standouts. Motherboard failures are classified as catastrophic,
ethereal and component. With a catastrophic failure the PC will
not boot. A possible failure of this type in manifested as ‘burn in’
failure when the PC is relatively new. Component failure is rare
Page | 61
and shows as a flaky connection or as intermittent problems. A
hard drive may show up in CMOS but be undetected in Windows,
when plugged into a faulty controller. Ethereal are difficult to
diagnose and are caused by a range of factors including faulty
component, buggy driver software, power supply problems etc.

The BIOS contain code that enables the PC to communicate with

devices built into the motherboard. So flashing BIOS may resolve
problems with these devices.

Expansion Bus

Bus Speed Bit Description compatibility

width
PC or 7MHz 8 This first bus
XT bits required manual
configuration
ISA 7MHz 16 manual backwards
bits configuration compatible

PCI 33MHz 32 developed by Intel

bits - PnP - burst mode
feature
PCI-x 66, 133, 64 Used for Gigabyte It is fully
266 MHz bits NICS, video cards backwards
533 MHz - compatible with
much faster than PCI
PCI

PCIe is the latest and greatest. It is a serial point-to-point

connection operating at a very high speed; in the order of 5Gbps
minimum for PCIe 2.0. It connects directly to the Northbridge via a
pathway called a lane. The path between the PCI controller and
the Northbridge can be 1, 2, 4, 8, 12, 16 or 32 lanes to achieve a
maximum theoretical bandwidth of 320Gbps. There is a SFF
version of PCIe for mobile computers called PCI Express Mini
Card. The bandwidth generated by * 16 slot is far more than
anything, other than a video card would need.
Page | 62
System Resources is the name given to communication between
CPU and devices. System Resources are I/O addresses, IRQs,
DMA channels and memory addresses. The CPU issues a
command to a device using an I/O address. Every device
responds to at least 4 I/O addresses, meaning every device is
capable of responding to 4 commands. The address bus is always
32 bits long.

COM is a serial port, for example, a modem and LPT is a parallel

port, for example a printer.

We have an IRQ controller and a DMA controller to manage

access to the external data bus. In the modern era bus mastering
has removed the need to use the DMA controller. Devices now
contain their own circuitry for monitoring activity on the external
data bus. Hard drives use bus mastering. PCI and PCIe do not
support DMA so any device using PCI will not appear in device
manager under DMA.

Memory addresses are used by devices that contain their own

memory (on the chip) or contain option ROM.

Windows Vista, 64 bit, prevents the installation of unsigned

drivers.

Errors in device manager are usually identified with a black ‘!’ or a

red X or blue i. black ‘!’ is an indication of a problem with the
device but it may still work. Red x is a disabled device that may
have been turned off; this device will not work. A blue I indicates
that the device has been configured manually. This is for
information and the device will continue to function normally.
CHAPTER 6 BIOS and CMOS

Generally Northbridge (also called MCC) deals with faster devices

such as RAM and the video controller and the Southbridge deals
Page | 63
with slower devices such as keyboard controller, USB controller
and modem. Northbridge and Southbridge together is known as
the chipset.

The computer stores BIOS for the keyboard, mouse, hard drive,
DVD drive, USB ports and display on a ROM chip.

ROM chips on modern PCs store about 2MB.

CMOS stores information that describes device parameters. It

stores data that BIOS programs use for devices that change like
the hard drive or the memory and stores the date and time. It is
accessed by entering SETUP when the system is starting. CMOS
chips store around 64KB of data, but the PC needs about 128
bytes. American Megatrends Incorporated and Phoenix
Technology control 99% of the BIOS manufacturing market.

Motherboard manufactures buy a particular BIOS based on their

chipset (called modules) and add and delete elements as required.

Some motherboards support overclocking and a soft menu is

provided to change CPU multiplier and voltage settings. There is
an option to restore optimised settings when changes to CMOS
cause problems. ATA security mode is used to protect hard disks.
The associated passwords (master and user) are stored within the
HDD circuitry not in CMOS, so losing passwords will render the
HDD inoperable. Trusted Platform Module (TPM) provides
cryptographic services. The TPM can be a small circuit board on
the motherboard or can be built into the chipset. TPM can be
enabled or disabled in CMOS. TPM can be used for Network
access control, encryption and password protection.

BIOS can be stored on device drivers or on the device itself. A

SATA controller card may have BIOS on an OPTION ROM chip,
for example. All video cards have Option Rom built in. Most
modern devices do not contain BIOS on an option ROM chip.
POST is contained within system BIOS. During POST the PC
checks the hardware and reports failures either as beeps or as
messages on screen. Most modern PCs only have a beep code for
missing video which is one long beep followed a series of short
beeps. A POST card snaps into an expansion slot on the
Page | 64
motherboard and can be used to diagnose problems that are not
displayed by beep codes or on screen, for example, looping.
CHAPTER 7 The BOOT process

Page | 65

Power good > CPU sends [std] address to ROM chip > POST
>bootsrap loader > OS

The CMOS battery is used to store CMOS settings.

Common CMOS errors

CMOS configuration mismatch

CMOS date/time not set - Date resetting to1.1.01
CMOS battery state low
No boot device available

Clear CMOS jumper will remove forgotten passwords.

When flashing the BIOS always have a backup of the old BIOS. If
the flashing goes wrong and there is no backup the motherboard
will be useless.
CHAPTER 8 Troubleshooting Theory

Page | 66
Managing computer hardware and software requires problem
solving skills. Adopting a systematic logical approach is a pre-
requisite. The following is suggested.

 Identify the problem

 Establish a theory of probable cause
 Test the theory to determine cause
 Develop a plan of action to resolve the problem and
implement the solution
 Verify full system functionality and if applicable implement
preventative measures
 Document findings, actions and outcomes

Tools to have available

 Malware cleaners Anti-Malware – technicians prefer paid

versions
 Autoruns (www.sysinternals.com) by Mark Russinovich –
indicates what startup programs are running
 Password Clearer – to reset lost passwords
 ZIP file tool
 Backup tools to quickly backup most critical files
 Field Replacement Units (FRUs) – RAM, hard drive, NIC,
sound card, video card, power supply.
CHAPTER 9 NETWORKS

Page | 67
Windows Internet Connection Sharing

Internet Connection Sharing ICS enables one system (the ICS

host) to share its internet connection with Network systems. ICS is
fully supported by 2000/XP/Vista/7/10.

The ICS host connects to the phone line and to a switch that the
client computers also plug into.

To enable ICS (Vista) right-click properties from Network

Connections (IPv4) and select the sharing tab and select the
appropriate check box.

All home routers use NAT (Network Address Translation) that

presents all LAN computers to the internet as a single IP
address/machine. All IP addresses on the Network are therefore
hidden from the public internet; effectively creating a firewall.

If a router is being used in an office environment the router’s

DHCP server may conflict with the office DHCP server. It is
therefore advisable to disable the router’s DHCP server before
plugging it into the office LAN.

A web browser can be configured to set default font sizes and to

display graphics or not.
To set proxy settings in IE choose Tools>Internet
Options>Connections>LAN Settings. Once proxy settings have
been set all requests for internet services will be routed through
the proxy server. The security TAB can be used to control
programs that a web site may want to execute on the PC.
Page | 68
Ensure that anti-virus software checks for problems with programs
before they are installed.

To check that the DNS mail server is functioning obtain the IP

address for the SMTP and POP3 server by pinging each one. If a
connectivity problem arises place the IP address instead of the
DNS name in the configuration screen, and if connectivity is
established the culprit is the DNS server.

NETSTAT –n will show IP services and port numbers.

The NET command is useful for seeing other devices in the

Network.

Newsgroups are available free with MS Outlook Express.

Newsgroups run on News Servers using the (Network News
Transfer Protocol) NNTP.

FTP is on ports 20 and 21 and sends password details in clear

text.

Telnet and its replacement SSH (secure shell) are used to

establish a terminal emulation session. Information sent using
Telnet is in clear text whereas SSH sends encrypted information.
SSH can move any type of TCP traffic through its secure Network;
called tunnelling. VPN uses tunnelling at its core.

Vonage and Skype offer popular VoIP solutions. Remember low

latency is better than high speed when troubleshooting VoIP.
Latency is the time it takes a packet to get to its destination and is
measured in milliseconds. Use the PING command to display
latency.

VNC is a very popular terminal emulation program that is cross

platform. XP/Vista/Win7/10 offer Remote Desktop for terminal
emulation.
Virtual Private Networks
Page | 69
An encrypted tunnel is created between endpoints. An endpoint is
at the end of a tunnel where encryption and decryption occurs.

VPNs use various tunnelling (Microsoft use Point-to-Point

Tunnelling Protocol PPTP) protocols to request an IP address that
matches the subnet of the local LAN from the local DHCP server.
An address of 18.42.57.78 would be similar to a VPN client
address of 18.42.57.124. The client machine would have (RRAS)
Routing and Remote Access Service installed and this would be
used to initiate the VPN connection.
The connection is slow because all traffic has to go through to the
office network and back to the client machine. Web surfing will be
slow whilst connected to the office with VPN.

Page | 70
3 significant internet areas are

 Gaming – massively multiplayer online role-playing game

(MMORPG)
 File sharing – napster and kazaa are programs
 Chatting – internet relay chat (IRC) protocol

The Internet

The internet is broken down into groups called tiers. There are 9
tier 1 companies who own high speed, long distance fibre-optic
networks called backbones. These backbones are present in
major cities of the earth and interconnect at special locations
called Network Access Points (NAPs).

Tier 2 providers own smaller regional networks and pay tier 1

providers. Tier 3 providers connect to tier 2 providers. Backbone
routers are the bedrock of this structure. Backbone routers connect
to more than 1 other Backbone router creating a huge
interconnected network. The internet is resilient with built in
redundancy. Single or multiple failure points will not cause the
internet to collapse.

Every tier 1 and tier 2 provider leases connections to (ISPs)

Internet Service Providers.

Connecting to the internet is via

 Dialup - analogue and ISDN

 Dedicated - DSL, cable, LAN
 Wireless
 Satellite - modem or NIC

A modem achieves a maximum speed that is based on the V.90 or

V.92 standard. V.90 has a maximum upload speed of 33.6Kbps
and V92 has a maximum upload speed of 48 Kbps.
 V.90 V.92
Upload 33.6 Kbps 48 Kbps
Download 56 Kbps 56 Kbps
Flow Control (handshaking) is the means by which 2 serial Page | 71
devices verify a conversation. During a file transfer 2 distinct
conversations take place; local between Com port and modem and
end to end between 2 modems.

The modems handle end to end flow control and the PC handles
the conversation between the COM port and modem. The local
conversation requires extra wires called RTS (ready to send) and
CTS (clear to send). This hardware handshaking is often called
RTS/CTS. Software flow control uses a character called XON to
signal that data flow is beginning and XOFF to signal that data
transmission has ended. Software handshaking is often called
XON/XOFF. Software handshaking is slower and less reliable than
hardware handshaking and is rarely adopted.

Internal modems can connect to the PC via the PCI or PCIe

expansion bus inside the PC. Low end older PCs contain modems
in special expansion slots designed to accommodate modems,
NICs and sound cards. AMD motherboards use AMR Audio
Modem Riser or ACR Advanced Communication Riser and Intel
motherboards use CNR Communication and Network Riser slots

External modems connect to the serial port (9-pin or 25-pin) or to a

USB port.

Dial-up links use the Point-to-Point (PPP) hardware protocol.

The process of sending telephone transmissions across fully digital

lines end-to-end is called ISDN service. ISDN connects much
faster than modems eliminating the long ‘mating’ call.

ISDN is a process of transmitting digital signals over existing

copper telephone wires. ISDN services consist of 2 types of
channels Bearer or B channels or Delta or D channels @ 64Kbps
for B channel and 16Kbps for D channel.
 Page | 72

ISDN is expensive to set up and needs to be within 18000 feet of

the central office. ISDN modems look similar to normal modems;
but connect more quickly. ISDN is capable of 1.5Mbps by
combining channels called primary rate interface (PRI); composed
of twenty three 64 Kbps B channels and one 64 Kbps D channel.
PRI ISDN lines are also called T1 lines.

DSL uses standard telephone lines (for example, TalkTalk). The

typical upload speed is 795kbps; download speed is 6.3Mbps.
ADSL typically has slower upload and faster download speeds.
SDSL typically has the same upload and download speeds BUT
there is a higher price for increased upload speed. DSL is to be
within 18000 feet (5.4 KM) of a main phone service switching
centre. A DSL modem and micro filter is used at both ends to
create an always on internet connection.

Cable is available anywhere you can get cable TV. It is faster than
DSL; with upload speeds of 1 – 10Mbps and download speeds of 6
to 50Mbps. With a splitter one can watch cable on a PC if a TV
tuner is installed on the PC. Cable uses a rg6 or rg59 cable and
does not use a micro filter.
 Page | 73

Rg6 cable

Rg59 cable

Every PC is required to have an IP address, subnet Mask, default

gateway and DNS server.

Every NIC in the world has a unique MAC address. A Mac address
is 48 bits long represented as 12 Hex characters. Network cabling
usually runs through ceilings and down walls. It is best to use fire
resistant cables in plenum (ceiling) space. One can connect 2 PCs
together without a hub/switch using a crossover cable.

Full duplex means data can be sent and received simultaneously.

With Half duplex data can only be sent or received at any one
Page | 74
time. This is how a walkie talkie operates. The button is pressed to
talk and one cannot hear anything until the button released. It may
be necessary to drop the NIC down to half duplex to establish
communications.

Satellite in the early days had an upload speed of 26 to 48 Kbps.

Local Area Networking

A NIC helps break files into packets/frames. The terms packet and
frame are interchangeable.
Page | 75
Topology

 Bus

 Star

 Ring

 Mesh – mostly found on WLAN

 Page | 76

A MAC address is 48 bits long or 12 HEX characters. A packet

contains

 Recipient MAC
 Sender MAC
 Data
 CRC – Cyclic Redundancy Check

A hardware protocol is the means by which packets travel from

computer to computer. Names such as Token Ring, FDDI, ARCnet
and Ethernet are examples.

Ethernet comes in 2 main types

 Unshielded Twisted Pair

 Fibre Optic
 Page | 77

3 Ethernet technologies are

 10baseT
 100baseT
 1000baseT

100baseT has a bandwidth of up to 100Mbps; bandwidth is speed.

Nodes connected to a hub share

total bandwidth and nodes on a switch

do not share
bandwidth. For example, 12 PCs attached to a hub will share
100Mbps. With switches each PC has its own Network, thus each
PC will have a full 100Mbps each.

Ethernet uses a star bus Topology and connects via UTP cable.

Token Ring also use a star topology contained within the

hub/switch called media access unit (MAU).
 Page | 78

CAT levels determine recommended maximum speeds/bandwidth

for cables.

CAT Levels for UTP

Telecommunication Industry Association/Electronics
Industries Alliance (TIA/EIA)

CAT1 Standard phone line CAT2 Data speeds up to 4Mbps

(ISDN and T1 lines)
CAT3 Data speeds up to 16 CAT4 Data speeds up to 20
Mbps Mbps
CAT5 Data speeds up to 100 CAT5e Data speeds up to 1
Mbps Gbps
CAT6 Data speeds up to 10
Gbps

STP (shielded twisted pair) cables are rarely installed. STP can be
found in areas with lots of EMI (electromagnetic interference).
10baseT, 100baseT and 1000baseT cabling standards require 2
pairs of wires; a pair for sending and a pair for receiving. RJ-11 is
typically 2 pairs of wires and RJ-45 is up to 4 pairs of wires.

TIA/EIA 568A and 568B are 2 standards for connecting the RJ-45
Page | 79
jack to the UTP cable. Use plenum grade (fire retardant and costs
about 5 * more) cables in plenum spaces. Most NICs will adjust to
the speed of the Network.

Plenum grade cable

A crossover cable has a 568A jack at one end and a 568B jack at
the other to reverse the signal between the sending and receiving
wires and thus act like a hub or switch.

Crossover cable

Remember the link light is solid when connected and the activity
light flashes.

The accepted standards

 Solid green light = connectivity

 Flashing green light = intermittent connectivity
 No green light = no connectivity
 Flashing amber light = collisions on Network (usually OK)

Fibre Optic Ethernet can transmit signals at a distance of 2 KM

and is immune to electrical problems due to using light and not
electricity. Fibre optic Ethernet use 62.5/125 multimode fibre optic
cable and there is a square SC and a round ST connector. Other
types of connectors include FC/PC, SMA, D4, MU and LC and MT-
RJ (MT-RJ = higher end full-duplex). Fibre Optic is half duplex
mainly and has 2 cables; 1 for sending and 1 for receiving.

Fibre optic is not subject to interference in the way that Ethernet is.
Page | 80
Transmission is light not electricity. It is very fast, expensive and
delicate; so rarely used to connect PCs.

62.5/125 fibre optic cable

mt-rj cable

Most fibre optic network technologies use multimode fibre optic

cabling that transmit multiple light signals at the same time using
different reflection angles. The signal tends to disperse over longer
distances so multimode is used over shorter distances.
Multimode signals are LED and single mode (higher end) use laser
light that are capable of very high transfer rates over long
distances. Single mode is rare so expect to see multimode cabling
mainly.
Page | 81
Fibre optic standards

 1000BaseSX
 10GBaseSR

Fibre optic cabling is delicate, expensive and difficult to use so is

rarely used for connecting PC’s; it is more likely to be found in a
data centre.

Coax/BNC

Coax was used before UTP cables and consisted of a centre cable
surrounded by insulation and covered with braded cable. It was
labelled ‘thinnet’ or ‘802.2’. A twist-on BNC connector is used for
attaching to a machine. Coax is similar to RG-59 or RG-6 coax
used for cable connections.

Coax cable

A crossover parallel or serial (RS232) cable can be used to

connect 2 PCs. This would probably be a last resort as the
connection is relatively slow.

Connecting 2 PCs together via FireWire will automatically Network

the machines.
 Page | 82

Network Operating Systems

 Peer-to-Peer networks have security on each individual

machine. It is only suitable for small home networks.

 Client Server networks have a central server and clients.

Each server/network will have its own set of user accounts. A
major drawback in a multi-server environment.
  Domain based Networks have a domain controller
(centralised place) for administering user profiles. In other
words a single logon can be used to sign onto the mail
server or the HTTP server etc. A directory service stores
the user and computer account information. Microsoft
Page | 83
provides the Active Directory (AD) service for larger
Networks.

Windows Server 2003 Administrative tools has icons; Active

Directory, DHCP, DNS, Server Extensions and Domain Security
Policy. If the Administrator password is lost a reinstall of Windows
is required.

From computer >system properties> change settings; to change

the network role of the PC

NetBIOS Extended User Interface (NetBEUI) is the default

protocol for Windows for Workgroups, LANtastic and Windows 95.
NetBEUI is easy to configure and is fast, but is limited to about 200
nodes and can’t be used for routing.

IPX/SPX was developed by Novell for its Netware products. It is

quick, works well with routers and uses little RAM when loaded. It
has now largely been replaced by TCP/IP.

TCP/IP is the dominant network protocol.

Windows needs to have client software installed for every server

that is accessed over a network. When a NIC is installed Microsoft
installs Client for Microsoft Networks (to connect to a Microsoft
Network) and the Google Chrome/IE/Firefox etc. client will need to
be installed to access web pages.
A PC can be on a public network, a private network or a domain. A
PC will become a server when file sharing is enabled. XP
automatically blocks file and printer sharing by default. Open
Firewall and select exceptions to see if the default settings need to
be changed.
Page | 84

Installing and Configuring a Wired Network

The following are required to achieve network connectivity

 NIC
 Protocol
 Network client

When a NIC is installed, TCP/IP, Client for Microsoft Networks

and File and Printer Sharing for Microsoft Networks are
installed by default.

Configuring TCP/IP

Network class Address No of Network No. of host

range addresses nodes
available supported
A 1-126 129 16,777,214
B 129-191 16,384 65,534
C 192-223 2,097,152 254
A Private 10.0.0.1 to
10.255.255.25
5
B Private 172.16.0.1 to
172.16.255.25
5 for manually
configured
addresses and
169.254.0.1 to
169.254.255.2
54 for local-link
(APIPA)
addresses
C Private 192.168.0.0 to
192.168.255.2
55

Page | 85
Addresses that start 127* are reserved for local (loopback) testing.

In TCP/IP ports are 16-bit numbers between 0 and 65,535

assigned to a particular TCP/IP session. Each packet has 2 ports
assigned; a destination port and an ephemeral port. A
destination port is a fixed predetermined number that defines the
function or session type. The ephemeral port (1024-5000 range)
is an arbitrary number generated by the sending computer so that
the returning packet knows what application to use.

TCP/IP Service Port Number

HTTP 80
HTTPS 443
FTP 20, 21
POP 110
SMTP 25
Telnet 23
IMAP [internet message access 143
protocol] alternative to POP3
SSH 22

NETSTAT displays active TCP/IP applications including originating

address, destination addresses and port number. NETSTAT has a
number of switches. Enter NETSTAT /? at a command prompt to
see the switches.

A router used in an office environment should have DHCP

disabled. It can conflict with domain settings. www.icann.org
contains domain naming conventions etc.

WINS (windows Internet Name Service) enable NetBIOS Network

names such as Server1 to be correlated to an IP address. WINS
names are similar to DNS but instead of a fully qualified domain
internet name (bbc.co.uk); shorter names like mydonpc can be
used. WINS names should be 15 characters or fewer and unique.
XP/2000/Vista/7/10 does not use WINS. Dynamic DNS is used
instead supporting WINS and internet names. WINS can be
accessed

Computer>Network>Network and sharing centre>manage Network

connections>properties>IPv4>Properties>Advanced
Page | 86
The most common TCP/IP tools; enter from a DOS window.

PING - to contact an IP address or device

IPCONFIG - shows addresses of current device, subnet mask and
default gateway.
NSLOOKUP – shows server connected to and default gateway
address.
TRACERT – describes the path from source to destination
address.

Automatic Private IP Addressing

When a client is unable to obtain an IP address automatically,

Windows assigns an APIPA in the range 169.254.0.1 to
169.254.255.254 with a subnet mask of 255.255.0.0. The host will
be able to communicate with other computers with a 169* prefix.
APIPA is enabled by default if the system is configured to obtain
an IP address automatically.

Network sharing and NTFS sharing is separate. We would set

Network sharing to allow everyone access to an object and lock it
down with NTFS.

To access shared resources in XP/2000 -

from computer click tools > Map Network Drive to open the
dialogue box.

In Vista/7 the ALT key is pressed once to reveal the menu bar. The
effect of mapping a network drive is that it appears as a local drive
on the host computer.

Universal Naming Convention (UNC) enables resources to be

accessed using fully qualified names \\server\nice.

NET VIEW will show the computers in the network

NET USE X: \\Server\nice will map the share

To share a printer, right click to show properties and select share.

The printer will be available to other machines on the network and
the drivers should be copied from the target machine.
Page | 87

Troubleshooting Networks

Try to re-create the situation that led to the problem.

A loopback test requires a loopback plug inserted into the NICs

port. A cable tester can be used to test cabling.

Always check for viruses.

After fixing a problem get signoff from the user.

Use the OSI 7-layer model to pinpoint the source of the problem.

Layer Devices/Activity
1. Physical NIC/HUB/cable
2. Data link Switch, MAC addresses,
Ethernet CSMA/CD
3. Network Router, IP Protocol
4. Transport TCP UDP
5. Session FTP, telnet, SNMP
6. Presentation IE Firefox Outlook
7. Application IE Firefox Outlook
CHAPTER 10 Printing

Printer types
Page | 88
 Impact
 Inkjet
 Dye-sublimation
 Thermal
 Laser
 Solid ink

Impact printers create an image by physically striking an ink

ribbon against a page surface. Daisy wheel (not used much now)
and dot matrix are the 2 main types of Impact printers.

Dot-matrix can be used for multi-part forms (for example multiple

copies of invoices) and are widely installed. They are particularly
suited to POS environments where receipts/invoices need to be
printed in duplicate or triplicate.

Dot-matrix printers use a matrix/grid of pins also known as

printwires to strike an inked print ribbon to produce images on
paper. The case that holds the wires is called a printhead. Each
page is treated as a picture broken down into a dot based raster
image. 9-pin printers are generically called draft quality and 24-
pin printers are referred to as letter quality or near letter quality
(NLQ).

Tractor feed technology is used to drag the pages through the

printer. The sprockets look like tractor wheels.

Components of a Dot-matrix printer

  Platen
 Ribbon
 Printhead
 Power supply Page | 89
 Traverse assembly

The driver software produces an image in the same way that a

CRT monitor does by painting the dots.

Inkjet Printers work by injecting ink through tiny tubes. Heat or

mechanics is used to move the ink. The heat-method printers use
resistors or electro-conductive plates at the end of each tube to
boil the ink, causing a droplet to fall onto the page to form part of
the image.

Components of an Inkjet printer

 Traverse assembly
 Traverse guides
 Printhead and cartridge caddy
 Power supply
 Ink cartridges
 Storage/ cleaning/ maintenance section
 Print area
 Electronics
 Page | 90

Typically there are 4 cartridges CMYK, but some printers contain

other cartridge colours including green, blue, light cyan, dark cyan
etc. More colours equal better quality images in general.

Two key metrics are speed measured in PPM and resolution

measured in dpi. Inkjet printers are capable of printing onto a wide
variety of media including cloth.

Dye-Sublimation Printers
Sublimation means to change something from solid to vapour and
back to solid. Dye-Sublimation Printers are used in high end
desktop publishing, medical and scientific imaging and photo
printing. Snapshot printers use Dye-Sublimation to produce
photos.
Page | 91
Thermal printhead > vaporised dye > dye-ribbon roll

The resulting image is a continuous-tone display; i.e. does not

consist of dots. Images are of very high quality rivalling
professional photo lab processing.

Thermal Printers use a heated printhead to produce high quality

images on special or normal paper. There are two types

 Direct thermal – burn dots into the surface of special heat

sensitive paper – used to produce receipts in retail
businesses.
 Thermal wax transfer – similar to dye sublimation printers but
use thermal wax instead of dye imbedded film. They do not
require special paper and are therefore cheaper but lack
quality compared to dye- sublimation printers.

Laser Printers

A process called electro-photographic imaging is used to

produce high speed and high quality text and graphics. Laser
printers rely on the photoconductive properties of certain organic
compounds.
Photoconductive means that when particles of these compounds
are exposed to light they will conduct electricity. Laser printers use
lasers as the light source because of their precision. Some lower
cost printers use LED arrays.
Page | 92
Laser printers shine when producing spot colour; that is eye
catching headlines, charts or other graphic elements that dress up
an otherwise plain document.

Components of a Laser printer

 Printer memory
 System board
 Toner cartridge
 Hi-voltage power supply
 Primary power supply
 Paper tray
 Sub logic board
 Fuser assembly
  Gearbox/motors

Parts that suffer the most wear and tear are generally incorporated
into the toner cartridge.
Page | 93
The photosensitive drum is an aluminium cylinder coated with
particles of photosensitive compounds. The drum is grounded to
the power supply but the particles are not.

The Erase lamp exposes the photosensitive drum to light which

causes the photosensitive coating to be conductive.

The primary corona located close to the photosensitive drum is

charged with an extremely high voltage which leads to the forming
of an electrical field (or corona) that charges the particles on the
drums surface.

The laser writes positive images onto the drum. The drum has a
negative charge of between ˷600 and ˷1000 V.

The toner is a fine powder made up of (carbon melt mixed with

polyester resin) plastic particles bonded to iron particles. The toner
is negatively (between ˷200 and ˷500V) charged and is attracted to
areas of the photosensitive drum that are positively charged. Toner
is attracted to areas of the photosensitive drum that have been hit
by the laser.

The transfer corona (a thin wire) applies positive charge to the

paper thus attracting negatively charged toner to it. In most large
printers the transfer corona is outside the toner cartridge. The
transfer corona collects dirt and must be cleaned. Use a cotton
swab soaked in 90% denatured alcohol for this.

The fuser assembly is usually separate from the toner cartridge.

Located at the bottom of the toner it can be identified by 2 rollers
(pressure roller and heated roller) that are used to bind the toner to
the paper. The heated roller has a none-stick coating (sometimes
Teflon) to prevent the paper from sticking to the roller.

Laser printers have 2 power supplies. The high-voltage power

supply is for the primary corona. The primary power supply
supplies the motors that move the paper, the laser, the system
electronics and the transfer corona.
A laser printer performs mechanical functions such as ‘kicking out’
a printed page; drawing paper out of the paper tray and evenly
distributing toner etc. These functions are performed by gear
packs or gear boxes. The gears rarely fail and can be replaced
Page | 94
relatively easily.

The system board contains RAM, processor and ROM. The RAM
is used to store an image prior to being printed. If the printer does
not contain enough RAM a memory overflow is encountered.

Most printers contain an Ozone Filter that needs to be vacuumed

or replaced periodically. Occasionally a printer will have a faulty
sensor.

Solid ink printers use solid sticks of non-toxic ink that produce
more vibrant colours than other methods. All colours are applied to
the paper in a single pass eliminating misalignment. These printers
are fast and are about double to 6 times the price of a comparable
laser printer. A colour stick costs about the same price as an inkjet
cartridge but delivers about 1000 pages; far higher than what an
inkjet would produce.
 Page | 95

Printer languages are used for communication between the PC

and the printer.

ASCII contains a number of printer specific commands. For

example OA means ‘line feed’ and 0C means ‘form feed’.

Adobe Systems developed the PostScript page description

language in the 80’s as a device independent language capable of
high-resolution graphics and scalable fonts. PostScript is fast due
to processing taking place on the printer and not the PC. The page
is described as a single raster image making the files portable.

Hewlett-Packard Printer Control Language (PCL) is an

enhancement to ASCII. It does not support advanced graphics
functions. PCL files are less portable than PostScript files due to
not defining pages, but characters. The characters on the page are
model specific.

Windows GDI and XPS use the GDI (graphical device interface)
of the OS to handle print functions. Processing the image is
controlled by Windows and the job is sent to the printer. The job is
sent as a bitmapped image and is seen by the printer as a picture
not as text.

Vista supports GDI printing, but incorporates a new printing

subsystem called XML Paper Specification (XPS) print path. XPS
Page | 96
provides enhanced colour management and better print layout.

Connecting to a printer is over a Network or USB or via a DB-25

parallel port. Parallel connectivity is about 150KBps and is CPU
intensive.

IEEE 1284 Standard requires the following

 Support for 5 modes of operation: compatibility mode, nibble

mode, byte mode, EPP and ECP. [These modes are close to
obsolescence due to USB]

 Standard method to determine which modes are supported

by the host PC and the peripheral device

 Standard physical interface

 Standard electrical interface (i.e. termination and impedance)

All transfer modes within the IEEE 1284 Standard is half duplex
meaning that data is transferred in 1 direction only at a time.

The standard parallel cable has a 36-pin Centronics connector on

one end and DB-25 connector on the other. 1.8m (6 feet) is the
allowable transfer length (unshielded) but electrical interference
may make this distance very unreliable for some transfer modes.
Using IEEE 1284 compliant cabling can extend the distance to 10
metres (32 feet) although transfer speed will drop.

Most USB printers use the standard USB type A connector at one
end and a type B connector at the other end. Some printers have a
FireWire port.
Laser Printer Steps

Page | 97

 Clean

The drum is cleaned before printing a new page. All residual toner
is removed by scraping the surface of the drum with a rubber
cleaning blade. Any remaining toner will appear as dots or streaks
on subsequent pages. Excess toner is returned to the toner supply
or placed in a toner debris compartment. The printer is also
electrically cleaned by erase lamps that bombard the surface of
the drum with waves of light, causing surface particles to discharge
into the grounded drum. After cleaning the drum should be
completely free of toner and have a neutral charge.

 Charge

The primary corona wire is used to apply a uniform negative (~600

to 1000 V) charge to the entire surface of the drum.

 Write and Develop

A laser is used to write a positive image to the surface of the drum.

Particles hit by the laser lose most of its negative charge. Particles
with lesser negative charge relative to toner attract them forming
an image.

 Transfer
The transfer corona gives the paper a positive charge causing the
negatively charged toner to leap from the drum onto the paper

 Fuse
Page | 98
A heated roller and a pressure roller fuse the toner to the paper.
Finally a static charge eliminator removes the positive charge from
the paper.

Impact printers transfer data to the printer one character at a time.

Laser printers transfer an entire page by generating a raster
image.

The laser paints the raster image on the photosensitive drum. A

chip called RIP (raster image processor) is used to translate the
raster image into commands to the laser. An inkjet also has a RIP
but it is part of the driver software rather than hardware circuitry.

See www.colorbytesoftware.com for 3rd party RIP software.

A printer’s maximum resolution is determined by its physical

characteristics (hl4040cn 2400*600 dpi, osi3200 1200 x 600 dpi,
MFC7820N 2,400 x 600 dpi).

Even at 300 dpi laser printers are far superior to dot matrix due to
resolution enhancement technology (RET). RET uses smaller dots
among characters and smoothes out jagged curves, but consumes
additional memory. A memory overflow error may be resolved by
disabling RET.

Installing a Printer in Windows

In Win 2000/XP/Vista/7 printers are not a physical device. It is a

program that controls one or more physical printers. Meaning that
one printer can support multiple print devices and act as a print
server.

Printer emulation means using a substitute driver for a printer or a

driver that is not made specifically for that printer. Some printers
may need to be put into emulation mode.
The readme file on the installation CD contains information
regarding compatibility or driver issues for the printer.

Calibration matches the printed output to what appears on the

monitor. Monitors display RGB and printers display CMYK. Vista
Page | 99
includes Windows Colour System (WCS) to help build colour
profiles for use with printers, scanners, cameras etc.

Troubleshooting Printers

Have these tools to hand

 Multimeter
 Denatured alcohol
 Extension magnet for hard to reach screws and toner
 Optical disc or USB drive with test patterns for checking print
quality
 Screwdriver(s)

It is possible to bypass the print spooler (small icon in task bar) by

selecting the printer in Control panel with right click for properties >
select advanced and click ‘send print directly to the printer’ radio
button.

If the wrong type of paper is loaded the printer can stall waiting for
the correct paper, for example, A3 to be loaded. Hitting Go on the
printer can bypass the message and send the output.

Selecting the paper tray, size of paper etc. is accessed within

properties (right click on printer icon). Remember power cycling
(switch off and on) can resolve a surprising amount of issues.

Misaligned or garbled printouts point to an incorrect or corrupt

driver.

A MSDS (material data safety sheet) is a standard form that

provides information about the environmental impact for items.
www.hp.com/hpinfo/globalcitizenship/environment/productdata/ind
ex.html is a possible source for this type of information.
Troubleshooting Dot-Matrix Printers

Keep the platen (the roller or plate on which the pins impact) clean
with denatured alcohol and lubricate gears and pulleys according
to the manufactures instructions.
Page | 100
White bars going through the text point to a dirty or damaged
printhead. Printheads can be replaced if cleaning does not resolve.
Chopped characters may be caused by a misaligned print head.

If the page is spotty or contains smudges the platen is dirty.

Troubleshooting Inkjet Printers

Inkjets come with maintenance software that contain options like

nozzle check, head cleaning, print head alignment and status
monitor. The printer head nozzle may get clogged up with ink.

Troubleshooting Laser Printers

Keep printers clean using compressed air to remove excess

toner/debris. Cleaning is best carried out outdoors. Clean the
rollers that guide the paper with denatured alcohol. Dirty rollers
can lead to paper jams.

The photosensitive drum can be wiped clean, but any scratches

will show on every page that is printed.

HP sells maintenance kits containing replacement parts that are

likely to wear out.

Some ozone filters can be cleaned with a vacuum and some have
to be replaced. The fuser assembly can be cleaned with 90%
denatured alcohol and replaced if required.

Blank pages may be caused by missing toner. There could be a

problem with the transfer corona if the image is remaining on the
drum.

A dirty fusing mechanism can show as a dusting of toner on the

paper. Any toner on the paper means the printer needs cleaning.
Ghost images may be caused by the drum not being cleaned
properly. Perhaps the rubber blade may need to be replaced. Low
temperature and low humidity can aggravate ghosting
Page | 101
Vertical white lines usually occur when the toner is clogged. Try
shaking the toner cartridge or replacing it.

If spots appear at regular intervals, the drum may be damaged or

perhaps toner is stuck to the fuser rollers.

Creased pages may be caused by using incorrect/unsuitable

paper.

If the printer states that there is a jam and there isn’t one a sensor
is faulty.

The separation pad is a small piece of cork that separates the

sheets as they are pulled from the paper feed tray. A worn
separation pad looks shiny and worn. www.printerworks.com may
be a source for a replacement.

Most laser printers have a self-test function to check for

connectivity and configuration problems.
CHAPTER 11 Portable Computing
Page | 102

Potential problems

A faulty peripheral may prevent a laptop from powering up.

A failing inverter can make a nasty hum and make a pop sound
when they fail completely.

A blast of compressed air may resolve problems with an

unresponsive touchpad.

Standards

Acronym Name Native Resolution

XGA eXtended Graphics 1024*768
Array
WXGA (16*10) Wide eXtended 1280*800
Graphics Array
WXGA (16*9) Wide eXtended 1366*768
Graphics Array
SXGA Super eXtended 1280*1024
Graphics Array
SXGA+ Super eXtended 1400*1050
Graphics Array Plus
WSXGA+ Widescreen SXGA 1680*1050
Plus
UXGA Ultra eXtended 1600*1200
Graphics Array
WUXGA Widescreen UXGA 1920*1200

Laptop Display Resolutions

Laptop screens are finished matte or high gloss. The main

disadvantage of the matte finish is that they wash out in bright
sunlight and are hard to see.
 Page | 103

High gloss was released in 2006. Manufactures have assigned

names as follows

HP BrightView
Dell TrueLife
Acer CrystalBrite

High gloss offers sharper contrast, richer colours and wider

viewing angles. The main drawback is lots of reflection from
nearby objects including the user.

A Desktop Extender is a device that provides a subset of a fully

functioning desktop. It is the next size down (13” screen) from a
desktop replacement laptop.

A lot of PDAs use handwriting recognition and sync software. IrDA

was the original technology for transferring data between PDAs;
now largely replaced by Bluetooth. If a PDA has the appropriate
OS installed, files can be shared over a WLAN.

A Tablet PC combines the flexibility of a PDA with the power of a

laptop. They come in 2 main form factors; convertible (containing a
foldaway keyboard) and slate (no keyboard).
 Page | 104

Microsoft has a feature called digital ink that recognises pen

strokes as input. Microsoft Journal is an application that uses
digital ink.

www.cfcassidy.com/inkyboard
InkyBoard is a simple application for the Tablet PC that mimics a
white board or a flip chart. To install InkyBoard, download and run
the Installer file. To remove InkyBoard, use the Add/Remove
Programs in Control Panel.

PCMCIA have two versions of PC cards; one using the parallel bus
and the other using the serial bus.

Parallel PC cards are 16-bit or CardBus and are Type I, Type II or

type III. The 16-bit cards are 5V and have 2 distinct functions. 32-
Bit CardBus are 3.3V and can have up to 8 functions.

TYPE II AND TYPE III

16-bit cards can work in 32 bit slots. Type I, II and III cards vary in
thickness with type III being the thickest and type I being the
thinnest. Type II cards are by far the most popular so most laptops
have two type II slots, one above the other meaning the computer
can accept two type I or II cards or 1 type III card.
 Page | 105

Type Length Width Thickness Typical Use

Type I 85.6mm 54mm 3.3mm Flash
memory
Type II 85.6mm 54mm 5mm I/O (modem,
NIC and so
on
Type III 85.6 mm 54 mm 10.5 mm Hard drives

ExpressCard is the high performance serial version of the PC

Card. ExpressCard and PC Card are incompatible.

ExpressCard is either 54mm or 34mm wide and is 75mm long and

5mm thick. They connect either to the USB 2.0 interface at 480
Mbps or PCIe interface at 2.5 Gbps.
 Page | 106

Standard Maximum Theoretical

Throughput
PC Card using 16-bit bus 160 Mbps
Cardbus PC Card Using PCI 1056 Mbps
Bus
ExpressCard using USB 2.0 bus 480 Mbps
ExpressCard using PCIe bus 2.5 Gbps

Software Support for PC Cards

PCMCIA defines 2 levels of software drivers for PC cards. Lower

level known as Socket Services and a higher level called Card
Services. BIOS handles Socket Services (provides basic I/O
detecting when a card is inserted or removed) and Windows
handles Card Services (provide specialised drivers to make the
card function). ExpressCard do not use Socket or Card Services
and are true PnP.

Most PDA/Smartphones contain speaker ports to connect to a

home/PC speaker.

A port replicator provides connectivity to USB, legacy, VGA, DVI

ports etc. for laptops. A docking station is similar to a port
replicator but may contain a DVD drive or PC Card.
 Page | 107

Most laptops use 72-pin or 144-pin SO-DIMMs with SDRAM

technology. DDR, DDR2 and DDR3 systems use 200-pin SO-
DIMMs mainly.

Shared Memory technologies include TurboCache (developed by

NVIDIA) and Hyper Memory (developed by ATI). Shared memory
is controlled by the video card and is not available to Windows
programs. Some systems allow control of shared memory quantity
(through CMOS) and others provide the ability just to turn it off or
on.

A 2.5 inch hard drive can hold up to a maximum of 1TB. 3.5 inch
hard drives can hold up to 2 TB + of data.

Some video card makers produce modular video cards for laptops.
A lot of video card problems can be resolved by going into safe
mode and doing a roll back or similar.

With some laptops a drive can be replaced with a second battery.

Mini PCI was developed for integrated peripherals such as

Bluetooth, modems, Wi-Fi, audio or hard drive controllers. Mini PCI
is a 32-bit 33-MHz bus. Mini PCI cards are about ¼ the size of
regular PCI cards.

Managing and Maintaining Portable Computers

There are 3 types of batteries used with portable computers;

Nickel-Cadmium (Ni-Cd), Nickel-Metal Hydride (Ni-MH) and
Lithium-Ion (Li-Ion).
 Page | 108

Ni-Cd

Ni-Mh

Li-Ion

Ni-Cd batteries had a tendency to lose a significant amount of its

re-chargeability if charged repeatedly without being totally
discharged. Ni-Cd batteries did not like being overcharged and it
was impossible to ascertain if a battery was fully charged without
an expensive tester. They were susceptible to heat and would
discharge if too hot and contain highly toxic substances. Many
devices such as cellular and cordless phones still use Ni-Cd
Page | 109
technology.

Ni-MH (land line phones use this) batteries are much less
susceptible to memory problems (and do not lose chargeability as
easily). They are susceptible to heat like Ni-Cd, but are less toxic.
Ni-MH is better when subject to re-charges unlike Ni-Cd that
requires a complete discharge/re-charge.

Li-Ion batteries are the most prevalent. They do not suffer from
memory problems. They last twice as long as Ni-Cd on a single
charge, but do not last as long as Ni-MH. Li-Ion batteries will
EXPLODE if overcharged so they come with built in circuitry to
prevent overcharging. Li-Ion should only be used on the system
they are designed for and not as replacement batteries.

Use a charger for Ni-MH and Ni-Cd that contains conditioning.

Conditioning will extend the lifespan of the battery. Keep contacts
clean and always re-cycle old batteries. Old batteries need to be
removed from the home/office and taken to a re-cycling facility.
CHAPTER 12 Power Management

The process used to manage power consumption for the OS,

BIOS and hardware is called Power Management. System Page | 110
Management Mode (SMM) was introduced with the 386 CPU.
SMM enables the CPU to stop or slow down its clock without
erasing registry information and provides power saving for
peripherals. All modern CPUs contain SMM.

Advanced Power Management (APM) specification appeared in

1992 and the Advanced Configuration and Power Interface (ACPI)
standard appeared in 1996.

APM/ACPI stipulate

 APM compliant BIOS that enables the CPU to shut off

peripherals when required

 SMM capable CPU

 Energy Star device – a device able to shut down without

actually turning off and use much less power than a non-
Energy Star equivalent device

 OS must be able to request that a device shut down and the

CPUs clock is capable of slowing down or stopping

ACPI devices are PnP and this requirement is additional to APM

standards.

APM/ACPI Levels

 Full On all devices run at full power with NO power

management

 APM Enabled CPU and RAM at full power. Power

Management is enabled. Unused devices may or may not
shut down

 APM Standby CPU is stopped. RAM still stores all

programs. All peripherals are shut down
  APM Suspend PC is in a hibernation state where critical
system information is written to the hard drive. On wake-up
the information is written back to RAM
Page | 111
The above standards are not clearly set and manufactures have
flexibility in implementation.

ACPI global (G) and sleeping (S) system state specifications

 GO Working State
(S)

 G1 Sleeping state mode that is further subdivided into

4 S states

 S1 CPU stops processing. Power to CPU

and RAM is maintained

 S2 CPU is powered down

 S3 Sleep or Standby mode. Power to

RAM still on

 S4 Hibernation mode. Information in

RAM is stored to non-volatile memory or
hard drive and powered off

 G2 Soft power off mode. Certain devices used to

(S5) wake the system such as keyboard, LAN, USB
remain on while other components are
powered to a mechanical off state (G3)

 G3 Mechanical off mode. The system and all

components except the real-time clock (RTC)
are completely powered down
APM/ACPI Configuration

CMOS or Windows is where APM/ACPI is configured. Windows

settings override CMOS settings. Some CMOS versions allow for
monitoring of wake up events such as monitoring a modem or NIC.
Page | 112
The Power Options applet in XP has several built in power
schemes such as Home/Office and Max Battery. Power Options in
Vista offer enhancements such as customising a Balanced, Power
Saver or High Performance power plan.

Some laptops have fixed-input power supplies that run at either

120V or 230V. For these a transformer/converting device is
required.
CHAPTER 13 Multimedia

PCs consist of speakers, sound card, a microphone and Page | 113

recording/playback software for producing sound. Sound is
captured using a process called sampling. The sampling rate is
measured in KHz and a higher sampling rate equals higher quality
sound. PCs have a sampling rate from 11 KHz (very low like a
telephone) to 192 KHz (very high quality - exceeds human
hearing).

Sound is characterised by loudness (amplitude), how high or low

the tone (frequency), the qualities that differentiate the same note
played on different (timbre) instruments, and number of tracks of
sound captured.

Amplitude
Frequency
Timbre
No of Tracks

The number of characteristics captured during sampling is called

bit depth. 8 bits is fairly low quality and 16 bit (2ˆ16) is quite high
quality.

Bit depth and sampling frequency determine overall sound quality.

CD quality is 44.1 KHz with 16-bit depth in stereo.

Recorded Sound Formats

An early sound format is pulse code modulation (PCM), better

known as WAV. Compression algorithms for WAV files are called
codecs or compressor/decompressor programs. The most famous
codec is MP3 (also called the fraunhoffer MPEG-1 Layer 3 codec).
A CD quality MP3 bit rate is 128 Kbps.

Most sound formats can be played provided the right codec is

installed.
MIDI

A MIDI file is a text file that is read by a sound card to produce

music. MIDI files are tiny compared to WAV files – almost 1000
times smaller. Sound cards play MIDI files using FM synthesis or
Page | 114
wave table synthesis. FM synthesis sounds more electronic and
wave table synthesis more closely resembles the actual sound of
an instrument.

The number of instruments a sound card can play at once is called

polyphony. Better cards have a polyphony of 64 to 128 +.

Other File Formats

*AAC native format for Apple iTunes

AIFF used by QuickTime player and Macintosh

computers

ASM used in streaming sound

ASX deigned by Microsoft for streaming sound over the

internet through Windows Media Player

*AU players in non-windows systems can play this popular

file format. Also widely used in the Windows world

OGG open source codec

*RM proprietary to RealMedia

*WMA proprietary to Microsoft

3 popular streaming media players

 Windows Media Player

 Winamp
 Apples iTunes

There has been an explosion in internet radio stations due to live

streaming over broadband connections.

Modern motherboards come with built in sound processing.

Sound cards differ in six main areas

 Sound standard
 Processor capabilities Page | 115
 Speaker support
 Recording quality
 Jacks
 Extra features

Sound Card Standards

Most sound cards are either AC’97 or Intel High Definition

Audio. AC’97 is a basic standard that includes support for up to 6
channels and 48 KHz/20-bit quality. Intel High Definition Audio is
more complex supporting up to 8 channels at 192 KHz/32 bit
quality. Also one computer can send multiple streams of output to
different output devices.

Processor Capabilities

With an on-board processor the work done between applications

and the operating system is speeded up leading to better quality
sound.

Speaker Support

Every sound card supports 2 speakers. More advanced cards

support 5+ speakers on separate channels and include support for
a subwoofer.
Recording Quality
Page | 116
High end cards record with far less distortion. This distortion or
signal to noise ratio is measured in decibels. Low end cards are 30
to 50 decibels. High end cards are 96 to 100+ decibels; near to the
level used by professional musicians.

Jacks

Most cards come with at least 3 connections; green for stereo

speaker, blue for line-in connector and pink for microphone.

Other Common Connectors

 Line-out for connections so that the card can connect to a

stereo for example and is used to output sounds from the
computer
 Rear out for connecting speakers for surround sound output
 Joystick for connecting joystick or MIDI device
 Line in for connecting an external device to import sound to
the computer
 Analogue/digital out to connect a digital speaker system or
analogue sub-woofer

Extra features include connectivity to home entertainment systems

or a FireWire connection. A $50 speaker can sound 100 times
better than a $25 speaker.

The original speaker standard is stereo consisting of 2 speakers.

The 2.1 standard contains 2 speakers called satellites and a
subwoofer.

5.1 were created by Dolby and Digital Theatre Systems (DTS) and
consist of 5 speakers and a subwoofer providing surround sound.

A lot of sound cards come with a special Sony/Phillips digital

interface (S/PDIF). S/PDIF enables 1 wire to connect to the 5.1
speaker system instead of 1 wire for each speaker. The connector
is either optical or coaxial. Optical is shaped like a square and
coaxial is the same as that used to connect a CD player to a
stereo.

It is rare to find S/PDIF on 5.1 systems. It is more likely to appear

on 6.1 and 7.1 speaker sets.
Page | 117

7.1 speaker system

Games take advantage of 5.1, 6.1 and 7.1 but use DirectX. DirectX
is an API that offers numerous commands like play through the
rear right hand speaker or play music through the right and left
channels. Version 3 offers a feature called DirectSound 3D which
is the ability to play a sound anywhere in a 3D space, known as
positional audio.

Environmental Audio Extensions (EAX) was developed by Creative

Labs. EAX adds realism by simulating distance between audio
events, and creating a sense of environment. EAX is the standard
for audio events in gaming. All current sound cards support EAX
and DirectX.

DirectSound does not work in Vista. Workarounds have been

implemented to enable older games to work in Vista.

With on-board sound ensure it is enabled in CMOS. A microphone

is needed to record sounds. Win XP and Vista probably have basic
drivers for a USB sound card.

The final step in installing a sound card is to configure it by

installing sound programs. These programs are found in Sound in
Win Vista, Sounds and Audio Devices in XP or Sounds and
Multimedia in Win 2000. The speaker setup (for example, stereo
or 5.1) and selecting the device for voice output can be configured
with these applets. The hardware tab shows a list of the installed
codecs. www.afreecodec.com can be accessed for practically all
Page | 118
codecs.

Autosensing can configure ports automatically so it does not

matter if the line-in port contains the microphone connector.

Troubleshooting Sound

Consider

 Hardware
 Configuration
 Application

If speakers are of different power ratings or the connecting wire is

of poor quality degraded performance may be the result.

Always ensure that the speakers are configured correctly in the

Sound applet, for example, stereo if stereo or 5.1 if 5.1.

If an error is received record the details and check the support site
or the internet. Try reinstalling the application as a basic step.

Video Capture

Pinnacle Bluebox is a video capture device incorporating s-video,

RCA and proprietary jacks for connecting to the PC.

Pinnacle video capture

Most webcams, even those built into portable computers are
analogue.

Software
Page | 119
Video is 2 [1. Video 2. Audio] or more separate tracks that go
through a compression algorithm (otherwise the file would be huge
even for a short video) and are then placed in a wrapper called a
container file. AVI or .MOV (QuickTime movie file) are examples
of container files that contain codecs.

Standard Video Codecs

Codec Use
MPEG-2 Part 2 DVDs
MPEG-4 Part 2 Internet broadcasts – implemented with
names such as DivX
H.264 High-definition movies for Blu-ray Discs
Windows Media The family of Microsoft developed codecs
Video
Theora Open source codec goes with vorbis audio
codec as part of OGG project
TrueMotion VP6 Adobe Flash and VP7 used for Skype video
conferencing et al
VC-1 Microsoft product competes with H.264.
usually wrapped in WMV container file

Common Container Files

Container Use
ASF Mainly for WMV and WMA streams
*AVI Standard container file for Windows
Flash Video (.FLV)
Contains streams encoded with H.263 and
H.264 codecs. The dominant standard for
displaying video content on YouTube and
Hulu
Page | 120
MOV Standard for Apple QuickTime
MPEG-2 Transport Container that handles many streams
Stream (MPEG-TS)
OGG Container file for open source Vorbis and
Theora codecs

When capturing video there may be dropped frames and problems

with video and audio synchronisation. Ensure that all other activity
on the PC is ceased in order to avoid dropped frames. Use task
manager to disable as many processes as possible, by clicking
end process tree.

The process of synchronising audio and video is called A/V sync.

Words not connecting to mouth movement occur when video and
audio is not synchronised.

Details of how to capture video is at www.digitalfaq.com.

XP codecs can be displayed by Control Panel>Sound and Audio

Devices>Hardware>audio codec>properties

Vista codecs can be displayed by Windows Media Player >CTRL-

M to show classic menu>help>about Windows Media
Player>Technical Support Information>audio and video codecs will
appear down the list

Sources for codecs

www.fourcc.org
www.afreecodec.com

A TV tuner can be connected to a cable or satellite receiver.

Sound cards may consume excessive resources whilst playing

games. http://audio.rightmark.org is a location where tools are
available to monitor sound card usage.
CHAPTER 14 DISPLAYS

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CRT Monitors

CRT consists of a slender cylinder that contains 3 electron guns at

one end of the tube and a fatter, wider element containing the
display at the other end of the tube. Most monitors have internal
voltages that exceed 30,000 V, even when disconnected.

The inside of the display has a phosphor coating. When the

coating is struck by electron beams light is released. The screen
continues to glow after being struck by the electron beam due to a
quality called persistence. Too much persistence and the image is
smeary; too little causes flicker.

The monitor displays images as the electron guns make a series of

horizontal sweeps across the screen. These sweeps that start at
the upper left corner and move down to the lower right corner is
called raster lines.

The speed at which the gun makes a horizontal sweep is called

the horizontal refresh rate (HRR). The vertical refresh rate (VRR)
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is the amount of time the gun takes to travel from the top left hand
corner to the bottom right corner. The VRR is set by the video
card and if the VRR is too high for the monitor the monitor could be
damaged. If the VRR is too low the screen can flicker. The main
destroyer of monitors is setting VRR to high, and setting it too low
causes eye problems. The higher the screen resolution the higher
the refresh rate should be.

All CRT monitors contain dots of phosphorous or some other light

sensitive compound that are evenly distributed across the screen.
Positioned behind the phosphor is a shadow mask; a screen that
prevents a green beam from bleeding into a red beam for example.

Resolution is expressed as the number of horizontal pixels times

the number of vertical pixels. The ratio of horizontal pixels to
vertical pixels is called the aspect ratio (4:3 or 16:9). Common 4.3
ratios include 640*480, 800*600, 1024*768, 1280*690, 1280*1024,
1600*1200. Common 16.9 or 16:10 ratios include 1366*768 and
1920*1200.

The dot pitch determines the maximum resolution that a monitor

can render. The dot pitch defines the diagonal distance between
phosphorous dots of the same colour and is measured in
millimetres. The dot pitch ranges from about 0.39mm to 0.18mm. A
17-inch monitor is considered to work best with a dot pitch of
0.28mm.

Bandwidth determines how quickly an image can be placed on

screen. A good quality 17-inch monitor might have a bandwidth of
150 MHz. Most monitor makers provide tables for refresh rates at
certain resolutions.

LCD Monitors
Page | 123
Advantages of LCD

 much less power

 virtually flicker free
 don’t emit potentially harmful radiation

The wavelength of light determines its colour. LCD technology use

different wavelengths to produce different colours.

An LCD screen is composed of many tiny liquid crystal molecules

arranged in rows and columns between polarizing filters. CRT
pixels change size according to resolution; whereas LCD pixels
are a fixed size. Old LCD used static charging to form a
character (old digital watches). Passive matrix varies the amount
of charge on each pixel (or sub pixel) and this produces different
colours. Passive matrix is newer than static charging and uses x
and y wires to charge individual sub pixels.

Active matrix or thin film transistor (TFT) is the dominant LCD

technology currently. Transistors control each dot instead of x and
y wires.

An active matrix display consists of a polarizer with a thin film of

transistors above and a liquid crystal above and a colour layer
above topped with a polarizer.

Polarizer
Colour layer
Liquid crystal
Thin film transistors
Polarizer

Components of a LCD display

 Inverters – send power to the backlights – converts AC to DC

  Transformer
 DVI – digital port
 VGA - analogue port
 Analogue/digital converter
 Backlights – illuminate the image with AC power using cold Page | 124
cathode fluorescent lamp (CCFL) technology
 LCD panel – create the image using DC power
 LCD logic board

CCFL is characterised by low power consumption, long life and

even brightness.

It is not possible to run a LCD monitor at a resolution higher than

its native resolution. Running a LCD monitor at lower than its
native resolution severely degrades quality. A CRT monitor can
have a sharp picture if the resolution is lower than the native
resolution.

Running a high quality 17-inch LCD monitor at its native resolution

may make the fonts appear too small.

Running the monitor at a lower resolution (to increase font size)

with degraded picture quality is not a good solution. Font sizes,
shape, colour etc. can be changed within Windows so that the
optimum resolution can be maintained. Icons can be resized along
with toolbars and the number of dots per inch (DPI).

A LCDs response rate is the time it takes for all of the sub-pixels
to go from pure black to pure white and back again. A rate of 6-8
ms is now the standard. The refresh rate for an LCD monitor
refers to how often a screen can change or update completely.
60Hz is the industry standard and the human eye can only notice
24 times per second. 120 Hz is another widely used refresh rate.

The standard contrast ratio is a measure of the darkest and the

lightest spots that a monitor can display. 450:1 is a good measure
Page | 125
and figures for dynamic contrast ratios should be ignored for
computer screens.

Projectors

Projectors are either Rear-View or Front-View meaning the

image is projected through the front or the rear of the projector.
Rear-View projectors are mainly used with TVs and rarely found in
the PC world, unlike Front-View projectors that are used with PCs.

CRT projector

The 1st projectors used CRT technology and produced nice images
but are cumbersome, expensive and very heavy.

LCD projectors on the other hand are light and inexpensive but
lack image quality compared to CRT.
 Page | 126

The brightness of a projector is measured in Lumens. For a small

dark room, a 1000 to 1500 lumens projector is suitable. 2000
lumens can be used in a medium sized room. Projectors in large
rooms have ratings over 10,000 lumens.

All projectors have minimum and maximum recommended throw

distances. A long throw lens has a ratio of 1:2 (ratio of screen
size to distance) meaning that to display a 1.5M screen the
projector will need to be 3M away. A short throw lens can reduce
this ratio to 1:1

Lamps are expensive to replace so factor in the cost of a

replacement lamp when deciding on a projector purchase. Lamps
generate quite a bit of heat so fans are used for cooling.

Digital Light Processing (DLP) projectors

are very expensive compared to LCD projectors and produce a
very high quality image.
Monitors

Page | 127

The size of a monitor is determined by measuring the diagonal

size from corner to corner. CRT monitors have a viewable image
size (VIS) that is 1 or 2 inches smaller than the total size. LCD
monitors simply express the VIS value. A 15-inch LCD monitor will
have about the same VIS as a 17-inch CRT monitor.

A CRT monitor will have the 15-pin, 3-row, DB-type (also known as
D-shell) connector. All VGA and later cards contain a random
access memory digital-to-analogue converter (RAMDAC) that
takes the digital signal from the card and converts it to an
analogue signal for the CRT.

The RAMDAC defines the bandwidth that the video card outputs
and can convert from analogue to digital (RAMDAC on the video
card converts digital to analogue and RAMDAC on the monitor
converts analogue to digital).
 Page | 128

Video card showing ramdac chip

The DVI (digital video interface) is available as an alternative for

connecting an LCD monitor without converting from analogue to
digital. DVI-A is for analogue (for backwards compatibility), DVI-D
is for digital and DVI-A/D or DVI is interchangeable.

DVI-D and DVI-I connectors can be single-link with a bandwidth

of 165MHz meaning 1920*1080 or 1280*1024 resolutions can be
displayed at 85 Hz. Dual-link DVI-D and DVI-I connectors can
display resolutions up to 2048*1536 at 60 Hz. Digital connectors
are quickly replacing analogue because they produce clearer
pictures, due to requiring no conversion. They are also easier to
configure and are less expensive.

DVI to VGA adaptors usually come in the box with the video card.
 Page | 129

DVI to VGA adaptor

If the PC has a CRT approximately ½ of its total power

consumption is by the monitor. Monitors that comply with (Video
Electronics Standards Association) VESA can reduce power
consumption by 75%. This is achieved by reducing the signals
sent by the video card to the monitor during idle periods.

A typical CRT monitor consumes 120W. During idle periods this

drops to below 25W, whilst enabling the screen to return to full
functionality within 10 seconds.

A typical LCD monitor consumes around 33 W at peak, dropping to

less than 2 W when idle.

Video Cards consists of 2 major elements; the video RAM and the
video processor circuitry. Early video cards contained DRAM and
modern video cards have better RAM than the system.

A video card is defined by

 Display Modes
 Motherboard Connection
 Graphics Processor Circuitry
  Video Memory
 Connections

The amount of colours supported by the video card determines the

colour depth. A 24 bit colour depth can support 2^24 16.7 million Page | 130
colours. Win 2000/XP provide tools to set the colour depth using
the display properties applet of the settings tab. The offering of 32
bit colour includes what are known as 8 bit alpha channels that
enable blending and showing transparency. Almost every screen
element in Vista can be semi-transparent.

A video card and monitor can show a fixed number of different

resolutions and colour depths. This depends on the bandwidth the
monitor can support and the resolutions and colour depths the
video card can push to the monitor. Any single combination of
resolution and colour depth is called mode.

For standardisation VESA have issued resolutions derived from

the original VGA mode. VGA mode is 640*480 and 16 colours and
all video cards made over the last decade and a half can output as
VGA. See below for common modes

Video Mode Resolution Aspect Ratio Typical Device

SVGA 800*600 4:3 Small monitors
HDTV 720p 1280*720 16:9 Lowest
resolution that
can be called
HDTV
SXGA 1280*1024 5:4 Native
resolution for
many desktop
LCD monitors
WSXGA 1440*900 16:10 Widescreen
laptops
SXGA+ 1400*900 4:3 Laptop
monitors and
high-end
projectors
UXGA 1600*1200 4:3 Larger CRT
monitors
HDTV 1080p 1920*1080 16:9 Full HDTV
 resolution
WUXGA 1920*1200 16:10 For 24”
widescreen
monitors
Page | 131
Typical Display Modes
Resolution 16-bit (high colour) 24-bit (true colour)
640*480 1 MB 1MB
800*600 1 MB 2 MB
1024*768 2 MB 4 MB
1280*1024 4 MB 4 MB
1600*1200 4 MB 6 MB
Common modes and minimum video memory requirements

Motherboard Connection

AGP is a specialised graphics/video 32-bit port running at 66-MHz

and based on the PCI 2.1 specification. It is connected directly to
the Northbridge, uses a function called strobing to increase
signals by 2, 4 and 8 times on each clock cycle and has 3-D
texturing capability.

AGP takes advantage of pipelining and a feature called

sidebanding that is effectively a second data bus for sending
commands to the Northbridge and receiving commands at the
same time. There is also a feature called system memory access
whereby the video card can access additional system memory
when required.

AGP specifications (AGP 1.0, AGP 2.0, AGP 3.0) are largely
ignored; replaced with strobing multiplier values, 1*, 2*, 4* and 8*.
Take care when inserting an AGP card, as tolerances are very
tight and an imprecise fit may not be recognised by the system.

PCIe has largely replaced AGP for video card connectivity. All
Page | 132
PCIe video cards use the PCIe *16 connector that is incredibly
fast.

Graphics Processors

ATI chip
Radeon X1950 XTX - Model and Processor
512 MB - amount of video RAM

The processors on all video cards are manufactured by 2 main

companies; NVIDIA and ATI. The most important decision in
purchasing a video card is selecting the graphics processor.

3D-gaming is the most obvious and widespread implementation of

video card capability.
A texture is used to create the 3-D effect. A video card can
produce effects such as transparency, shadows and reflection.
When choosing a video card aim for 1 in the middle of the price
range.
Page | 133
Video Memory is impacted by data throughput speed, access
speed and simple capacity. Using specialised fast RAM and
increasing the width of the bus (to 64, 128 and 256 bits wide)
between video RAM and GPU have increased overall speed. By
handling most of the work on the video chip the discrepancy
between the width of the video bus and the system bus (typically
64 bits) is dealt with. The main difference between video RAM and
DRAM is that video RAM can read and write data at the same
time.

Acronym Name Purpose

VRAM Video RAM The original graphics
RAM
WRAM Windows RAM Designed to replace
VRAM; never caught
on
SGRAM Synchronous A version of SDRAM
Graphics RAM with features to
speed up access for
graphics
DDR SDRAM Double Data Rate Used on budget
Synchronous DRAM graphics cards and
very common on
laptop video cards
DDR2 SDRAM Double Data Rate Popular on video
 version 2 cards until GDDR3;
Synchronous DRAM lower voltage than
DDR memory
GDDR3 SDRAM Graphics Double Similar to DDR2, but
Data Rate Version 3 faster, different
Page | 134
cooling requirements
GDDR4 SDRAM Graphics Double Upgrade to GDDR3;
Data Rate Version 4 faster clock
GDDR5 SDRAM Graphics Double Successor to
Data Rate Version 5 GDDR4; double the
input/output rate of
GDDR4

Advanced 3-D video cards come with up to 1 GB of RAM

Connections

 VGA
 DVI-I
 S-video
 HDMI

Apple Macintosh desktops use a DisplayPort

connection rather than DVI. Dell also

supports DisplayPort. Use a DVI to HDMI cable to connect a PC to
a television, if the PC does not have a HDMI port.

A composite
connector
provides a
signal through
a single cable. A component connector provides a split signal; red,
green and blue.

Page | 135

Component connector

Composite connector

Installing and Configuring Video

2 issues to be aware of

 Long cards – some high end video cards simply won’t fit in
the space provided.

 Proximity to nearest PCI card – some cards get very hot so

do not place near to other cards. A good practice is to have a
space next to the video card, leaving the adjacent slot(s)
empty.

Be sure to uninstall previously installed video drivers before

installing a driver for a new video card.
Using the Display/Personalization Applet

The display applet can be used to configure resolution, refresh

rate, driver information and colour depth.
Page | 136
Within Display Properties the settings tab is where changes
specific to the monitor and video card can be made (Win XP). In
Vista Display Settings is found under Personalisation. The
settings tab will only contain modes that the video card/monitor
combination can accept. A higher resolution will mean smaller
icons.

Themes/Theme, Desktop/Desktop Background,

Appearance/Windows Colour and Appearance is where
adjustments are made. In Win XP the Desktop tab can be used to
include web pages to appear on the desktop. The advanced button
of the Appearance tab is used to adjust font sizes and almost
every element of a window. Window Colour and Appearance
provides equivalent functionality in Vista when ‘open classic
appearance’ is clicked. Ctr> Win>tab will bring up aero mode.

In Vista the icons that appear on the task bar can be configured.
Power management is found under screen saver.

To view 2 monitors using DualView (Microsoft name for viewing 2

monitors) requires either 2 separate video cards or a single card
that supports DualView.

The Advanced option in settings shows the type of video card

including memory details, the GPU and BIOS information. To see
all the modes that the video card supports just select it. Selecting
the monitor tab is useful with CRT monitors, because the refresh
rate can be adjusted here. Pushing a CRT monitor past its fastest
refresh rate can damage it.

3-D Graphics

Early 3-D games used fixed 3-D images called sprites. Sprites
were replaced with true 3-D objects that are far more complex than
sprites. A true 3-D object consists of a group of points called
vertices. Each vertex has a defined x, y and z position. Keeping
track of vertices is taxing for the processor. Intel’s SIMD and
AMD’s 3DNow! was designed to perform the calculations (called
transformations) for vertices.

Page | 137

Sprites

Texturing and sprites are a feature of 2 nd generation 3-D.

(Textures provide dramatic detail) True 3-D objects are referred to
as rendered.

3-D Video Cards

Standard video card instructions were created to establish

consistency for manipulating graphics objects. An API (application
program interface) is a library of commands that games producers
use in their programs. API commands are sent to the video card
device drivers.
 Page | 138

The 2 dominant APIs are OpenGL

(developed by Unix but widely adopted in Windows and Apple

environments) and DirectX (a

Microsoft product).

DirectX supports video, sound, Network communications, input

devices and other PC devices. Subsets of DirectX

 DirectDraw – supports direct access to hardware for 2-D

graphics
 Direct3D supports direct access to hardware for 3-D
graphics; most important part of DirectX
 DirectInput - supports direct access to hardware for
joysticks and games controllers
 DirectSound - supports direct access to hardware for
waveforms
 DirectMusic - supports direct access to hardware for MIDI
devices
 DirectPlay - supports direct access to hardware for
multiplayer games
 DirectShow - supports direct access to video and
presentation devices
It is important to verify that DirectX is installed correctly. In
Win2000/XP; go to Accessories>system tools and select DirectX
Diagnostic Tool.

Dxdiag will start the tool in Vista/Win 7 from the search box.
Page | 139
Thanks to OpenGL and DirectX purchasing a game is no longer a
matter of deciding if it is compatible with a particular video card.

Consult the following websites before purchasing a video card

www.arstechnica.com
www.hardocp.com
www.tomshardware.com
www.sharkyextreme.com

Troubleshooting Video

Video cards rarely fail so most problems relate to drivers; either

bad or incompatible drivers or incorrect settings. If an incompatible
driver is installed windows will default to 640*480, 16 colour VGA.
If a corrupt driver is encountered Windows will go into VGA mode
or display a blank monitor or lock up or display a garbled

screen.

Video card failure is usually RAM or the fan. Symptoms can be a

strange looking screen or lockups or a very messy screen.

If the screen does not display objects in the right proportions

investigate video settings. If the monitor shows everything
 Page | 140

sideways have a look at rotation

settings. If a previously nice mountain view looks like a cartoon
investigate colour depth.

Troubleshooting Monitors

The brightness or menu button can be replaced. If 1 colour is

missing check cables for broken or bent pins or check the controls
for that colour. Monitors lose brightness as they age.

A fuzzy CRT monitor may require a degauss. A degauss removes

a magnetic charge on the shadow mask. Degaussing can make a
thunk sound and the screen will jump.

Troubleshooting CRT

Misconvergence occurs when a

halo effect is visible. Low end monitors are susceptible to this
problem. This problem is resolved by opening the monitor so is
best left to a specialist.

Troubleshooting LCD

Categories of bad pixels

 Page | 141

 Dead pixel pixel that never

lights up

 Lit Pixel pixel that is stuck

on pure white

 Stuck pixel pixel

stuck on a certain colour

Even new monitors can contain bad pixels so check if a monitor

has more than the allowable number under the warranty if looking
to return a monitor.

If the monitor is very dark and the image is barely visible under
bright lights the lamp or the inverter has gone.

If the LCD makes a hissing noise the inverter is about to fail.

Before opening the LCD monitor always allow the monitor time to
cool after unplugging it as the inverter and lamp get very hot.

Plasma screens suffer from ghosting; that is a tendency to display

Page | 142
a screen image after the display has been switched off. Also
modes for plasma displays do not match modes found in the
Windows environment.

Input/Output

Modems use built in serial ports. A COM port is a preset I/O

address with IRQs for serial ports. A traditional serial port consists
of a 9-pin DB connector and a UART chip. UART (universal
asynchronous receiver/transmitter) converts serial data to parallel
data.

Serial ports use the RS232 standard. RS232 defines language,

speed, connectivity etc. All serial ports are configured manually. It
is the only remaining manually configured port on the PC.

The backbone of USB connectivity is the USB host controller,

an integrated circuit normally built into the chipset. The USB root
hub/host adapter is inside the host controller and connects to the
USB port. A USB device connected to a host adapter will share
bandwidth with every other USB device connected to the same
host adapter. Also power consumption increases with more
connected USB devices. Bus powered USB devices do not have
their own power source. It is possible for a USB device to stop
working if available power is exceeded.
USB version 1.1 had 2 speeds; Low-Speed USB at 1.5 Mbps and
Full-Speed USB at 12 Mbps. USB 2.0 increased the speed to 480
Mbps called Hi-Speed USB. There are Low-Speed and Full-Speed
USB devices under the USB 2.0 standard. To transfer data at Hi-
Speed ensure that a Hi-Speed cable is used.
Page | 143
USB 3.0 (also called SuperSpeed) is now available with speeds up
to 4.8Gbps

In device manager the Standard Enhanced Host Controller is Hi-

Speed and the Standard OpenHCD Host Controller is the Low and
Full-Speed controller.

Each USB host controller supports up to 127 devices but

motherboards typically contain up to 8 USB ports. To provide for
additional USB devices a USB hub can be used or extra cards can
be snapped into the motherboard.

USB specifications allow cables up to 5M in length but electrical

interference can be a factor for any length greater than 2M.
FireWire cables can be up to 4.5M length. Remember to install the
device driver before plugging in the USB device.

To check USB power usage, open Device Manager and locate a

USB root hub under USB Serial Bus Controller. Right click the hub
and select properties and then select the power tab. Sometimes a
USB hub may be set to sleep to save power. The power
management tab can be adjusted to prevent this by unchecking
“allow computer to turn off this device to save power”.

FireWire (created by Apple) operates at 2 speeds; 480Mbps (IEEE

1394a) and 800Mbps (IEEE 1394b). FireWire has a sustained
data rate transfer of 480Mbps beating the Hi-Speed USB burst
rate of 480 Mbps. There is a 6-pin powered (mainly desktop)
connector and a 4-pin bus-powered (mainly laptop) connector.
For bus-powered devices an external power supply is required. A
FireWire device does (can be daisy chain) not need to connect
directly to a hub and can support up to 63 devices. A USB device
Page | 144
needs to connect directly to a hub. The drivers for FireWire
devices are most likely contained within Windows so a FireWire
device should automatically configure. FireWire draws more
power than USB but FireWire controllers are designed to handle
higher voltages.

If a device does not work when connected to a port, first try to

swap the device. Next check CMOS or Device Manager to ensure
the device is enabled. If a device does not appear in Device
Manager there may be something physically wrong. For example
the connectors may be bent or the device may need to be re-
soldered.

Keyboard configuration is controlled with the keyboard Applet in

Control Panel; where the default cursor blink rate and how quickly
a key repeats when pressed continually can be set. Compressed
air can be used to clean a keyboard.

There are 2 main types of mice; ball mice and optical mice. Ball
mice require maintenance and are rarely manufactured these
days. Ball mice should be cleaned every 2/3 months. There is a
mouse control panel applet. Mouse acceleration refers to how
quickly a mouse moves over relatively large distances.
 Page | 145

ball mouse

Optical mouse

Scanners

Most scanners use TWAIN drivers. The maximum speed of the

scanner is hard coded. Older scanners have a resolution of
600*600 dpi. Modern scanners are capable of 2400*2400 dpi and
high end scanners have far higher resolutions. Manufactures quote
2 figures, optical resolution and enhanced resolution. Ignore
the latter number as it relates to software and is useless.

The Scan Colour Bit Depth indicates the number of bits of

information used to describe each dot. A scanner with a higher
number for this metric will produce better picture quality. An 8 bit
scanner can save up to 256 colour variations. A 16 bit scanner can
save 65,536 variations. Modern scanners are 24-bit, 36-bit and 48-
bit.
 Page | 146

Grayscale Depth indicates the number of shades of grey per dot;

an important metric if working with black and white images.
Current consumer scanners are 8-bit, 12-bit and 16-bit and 16-bit
is recommended.

Scanning Speed can range from 30 seconds to scan a 4*6 photo

to about 10 seconds for a faster scanner. Also a higher resolution
document will take longer.

For travel purposes ensure that the locking mechanism for the
scanner light assembly is used.

Cameras

A 10+ megapixels digital camera can be obtained for about

£45.00. Instead of light sensitive film, digital cameras have 1 CCD
(charged coupled device) or CMOS (complimentary metal-oxide
semiconductor) sensor with photosensitive pixels (called
photosites) to capture the image. A 2-megapixel camera can
produce 4*6 pictures at print photograph quality. A 5-megapixel
unit can produce a high-quality 8*10 print.

Typical sizes

Nokia 6120 Classic 2-magapixel

Samsung Europa 2-magapixel
Nokia N75 3.2-magapixel
Sony Handycam DCR-HC35 8-megapixel
 Page | 147

Choose a digital camera with an optical zoom of 3* or better.

Digital zoom is useless.

In general terms, a bigger camera tends to mean better features.

The shape of a camera is rectangular where the lens retracts into
the body or SLR-type when the lens sticks out of the body.

Web Cameras

Webcams of 1.3-megapixels resolution is an upper limit before

bandwidth becomes an issue. There will be difficulty transmitting
images with higher (> 1.3-megapixels) resolutions. Frame rate is
the amount of time the camera takes a picture per second. A
higher frame rate equals smoother video and 30 frames per
second is very good. Most webcams use Hi-Speed USB
(480Mbps).
Specialty I/O Devices
Page | 148
 Biometric Scanners

Devices that require some sort of physical flesh and blood

authentication are called biometric devices. A biometric device
recognises parts of the human body, either eyes, fingerprints; head
image etc. A keyboard can contain one of these devices. When a
website asks for your password pressing the fingerprint key will
confirm your identity on the website.

 Bar Code Readers

Bar Code Readers read standard Universal Product Code (UPC)

bar codes to track inventory. There are 2 types commonly found
on PCs; pen scanners and hand scanners. Connectively is USB or
PS/2 and no configuration should be necessary.
  Touch Screens

Page | 149

These devices are used in information kiosks, in a supermarket, on

Smartphones etc.

 KVM (keyboard, video, mouse) switches

Multiple computers can be controlled using a single

keyboard/monitor/mouse.

Maintaining and Troubleshooting Windows

Windows update is accessible in Win 2000 by start > windows

update. In Windows XP/Vista/7 by start > all programs > windows
update.

Update choices are

 Automatic
 Download updates but let me choose when to install
  Check for updates but let me choose to download and install
 Turn off automatic updates and never check for updates

Vista distinguishes between important and recommended updates.

Page | 150
Disk cleanup, defrag and error checking can be accessed from
computer > C: > properties. Defrag is automated in Vista.

To clean the registry a 3rd party tool at www.ccleaner.com is

available.

Three key maintenance activities are check disk, defrag and

startup programs. Task Scheduler/Scheduled tasks is version 1
for Win 2000/XP and version 2 for Vista/7; Start > programs >
accessories > system tools > task scheduler or scheduled tasks.

The MSINFO32 command displays system information.

Msconfig is used to amend startup programs and services.

Msconfig brings up system configuration as

 General
 Boot
 Services
 Startup
 Tools

There is an option to initiate Remote Assistance within tools in

Vista.

Adding and removing components is found within add/remove

programs (WINXP/2000). Components include Management and
Monitoring Tools, Fax Services and Telnet.
CHAPTER 15 Performance Options

Computer > Properties > Advanced > Options/Settings

Page | 151
Performance options are used for configuring CPU, RAM and
virtual memory.

Turning off visual effects can make a difference to the

responsiveness of the machine. Visual effects can be accessed by
hitting windows pause-break combination and select settings from
the advanced tab.

Data Execution Prevention was part of Win XP SP2. DEP works

to prevent malware from taking over programs loaded in system
memory. DEP monitors critical programs by default, but can be
used to monitor all programs. Monitoring all programs will degrade
performance.

The performance monitor console provides two nodes, System

Monitor and Performance Logs and Alerts (Reliability Monitor
in Vista)

The system monitor gathers information on objects such as CPU,

Network and memory and presents this as a graph. To add
counters click add (only monitor 3 objects or else the graph will be
extremely cluttered). A counter is, for example, the percentage
processor time that tracks the percentage of elapsed time the
processor uses to execute a non-idle thread.

Performance Logs and Alerts are used to monitor any activity.

Backup Utility

If the archive attribute is turned on the file has changed since the
last backup. In explorer (search results) right click custom bar
(bar that contains name, size, type, attributes) and check attribute.
The A indicates that the file has been changed since the last
backup.
Vista has replaced NTBACKUP with Backup and Restore Centre.
There is no option for incremental or differential backups
(differential backups get larger each day due to being cumulative).
For that purchase a 3rd party tool.
Page | 152
Vista/Win 7 have discontinued Recovery Console replacing it with
GUI options. They are

 Startup Repair attempts to repair system files

 System Restore
 Windows Complete PC Backup will use the backup media
to recover the system
 Windows Memory Diagnostic Tool will check the system
for bad RAM
 Command Prompt is not to be confused with Recovery
Console. Any command can be run from here

Troubleshooting Windows

For Windows XP/2000 to load, NTLDR, NTDETECT.COM and

BOOT.INI must reside in the root directory of the C drive and
BOOT.INI must point at the boot files. Text errors [no boot device,
NTLDR bad or missing] occur very early in the OS loading process
and indicate a boot problem.

WIN7/Vista no longer uses the above files. The only file that may
get corrupted is BOOTMGR.

If the system fails to start there is a 3 step process.

1. Attempt repair
2. Attempt restore from backups
3. Rebuild system

Win XP/2000 uses Recovery Console that includes commands

attrib, chkdsk, fixboot etc. It is useful for repairing disk errors,
replacing missing files (using EXPAND), rebuilding partitions and
restoring registries.

A corrupted BOOT.INI file can be repaired with Fixmbr; that fixes

the master boot record.
If a message is received stating NTDLR is missing or corrupt;
chances are that the other system files are missing also. Try the
following
Page | 153
Copy d:\i386\ntldr replace ntdlr
Copy d:\i386\ntdetect.com replace NTDETECT.COM
Bootcfg /rebuild replace boot.ini

Attempt to restore using ERD (Win 2000) or ASR (Win XP). The
recovery CD that comes with most OEM machines will restore the
system to factory defaults meaning all data will be lost.

Failure to Load the GUI

The GUI can hang due to buggy device driver software or a corrupt
registry. If the BSoD (blue screen of death) is encountered read
the error message carefully. It may contain important clues.

Registry errors may produce messages like Windows cannot start

or “registry file failure”. The first attempt should be to restore last
known good configuration (rarely works). The 2 nd attempt should
be restore the registry by entering the following

Delete c:\windows\system32\config\system
Delete c:\windows\system32\config\software
Delete c:\windows\system32\config\sam
Delete c:\windows\system32\config\security
Delete c:\windows\system32\config\default
Copy c:\windows\repair\system
c:\windows\system32\config\system
Copy c:\windows\repair\system c:\windows\system32\config\
software
Copy c:\windows\repair\system c:\windows\system32\config\ sam
Copy c:\windows\repair\system c:\windows\system32\config\
security
Copy c:\windows\repair\system c:\windows\system32\config\
default
Advanced startup options can be used by hitting F8 to determine
why the system fails to start.

If a service or registry issue caused a problem have a look at

Event Viewer. Being at the splash screen and never loading
Page | 154
windows is indicative of a corrupt /bad registry. A solution is to
replace the registry using recovery console.

Windows lives on DLL (dynamic link library) files. Most windows

programs call to DLL files. The SFC /scannow command can be
used to try and fix DLL errors.
CHAPTER 16 INSTALLATION

Installation Problems
Page | 155
.NET is an extension of Windows that provides enhanced
database tools etc. If an application does not have a correct
version of .NET Framework some confusing error messages can
be issued. The solution can probably be found on the web so
check there.

Compatibility

Win 2000 only provides compatibility support for DOS programs.

This is achieved by copying the .EXE file. Right clicking the .EXE
file in Windows enables changing of the memory size so that it can
run more comfortably in Windows. Also under the advanced tab a
custom AUTOEXEC.BAT or CONFIG.SYS can be run.

Windows XP introduced the compatibility tab. A program designed

for an older OS could run in XP using compatibility mode. Video
settings can be set in compatibility mode.

Windows Vista takes compatibility a step further by adding

● Windows XP mode
● Run this program as an administrator.

Vista Commands

CHOICE
CLIP
CMDKEY
FORFILES
ICACLS
FSUTIL increases the file system
memory cache
MKLINK

TAKEOWN Allows an administrator to take

 ownership of a file
TIMOUT

VSP1CLN cleans up after a Win Vista SP1

installation
Page | 156

VSSADMIN volume shadow copy service

admin tool

WHERE

Try the above commands with help, for example, type in this
command at the command prompt - takeown /?

Securing Windows Resources

Protecting data is achieved by authentication and authorisation.

Windows 2000 has the Users and Passwords applet. Under the
Advanced tab there is a setting that requires users to press Ctrl-
Alt-Del before logging on. This prevents viruses from capturing
logon details by presenting a fake logon prompt.

Windows XP has the User Accounts applet. If the computer is a

member of a domain the default login requires Ctrl-Alt-Del. Using
Ctrl-Alt-Del is known as the classic logon prompt. The types of
account in XP is either Administrator or limited or Guest. The old
Users and Passwords applet is available in XP. Access this by
typing

Control userpasswords2

Selecting change the way users logon (from the User Accounts
applet) will enable switching between the Classic and Welcome
logon screens. Fast user switching can be enabled or disabled
from here also.

Vista provides 3 account types; Administrator, Guest and local

account at setup. Vista Business and Ultimate offers the User
Accounts applet. Vista Home Premium provides the User
Accounts and Family Safety applet.
Being or not being a member of a domain will present different
user account screens.

User Account Control Page | 157

XP made it almost necessary to create Administrator accounts.

Vista introduced UAC (user account control) to control intrusion for
accounts with lesser privileges. UAC demands permission to run
programs that could potentially cause harm. UAC can be turned off
from the User Account applet.

Parental Controls is used to restrict access to certain URLs or

games with a particular rating or to restrict logon to certain times of
the day etc.

Groups in Win 2000

 Administrators

 Power Users – Cannot install new devices or access other

users’ files unless specifically authorised.

 Users – cannot edit the registry or access critical files. Can

manage groups they create.

 Backup Operators – Same rights as users but can access

all files to perform backups.

 Replicator – members of the Replicator group can replicate

files and folders in a domain.

 Everyone – everyone that can logon.

 Guests – someone that does not have an account can login,

e.g in a library.

In XP if the computer is part of a domain the above groups are

provided; additionally HelpServiesGroup and Remote Desktop
Users. Computers that are not part of a domain have only 3
groups. The groups below are found in Administrative Tools >
Computer Management > Groups

computer administrator
limited user
Page | 158
guest

Groups in Windows Vista

In Vista Business and Ultimate the same groups available in XP

are available. Event log readers, Performance log readers and
performance monitor are some of many additional groups available
in Vista. The home editions of Vista offer only 3 groups;
administrators, users and guests.

Standard users in Vista have more privileges than users in XP.

Standard users can perform additional tasks like printing and
email.

Adding Groups and Changing Group Membership

The Professional versions of XP and Vista enable the addition of

groups using the Local Users and Groups tool found in the
computer management applet of the Administrative Tools (control
panel).

To add a new group right click an empty space. Select advanced

and find now.

NTFS permissions indicate the level of access permissions for an

object

 Ownership – all authority for an object/file

 List Folder Contents

 Take Ownership Permission – seize control by changing

ownership
  Change permission – can give and take away permissions
for accounts

Standard folder permissions

Page | 159

 Full control

 Modify

 Read & execute

 Read

 Write

Permission Propagation

What happens when files are moved/copied within a NTFS

partition or moved/copied to an alternative partition?

Inheritance describes the retention of permissions when an object

is copied or moved. A check box can be (within right click
properties >security > advanced) highlighted to turn inheritance off
or on. Folders with the inheritance tab enabled will cause objects
to have the same permissions as the folder it moves to.

Copying a file to a new folder causes the new file to inherit the
permissions of the new folder, which can be different to the
permissions in the old folder.

Moving a file within a partition will result in permissions being

unchanged. Moving a file to a new partition will cause the file to
inherit the permissions in the new partition. Any object moved to a
FAT partition will have no permissions at all.

Win 2000 requires shared folders to be explicitly created. XP has

shared folders by default. If a folder is encrypted ensure that a
password reset disk is available.
Simple file sharing provides all or nothing; either the folder is fully
sharable or it is not. XP Professional provides the ability to turn off
simple file sharing and unleash the full potential of NTFS.

To turn off simple file sharing from Computer go to Tools >

Page | 160
Folder Options > View Tab >last option > use single file sharing
(recommended) and uncheck. If the computer is part of a domain
simple file sharing is disabled.

Sharing in Windows Vista

The all or nothing approach of simple file sharing in XP is no

longer applicable in Vista. A folder or file can be shared with
specific users. The permission levels in Vista are Reader,
Contributor or Co-owner (these permissions must apply to domain)

Objects shared with everyone are placed in the public folder.

The Computer Management console in Administrative Tools will

show all the shared folders. Select shared folders under system
tools. The type of shares with $ are default shares that cannot be
altered. They enable remote access for administrators. Ensuring a
password for administrators should lock this down. Starting with
XP Home any remote administrator without a password would
become a guest on the target machine.

XP Professional uses EFS to encrypt files and Vista Enterprise

and Ultimate provides for encrypting an entire drive. BitLocker
Drive

Encryption is available in Vista Enterprise and Ultimate. It

requires a Trusted Platform Module (TPM) chip on the
motherboard. If the drive is legitimately moved or changed a
recovery key or password is required for continued access.
www.trueCrypt.org provides tools for encrypting a USB drive for
example. This tool can be used with XP or Vista home editions.

Page | 161

Working with the Command Line Interface

Filenames were described using the 8.3 format in the DOS era. In
Windows the 8.3 format is retained for backwards compatibility but
filenames can be 256 characters long using (LFN) long filenames.
The letters after the dot indicate the type of application used to
open the file, for example, PDF.

The ASCII format defines 256 (2^8=256) 8 bit characters as shown

below
http://www.asciitable.com/ - using ALT and keypad, for example, ^
is ALT 94. There is no bold, underline etc. within the standard.

Unicode was introduced in 2001 to overcome ASCII limitations. It

is 16 bit and covers virtually all characters in use today.

Commands

Entering c:\ will return to the root directory

Folder and filenames have the following excluded characters * “/ \

[]:;|=,

The command syntax is

[Command] [target (if any)] [switches] or

[Command] [switches] [target (if any)]

If the <junction> listing appears instead of <dir> the folder is

mounted.

RD will remove directories that are empty. To remove directories

that contain data use switch /S.
ATTRIB command will show files with attributes such as R (read-
only), H (hidden), S (system). + will add an attribute and - will
remove an attribute

XCOPY C:\DATA D:\DATA /S will move all DATA and sub

Page | 162
directories of DATA to the D: drive

Batch files can be created using EDIT at the command prompt.

CHKDSK
/f attempts to fix volume related errors
/r attempts to locate and fix bad sectors

I suggest you experiment with

FORMAT /?

SFC (System File Checker) /?

COMPACT displays or alters the compression of files on NTFS

partitions.

CIPHER displays or alters the encryption of folders and files on

NTFS partitions.

Installing and Upgrading Windows

 Identify hardware requirements

Component Minimum for a Win Recommended for a

2000 Professional Win 2000
Computer Professional
Computer
CPU Intel Pentium 133 Intel Pentium II 350
MHz MHz
Memory 64 MB 128 MB
Hard disk 2 GB with 650 MB of 6.4 GB with 2 GB
free space free space
Network None Modern Network card
Display Video adapter and Video adapter and
monitor with VGA monitor with SVGA
resolution resolution, capable of
high-colour (16-bit)
 display
Optical drive If you don’t have an If you don’t have an
optical drive you optical drive you
must use a floppy or must use a floppy or
install over a install over a Network
Page | 163
Network

XP Professional can be upgraded from

 Win 98 (all versions)

 Win Me
 Win NT 4.0 Workstation (Service Pack 5 or later)
 Win 2000 Professional (including service packs)
 Win XP Home Edition

Component Minimum for a Win Recommended for a

XP Professional Win XP
Computer Professional
Computer
CPU Any Intel or AMD Any Intel or AMD 300
233 MHz or higher MHz or higher
processor processor
Memory 64 MB of RAM 512 MB of RAM or
(though Microsoft higher
admits XP will be
somewhat crippled
with only this
amount)
Hard disk 1.5 GB of available 4 GB of available
hard drive space hard drive space
Network None Modern Network card
Display Video card that Video card that
supports SVGA with supports DirectX with
at least 800 * 600 1024 * 768 resolution
resolution
Optical drive Any CD- or DVD- Any CD- or DVD-
media drive media drive

 Verify hardware and software compatibility

If installing XP or Vista, the setup wizard automatically checks
hardware and software and reports any conflicts. Microsoft lists
compatible hardware on the Windows Logo’d Products list
previously called Hardware Compatibility List (HCL).
www.microsoft.com/whdc/hcl/default.mspx
Page | 164

 Decide what type of installation to perform

The choices are to do a clean installation or an upgrade

installation. WINNT32.EXE is the installation [for clean installations
only] command for XP/2000 and Setup.exe will start installing
Vista. A multiboot installation is having 2 or more operating
systems in the same partition. Vista will automatically install in a
separate partition.

Activation is achieved by an installation code being created that

identifies the key hardware components on the PC. This code is
sent to Microsoft and a 42 digit product activation code is returned
by Microsoft for entering onto the PC.

Installing or Upgrading to Windows Vista

Vista Home Vista Home Vista Vista

Basic Premium Business Ultimate
XP Clean Clean Upgrade Upgrade
Professiona Install Install Install Install
l
XP Home Upgrade Upgrade Upgrade Upgrade
Install Install Install Install
XP Media Clean Upgrade Clean Upgrade
Centre Install Install Install Install
XP Tablet Clean Clean Upgrade Upgrade
PC Install Install Install Install
XP Clean Clean Clean Clean Install
Professiona Install Install Install
l *64
Windows Clean Clean Clean Clean Install
2000 Install Install Install

Component Minimum for a Win Recommended for a

 Vista Computer Vista Computer
CPU 1 GHz 32-bit (x86) or Any dual-core Intel or
64 bit (x64) AMD processor or
processor better
Memory 512 MB of RAM for 2 GB of RAM or
Page | 165
Vista Basic (for all higher
other editions, 1GB
of RAM)
Hard disk 20 GB hard drive 100 GB hard drive or
with 15 GB of greater
available hard drive
space for Vista Basic
(for all other editions,
40 GB hard drive
with 15 GB of free
space)
Network Modern Network Modern Network card
card with internet with internet access
access
Display Support for DirectX 9 DirectX 10 capable
graphics and 32 MB graphics card with at
of graphics memory least 512 MB of
for Vista Basic (for graphics memory
all other editions,
128 MB of graphics
memory, plus pixel
shader 2.0 support,
the WDDM driver
and 32 bits per pixel
Optical drive Any DVD-media Any DVD-media drive
drive

Windows XP mode is available on higher end Windows 7

machines so that applications designed for XP can run in a
Windows 7 environment.

Loading the Win XP CD (or Win 2000 CD) and entering

d: \i386\winnt32 /checkupgradeonly (where d: is optical drive letter)

will generate a list of potentially problematic devices and
applications.

 Determine how to backup and restore existing data

The files and transfer wizard is useful for migrating users to a new
system. Run this tool on the new system to pull settings from the
old one. Vista has a tool called Windows Easy Transfer to
accomplish the transfer. User State Migration Tool (USMT - Win
Page | 166
Server 2003) is the tool for transferring multiple users.

Windows Backup Utility (Win 2000/XP) or the Backup and Restore

Centre (Vista) or a 3rd party tool can be used for backup and
restore.

 Select an installation method

This may be accomplished using an installation disc or installing

over a Network or by cloning.

 Determine how to partition the hard drive and what file

system to use

 Determine your computer’s Network role

The computer can either be standalone, member of a workgroup

or member of a domain. A Windows XP Home computer can only
be standalone.

 Decide language and locale settings

 Plan for post installation tasks

This includes installing the latest service packs and establishing

wireless connectivity et al.

Carry out the following tasks when upgrading

i. Generate a list of potential incompatibilities

ii. Have an up to date backup of data and configuration files
iii. Uninstall unused applications and delete old files
iv. Perform a disc scan and defrag
v. Uncompress all files, folders and partitions
vi. Perform a virus scan then remove or disable anti-virus
software
vii. Disable virus checking in CMOS
Windows Vista Clean Install Process

Vista requests the product key very early in the process in contrast
with 2000/XP. If you don’t enter the key a choice of Vista
installations from Basic to Ultimate will be presented.
Page | 167
To select the upgrade option the installation would have to start
from within the previous OS. If a clean install is in progress the
upgrade option will be dimmed.

Select the Custom option to change partition sizes for example.

Select install important updates only if in a business environment

where prior testing of software is necessary.

Automating the Installation

WINXP/2000 has the option to create a text file using Setup

Manager (downloadable @ Microsoft.com). Setup Manager can
automate Unattended, Sysprep and Remote Installation Services.
The tool can create answer files in Win XP Home, XP Professional
and Win Server 2003 (Standard, Enterprise or Web Edition).
Create the installation files on a Network share. Additional tasks
such as installing Office or Adobe can be added to the script.
Setup Manager can generate random unique names for networked
machines.

Install command

D:\i386\winnt32 /s:[substitute location of setup files here]/unattend:

[substitute name of answer file here]

The above command will start the unattend process.

www.netbootdisk.com/bootcd.htm is a possible source for a
Network boot CD.

Vista has a very complicated replacement for setup manager,

called the Automated Install Kit (AIK). AIK is reduced to an image
file that can be burned to DVD. Windows PE and ImageX are used
to capture the installation.

Cloning machines with different hardware can be achieved using

the Sysprep (System Preparation Tool) tool.
 Page | 168

Troubleshooting Installation Problems

Text mode errors occur in the early stages of the installation and
can be ‘No Boot device present’ or ‘Not Ready Error on Optical
Drive’.

The Blue Screen of Death may be caused by incompatible

hardware.

The HAL (hardware abstraction layer) is the interface between

hardware and the OS.

If the system locks up during installation completely disconnect

and restart. Remember to check the media or swap media if
possible and check hardware compatibility.

SETUPLOG.TXT tracks installation logging registry updates etc.

SETUPAPI.LOG TRACKS EACH HARDWARE component as it
installs. These files are located in the same directory as the OS.

Webroot Window Washer security software can be used to

remove data so that a drive can be passed onto a 3 rd party. Data
on a hard drive cannot be made 100% unrecoverable.

CPU > BIOS >valid OS

There are files that start the OS (XP/2000) called system files and
other OS files in the OS folder. The 3 system files are NTLDR,
BOOT.INI and NTDETECT.COM. A 4 th file called
NTBOOTDD.SYS is present when a SCSI drive is installed.
NTLDR, pronounced NT loader starts the boot process.

The OS is searched for in the master file table (MFT) that is

Page | 169
located in the boot sector. The MFT points to the system files.

The boot files consist of

NTOSKRNL.EXE (the Windows Kernel), the
WINNT\SYSTEM32\CONFIG\SYSTEM file (which controls loading
of device drivers) and the device drivers. The boot files do not start
the system; that job is performed by the system files.

The system starts and then the CPU points at the boot files
communicating with NTOSKRNL.

Role of System Files

When the system boots up the master boot record (MBR) on the
HDD loads the NTLDR program. NTLDR then starts the OS, by
querying the BOOT.INI configuration file to find out what OS to
load.

A section of the BOOT.INI file

Multi (0) disk (0) rdisk(0) partition(1) \Windows = “Microsoft

Windows XP Professional”

This is part of the advanced RISC computing naming system

(ARC). It enables the system to boot from any hard drive.

Multi is the adapter number starting with 0. SCSI drives always

start 1 and PATA drives always start with 0.

Disk is only used for SCSI drives, but the value is required in the
ARC format so ATA drives will always be 0.

Rdisk is the number of the drive; with PATA master is Rdisk (0)
and slave is Rdisk (1).

Partition refers to the partition number starting with 1

\Windows is the name of the folder that holds the boot files. This
means that when using ARC different versions of Windows can run
in the same partition.

BOOT.INI contains a number of switches

Page | 170
/BOOTLOG creates a log file of the boot process and writes to
Ntbtlog.txt.

/CMDCONS starts the recovery console.

/LASTKNOWNGOOD starts last known good configuration.

/NOEXECUTE is a new switch that prevents Windows launching

programs that cause system lockups.

NTDETECT.COM is launched by NTLDR to detect the installed

hardware on the system. WINLOGON.EXE displays the Win XP
logo screen.

VISTA/7 Boot Process

UEFI (Unified Extensible Firmware Interface) is a replacement for

BIOS. Vista supports UEFI and BIOS, using a separate BOOT
process to support either.

When Vista starts the 1st job is to determine if the system will
BOOT using BIOS or UEFI. With BIOS a number of steps occur
before BOOTMGR takes over. With UEFI the system immediately
starts BOOTMGR.

BOOTMGR is also responsible for bringing the system out of

hibernation.

Boot Configuration Data (BCD) replaces the BOOT.INI used in

previous operating systems and can be altered using the
bcdedit.exe command.
 Page | 171
CHAPTER 17 Power Supply

Power supplies have automatic or manual switches to

accommodate 120V (USA) or 240V (rest of world).

The power supply will not start unless connected to a

motherboard. Power supplies break more often than any other PC
component, apart from a floppy disk.

Multimeters can test 4 items –

1. continuity – flow of electrons from one end of a wire to the
next
2. resistance – a wire with a break will show infinite resistance
and a good wire will show very little resistance
3. AC voltage
4. DC voltage

Circuit Tester can be

used instead of a multimeter. Surge Suppressors
 Page | 172

can be used to protect from spikes that

could damage PC hardware. Ensure the Surge Suppressor has
the Underwriters laboratories UL 1449 for 330 V rating and is
rated to at least 800 joules. A quality Surge Suppressor will
contain power conditioning to filter out EMI (electromagnetic
interference) and (radio frequency RFI interference).

UPS types

1. Online – always supply power

2. Standby - Supplies power when normal AC drops below 80V

UPS power is measured in VA. A UPS supplies perfect AC power

but devices, due to varying factors, receive less power than
supplied. Watts would equal VA under perfect
conditions.http://www.apc.com/site/apc/index.cfm?ISOCountryCode=gb
contains tools for determining the correct voltage based on the
wattage of all the PC components combined. We need to consider
how long the battery will last when a power outage occurs and the
cost of a replacement battery when selecting a suitable UPS. Try
to obtain a UPS with USB or serial connection. These have an on
screen utility to monitor usage etc.
The most common PSU form factor is 150mm * 140mm * 86mm.
12V supplies hard drives and the monitor; 5V and 3.3V powers on-
board electronics. The typical PSU has 3 types of connectors that
plug into peripherals – molex, mini and SATA.
Page | 173

Molex to SATA converter

The Molex connector has notches called chamfers that can be

destroyed if pushed too hard with incorrect orientation. Molex
usually supplies 12V and 5V.

Mini connectors can supply 5V or

12V to only the floppy drive in modern systems. The ridge needs
to be away from the body of the data socket. It is very easy to
insert the wrong way; which will probably destroy the floppy.

SATA connectors have 15 pins and can use 3.3V, 5V and 12V. It
is very difficult to insert incorrectly. SATA connectors are also
slimline 6-pin and micro 9-pin. Splitters and adaptors can add
connectivity options.
 Page | 174

Slimline 6 pin

An ATX power supply never shuts off; it is always supplying 5V of

power to the motherboard. The only way to switch off is to hit the
power switch on the back of the PSU. Powering down systems in
the normal way is a ‘soft’ power down. A fan is vital for the power
supply. If it fails, PC failure can quickly follow.

ATX power supplies are characterised by the motherboard power

connector and softpower. Motherboard power comes from a P1
power connector attached to a cable. ATX power supplies have at
least 2 additional cables each populated with 2 or more molex or
mini connectors. When plugged in there is always 5V running to
the mainboard. Updates to the ATX power supply include ATX12
1.3, EPS12V, multiple rails, ATX12V 2.0 other form factors and
active PFC.

ATX12 1.3 arrived in 2003. There was an additional 4-pin

motherboard connector called P4 as well as P1 providing more
power. Also there was a 6-pin auxiliary connector to supply 3.3V
and 5V called an AUX connector. ATX12 1.3 suffered due to
standards not being clearly defined or adhered to. For example
AMD motherboards used the AUX connector and Intel
Motherboards used P4 connectors so manufactures provided
either P4 or AUX to save money.

EPS12V is mainly found on servers. It contains a 24-pin main

motherboard connector offering more current and stability than a
Page | 175
20-pin ATX connector. It also came with a P4 connector and an
AUX connector and a unique 8-pin connector. EPS12V featured
RAILS with each rail supplying a separate 12V.

The ATX12 2.0 standard includes a 24-pin connector that is

backward compatible with the older 20-pin connector and requires
2, 12V rails for any power supply rated higher than 230V. The AUX
connector was dropped in favour of SATA hard drive connectors.
There is a 6-pin PCIe power connector with either a molex for
PCIe and/or Molex.

There are niche power supply form factors

TFX12V for low-profile ATX systems

TFX12V

SFX12V for Flex-ATX motherboards

SFX12V

CFX12V for microBTX systems

 Page | 176
CFX12V

LFX12 for low-profile BTX systems

LFX12V

Active PFC (Power Factor Correction) smooths out power as

received from the power company and ‘cleans it’, reducing
humming that can damage the power supply. Ensure that you
purchase a power supply with active PFC.

A hard drive draws about 15W and the CPU typically draws about
70W. One would need to aggregate all power consumed by PC
components to determine the wattage requirements for a new
power supply.

ATX12V 2.0 requires a power supply to be at least

70% efficient. As a general rule purchase a new power supply
rated at least 500W; providing plenty of power for upgrades. A
500W power supply will not consume any more power than a
300W supply. It only supplies the amount of power required by the
PC.
The power supply fan provides the basic cooling for the PC. Some
power supply units come with a sensor that will spin the fan faster
if required. The 3 pin sensor plugs directly into the motherboard.
Case fans snap into special brackets on the case to provide
additional cooling. Most modern PCs come with case fans.
Page | 177
Maintaining Airflow

A typical case layout will have a fan near the bottom taking cool air
from outside and blowing it over the internal components. At the
top of the case is an exhaust fan that will take warm air and blow it
outside of the unit. Fan sizes range from about 80mm to over
120mm. Using temperature sensors that speed up or slow down
fans in response to temperature changes is a good idea. Modern
systems support 3 fans via 3-pin connectors on the motherboard;
the CPU fan, the power supply fan and the system fan. Within
CMOS there is (sometimes) a utility to control fans, so that an
alarm is sounded when a certain temperature is reached.

http://www.almico.com/speedfan.php is a free download that monitors

voltages, fan speeds and temperatures in computers with
hardware monitor chips.

System fan

The Best way to check a power supply is to use a multimeter.

Remove the back cover and power on the PC. Locate a spare
Molex connector and place the live wire into red and the black wire
into black – this should produce a reading of 5V. Placing the live
wire into yellow with the black wire in black should show a reading
of 12V. If a motherboard is not available to plug the power supply
into use a power supply tester. The power switch located behind
the on/off button on every PC fails occasionally.
Whenever intermittent PC problems arise; suspect a power supply
problem.

It is good practice to have a category C (live electrical equipment)

fire extinguisher available when dealing with electricity.
Page | 178
CHAPTER 18 Security

A software tracking system (www.computersecurity.com) can be

installed that will automatically delete sensitive data if the
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computer is stolen.

Security on Network

It is best to create groups to control user access. Users should

belong to groups with privileges defined at group level. Ensure the
default group, EVERYONE is assigned appropriate authority; the
default is very powerful.

Use policies to determine activities permitted for example, ability

to change the registry, access to the command prompt, number of
invalid logon attempts allowed and minimum number of characters
for a password.

Two tools can be used to report problems in windows; auditing

and event viewer (can be found in administrative tools in control
panel).

Malicious Software

Most common malware

 grayware
 spam
 viruses
 Trojan horses
 worms

Grayware is programs that don’t actually cause tangible damage.

There are 3 types; pop-ups, spyware and adware.

Spyware records browsing activity and adware provide advertising

based on that activity. To get rid of a pop-up; ALT TAB will bring
the browser to the forefront and ALT F4 will close it. Or right click
the browser icon on task bar (task bar has start in bottom left) and
select close.
Windows defender, Lavasoft’s Ad-Aware and PepiMK’s Spybot
Search & Destroy is recommended for removing spyware.

It is possible to block spam by subject or from particular recipients.

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Worms are designed to take advantage of security vulnerabilities
and install themselves. They can overwhelm Networks by rapidly
consuming bandwidth.

Trojan horses are programs that pretend to be something other

than what they actually are. A utility that purports to be a disk
cleaner may actually be a virus.

Viruses spread from computer to computer. Anti-virus programs

compare what the boot sector looks like with what it should look
like. Differences are highlighted as potential threats. Also anti-virus
programs operate by passively monitoring events and generating
alerts, when an executable file is run or an email is being received.
Engine is another name for core anti-virus programs.

Viruses are detected by signature recognition. A library of

signatures is held by the anti-virus program. A signature is the
code pattern of a particular virus.

A polymorph virus is one that attempts to change its signature. To

combat this, anti-virus programs attempt to recognise this change.
Another way is by creating a checksum for each file and doing a
comparison. A checksum is a number generated by the anti-virus
program based on the contents of the file rather than its name,
date, size etc. Differences to this checksum are an indication of the
presence of a virus.

A Stealth virus hides in the boot sector from anti-virus programs. A

list of signatures held by an anti-virus program is stored in a
definition file, which needs to be kept up to date.

If a machine is infected with a boot sector virus it may be

necessary to boot from CD. This will load without interacting with
the hard drive.
Authentication

PAP Password authentication protocol is the oldest and most

basic. It sends login information is clear text. TELNET uses this
protocol. Page | 181

CHAP Challenge Handshake Authentication Protocol is the most

common remote access protocol; the remote client is challenged to
provide some secret information; usually a password.

MS-CHAP is Microsoft’s variation of the CHAP protocol; a more

advanced encryption. MS-CHAP v2 comes with VISTA.

For dial-up IPSec is the type of encryption used.

The most famous of all application encryption, is Netscape’s

Secure Sockets Layer (SSL). Microsoft incorporates SSL into the
HTTPS (HTTP over SSL) protocol. HTTPS establishes a secure
encrypted connection between the web browser and the server.

A public key is sent by both, known as a digital certificate.

VeriSign is probably the most famous (trusted authority)
organisation that issues and verifies digital certificates.

If a certificate is received from a source not listed in the browsers

database/list of trusted authorities; a message is issued asking if
you would like to proceed.

VPNs use an encrypted tunnel enabling connection to a central

company server from a remote location, using a protocol like PPTP
(point-to-point tunnelling protocol). VPNs have endpoints in order
to function and are not very speedy.

RRAS (Routing and Remote Access Service) runs on the server.

A File sharing application like bitTorrent can be used to share
music anonymously and download applications like Ubuntu.

SSH (secure shell) has replaced Telnet for terminal emulation.

Dial–up links to the internet use the (Point to Point) PPP protocol.
Phone systems are digital apart from the line from home to the
telephone exchange.
Wireless

Service set identifier SSID, also called Network name should be

Page | 182
changed from the default.

With Ad hoc mode every node is connected to every other node.

It is a decentralised free for all. Ad hoc mode is good for small
study groups or business meetings. No WAP is required; nodes to
have the same SSID and a different IP address.

With Infrastructure mode a WAP (or wireless router) is connected

to a wired segment.

Standards

Standard Speed Range Description

802.11a 54Mbps 150 feet 5Ghz - less
prone to
interference
than 802.11b,g
802.11b 11Mbps 300 feet 2.4Ghz 14
channels
available - 3
non
overlapping
802.11g 54Mbps 300 feet 2.4Ghz 14
channels
available - 3
non
overlapping -
share same
frequency
spectrum as
mobile phones
garage doors,
baby monitors
etc. so scope
for interference
802.11n 100+ Mbps 300+ feet 5Ghz and
2.4Ghz –
 makes use of
multiple
antennae to
reduce dead
spots and
Page | 183
interference
and increase
speed

All of the above support ad-hoc and infrastructure mode SSID,

MAC filtering, industry-standard WEP and WPA.

Mac address filtering can limit devices to those with a specific Mac
address. WEP uses standard 40 bit encryption; is extremely
vulnerable to attack BUT better than nothing. WEP provides
encryption only between the WAP and wireless device. Encryption
is stripped from the packet as it travels up through the Network
layers.

WPA is end to end. WPA2 is intended to lock down wireless

Networks using the advanced encryption standard (AES).

You may need to update firmware on the router. Ensure the

correct firmware is downloaded otherwise the WAP will be
inoperable.

Wireless speeds range from about 2Mbps to about 100Mbps. A

distance exceeding 25ft will result in lower speeds. Objects
capable of blocking wireless signals are large fridges, a/c units and
fuse boxes.

You can boost speeds by installing multiple WAPs or a faster

WAP.

Wi-Fi is the name for Ethernet wireless; with a frequency at either

2.4 GHz or 5 GHz (5.8 GHz).
See the table below for an explanation of csma/ca and csma/cd.

csma/ca Wireless Network standard

carrier sense multiple
Page | 184
access/collision avoidance
csma/cd Wired Ethernet Networks carrier
sense multiple access/collision
detection

The Infrared wireless standard Irda has a speed of 4Mbps. The

range is 1 meter. It supports point to point, or ad hoc
communications and has no security.

Bluetooth has replaced infrared for transferring files. Versions 1

and 1.2 support speeds of about 1Mbps. Versions 2 and 2.1
support speeds of up to 3Mbps. Bluetooth operates on 17
frequencies in the 2.4 GHz range. It is not susceptible to
interference due to an ability to rapidly change frequencies. There
are 3 power ratings

Class 1 - 100mW 100m

Class 2 - 2.5mW 10m
Class 3 - 1mW 1 meter

Laptops with infrared windows can be operated with a remote just

like a TV.