Day 20

Today we went over IC3, We went over comparisons on buying laptops and giving a presentation.
We also did some computer hardware system, But I left after lunch because I had oral surgery recently and my gum line was really giving me trouble I had to run to the dentist(Not literally).
I will give a more in depth blog about day 21.
-Mark Bartlett

Day 19

So ladies and gentlemen                                                                                    Feb/19th/2013                                                                                
Welcome to another blog entry from my most excellent ITTechnician class!

So today we went over some more IC3 how exciting.

This included not limited to identifying  file types and matching them with the proper application.
We went into a bit more detail about creating sub folders and organizing the said folders.

We then jumped into identifying SATA or PATA hard drives before implementing the hard drive.
Note: Read the hard drive manual before setting up the jumpers.
After the hard drive is hard wired in, You now deal with bios and CMOS; From here you go on to setting up  dual partitions if you like, and formatting the hard drive.

We move onto the FAT system(fat 16 2 gb fat 32 4kb cluster) there is also fat 64 which is amazing.

Anyways we go over some more minor sections and error messages, But I'm going to cut this blog entry short, I have to make some flash cards. Ciao everyone

-Mark Bartlett

IC3 day

Feb/18/2013

So our class finally got into our IC3 books, and did a few rudimentary exercises.

We have gone over Operating systems quite extensively.  

Alot of the review was of the 3 different flavors, and the sub categories that were in said flavors.

We also went over the difference between the hardware and the O/S(operating system)

The O/S "performs the following actions- serves as a logical interface for the user and the hardware, Manages co-ordinates and services"

Here is a quote in regards to hardware "Hardware asks something to happen O/S makes it happen

provides logical environment in which application software can execute on the pc"

The O/S consists of 3 different "part's"

The" Kernel is loaded into the memory-contains the basic functions of the os which are memory management input output, file management, communications

The kernel provides services for communications software and the user interface.

Services that are not included in the kerner\l are called into memory temporarily and are executed as there needed."

The" User interface

Excerpts commands from the user and interprets them, this facilitates communication between the os and the user

Command interpreter

This is the gooey in the graphical environment and the command line interfaces, so non graphical"

And the "File System

Provides the methods used to organize files on the storage media

Storage-Access

To store files on the media and to provide access control and other types of file protection."

We also went quite a bit more in-depth, But those quotes are a good just of the situation.

We also went into task bar options and a few more small procedures, Moving on we were asked to choose a pc to log and document for the class Data base of computers that we will be working on and repairing throughout the remainder of the course.

-Mark Bartlett

Day 17

Welcome gentlemen.

So we started our day out right with some prevention by user steps and protocols, Then we moved onto computer process' a bit. We also covered trouble shooting between hardware and software, And I personally always say this, But NEVER ASSUME anything.

And once again we dabbled in powerpoint I will post the slide on this blog, It is on a need to know basis until then.

We then touched base on theories of trouble shooting,t he most common problems and then what to carry on you while doing repairs, I could go on but in other words we are trouble shoot pros now.

Moving on we went into Databases, This is a neat one! I cannot explain too much as its pretty basic You go into a program and create a few databses to fetch information from, and the info correlates with each other.

Now the real sweet part of today and maybe for awhile was actually getting a shipment of pcs to replace in the school it self, My team(I gave Colton leadership for this) did phenomenal IMO. We went further then we had too, And we left the place looking better then it was. Apparently the other groups disbanded and were all over the place.

Well on that note, I'm going to make my "brunch" and go enjoy the afk weather!

-Mark Bartlett

Day 16

Hey guys, I'm really cutting back on my blogs until I do more hardware as I really enjoy that part, And I also have two other classes to catch up on after classes.

But lets get started on day 16, We had to split up and group up and then review all of our pop quizs lately and decided who would write up the answers for each quiz; Then when all the writing is said and done, We exchange information for study purposes.
We also went over video Codecs today; video wrappers, dvd region codes and Blu ray region codes. and messed around a bit with mixing songs on acid 7.0, On this note we also did some video editing a few crops here and few crops there.

Near the end we went over operationl procedurs, Safety for on the job site and the Traits of a tech.

 Ah almost forgot, We also took apart some pcs with a group of 3' one of our partners left, We then sped up the process though even with a man down! Our pc was the first taken apart and cataloged, and then the first up and running as well, With extra parts in it to boot!
Ah ok ladies and gents sorry for the late posts. But enjoy!

-Mark Bartlett

Day 15

Another Excel day!

So today our class used Excel all day, I really did not enjoy it that  much.
We made fantasy hockey pools with long grueling data imports. But hey I learnt something new!
We imported data from a website, then we also made a selection of 12 players and made our own chart.
We also learned how to use a formula so our 12 player pool, can correlate with the NHL'S 686 player data base.

We had a CPU pop quiz, I did average in the class, But at least I have a reference point now on what I need to study up on. Well I had to draw this one out a bit as we learnt about Excel all morning, We only have half days on Tuesday btw.
As for my night, I studied a bit about some caches, CMOS and flasing the BIOS.

Anyways cya world, and sorry for the boring blog, I'm beat and I feel its unsafe to ingest any more caffeine.
-Mark Bartlett

Mobo reviews

MoBO review                                                                                                           Feb/10/2013

Section 1 Form Factors

ATX

This format was developed by intel to outdo the at factor

Measurements 12”x9.6”

Micro ATX

Backwards compatible with ATX and MICRO ATX cases,

Fewer chassis bays

9.6x9.x6”

ITX

Meant for theatres, or embedded systems.

Compatible with ATX chassis

Section 2 System board components

Bus architecture

- Serial communications  dominate- sustains data rates many times those of parallel connections.

Only downside is the capability of the transceivers.

Types

 SATA- USB, IEEE 1394/FIREwire, peripheral component interconnect express (PCIe)

The term bus is also used in any parallel or bit serial wiring implantation where multiple devices can be attached at the same time in parallel or in series(Daisy chained)

Chipsets

A chipset is a collection of chips or circuits that perfom interface and peripheral functions for the processor. This collection of chips is usually the circuitry that provides interfaces for memory, expansion cards, and onboard peripherals and generally dictates how a motherboard will communicate  with the installed peripherals.

Two major functions of a chipset, North bridge and southbridge

North Bridge

Peripheral boss primarily for communications with intergrated video

The cpuand memory occur over what is known as the frontside bus(FSB)

Backside bus (BSB) if present is responsible for the signal between the cpu and the cache memory

With no BSB the cache is placed on the frontside bus with the cpu and main memory.

Controls the southbridge

SouthBridge

Provides support to the onboard slower peripherals(P.S parallel ports, serial ports, serial and parallel ata, and so on), Unlike NORTHBRIDGE they do not keep up with the external clock of the cpu and do not represent a bottlekneck in the overall performance of the system.

The southbridge is responsible for handing the slower expansion buses

Section 3 Expansion Slots

Expansion Slots

Most visible on a MOBO

Ø  PCI

Ø  AGP

Ø  PCIe

Ø  CNR

PCI EXPANSION SLOTS

PCI EXPANSION buses operate at 33mhz or 66 mhz over a 32 bit (4 byte) channel

Data rates therefore at 133 and 266 mbps 133 mbps most common

Mixing 33 and 66 mhz adapters in a 66 mhz system will slow all adapters to 44mhz

Pci slots and adatpers are manufacture in 3.3 and 5v versions

Notches in the card 5v slots and adatpers oriented toward the front of the mobo

PCI-X expansion SLOT

Visually identical to 64bit PCImost common 133 mhz maximum 533 mhz, 8 byte (64 bit) Bus> maixumum throughput of 4622MBPS roughly 4.3 gbps

PCI-X supports a 266 mhz bus compatible with PCI ADAPTERS

PCI – X  targets server platforms

All adapters falling back to the frequency of the slowest inserted adapter

AGP expansion slots

Accelerated graphics port (AGP)

Mostly for legacy video card use

3d

AGP slots deigsned to be direct connection between the video circuitry and the PCS memory

BROWN slots

AGP X1 uses a 4 byte channel and a 66 mhz clock, results in data rate of 266 mbps

AGP 2X 4x and 8x multiply the 66mhz clock

PCIe Expansion Slots

Backwards compatible

PCIe is usually refered to as the bus architecture to simplify its comparison with other bus tehcnologies

Use switching correspondent bandwith

PciE is a serial technology, striping data packets across multiple serial paths to achieve higher data rates.

PCIE uses the concepts of lanes, which ware switched point to point signal paths between any two pcie components.

Seven different link widths

1x 2x 4x 8x 12x 16x and 32x

1x 4x 16x being most common

16x largest slot

Three major version of PCIE 1x 2x and 3.0

PCIE is compatible with PCI’s best

You can use smaller size cards in a bigger lane slot it will just run at the slower speed

PCIe is gamers choice

SLI on PCIe(two cards)

Perfomarnacne suffers without the proper amount of video cards in the slots

CNR Expansion Slots

Seperates the analog circuitry onto its own card. This allowed analog circuitry  to be separately certified from the already certified digital motherboard.

The communications and networking riser (CNR) slot that can be found on some was devolped after the Audio modem riser (AMR)

These legacy 60 pin slots allowed motherboard manufacturers to implement a motherboard chipset with certain integrated featuires.

A cnr riser card could be added to enhance the onboard capabilities 

CNR has good network support; plug and play compatibility support for hardware acceleration.

Mobo Notes at a glimpse

32 bit(4 Bytes)

64 bit(8byte)

North Bridge- Peripheral Boss- Controls South Bridge

South Bridge- provides support to the onboard slower peripherals

(ATX) advanced techonology extended

Micro Atx

ITX

(PCI) Peripheral component interconnect\

(PCIx)  EXtended

(AGP) Accelerated graphics port(BROWN SLOT)

(PCIe)Peripheral component express

(CNR) Communications and networking riser- 60 pin slots-Network Support

Good night everyone, Hope someone has learned something from this review.
-Mark Bartlett