Joshua Sirias PC Manual

Joshua Sirias PC Architecture

Joshua Sirias IS102 PC Manual 1

PC ARCHITECTURE Bachelor of Information Systems

IS 102 Tutor: Mr. O Tukavai

Tutor: Mr R Sos

Credit Points: 8



PC Manual (Guidelines)

By Joshua SIRIAS

Abstract: Three separate and contrasting PC systems are

described and studied at a level for a beginning technician.

Two are studied primarily by dismantling and the other

primarily by using software diagnostic tools.

1. Introduction

1.1 Rationale It is important for members of the IT / IS profession to have a good working

knowledge of PC architecture. Some members may specialise in PC maintenance and

support in their subsequent careers. Others may need to be able to service machines in

emergencies, particularly if they are working in remote locations where specialised

technical help is not readily available. Others may go into their own business or

become IT managers. All need a good working knowledge of computer hardware and

its functioning.

1.2 Objectives

This manual aims to provide technical information on each of the two supplied PC’s:

the Hardware PC and the Diagnostic PC. It is meant to be informative to first year

Diploma students as they prepare to enter the world of work experience in the IT / IS

industry.

As these are older machines, some information may not be available. Some

information will be obtained by dismantling and external observation and other

information will be obtained from Diagnostic software.

2. Diagnostic Software

The following diagnostic software tools were used to gather required information for

the Diagnostic PC:

• Nuts & Bolts

• MSD

• Amidiag

• Norton’s Utilities

• PCCHECK

• SiSoft Sandra

• System/ Device Manager from Control Panel in Windows 93

3 External Views of PC Case Types

AT PC Desktop

ATX PC Full Tower

Laptop ASUS® F3J

The following diagrams were constructed to show the external features of the

different PC’s studied. They were drawn using Microsoft Office Word 2010.



3.1 Labelled Front Panel



3.2 Labelled Rear Panel



3.3 Laptop Side Panels



4 Internal Components

This is a labelled side view with the case cover removed showing the internal

components. These include expansion slots, expansion cards, data cables, HDD, FDD,

CD ROM, Power supply.

4.1 AT/ATX PC Internal Components



4.2 Laptop Internal Components



5 System Board Architecture

5.1 AT PC Motherboard This is an AT (mini) system board manufactured by Intel. The following labelled

diagram shows the main features:



5.2 ATX PC Motherboard This is an ATX (mini) system board manufactured by Intel. The following labelled

diagram shows the main features:



5.3 Laptop Motherboard

6. CPU

On the Hardware PC, the CPU will have to be identified by direct observation. The

speed cannot be checked so check your text for the range of possible speeds available

for that CPU model. The other specifications can be obtained also from the text.

Information about the CPU on the Diagnostic PC can be obtained from your

diagnostic tools, such as: Nuts & Bolts, SiSoft Sandra, etc. Nuts & Bolts will also

give you the actual speed the CPU is running at, as well as the speed it is supposed to

run at.

The following table contains the technical specifications of each of the CPU’s studied.

The manufacturer is Intel for the AT PC, ATX PC and the Laptop also.



The terms used in this table are defined as follows:

• Clock speed: Clock speed is the rate at which a processor can complete a

processing cycle. It is typically measured in megahertz or gigahertz. One

megahertz is equal to one million cycles per second, while one gigahertz

equals one billion cycles per second.

• Internal Register: The size of the internal registers indicate how much

information the processor can operate on at one time and how it moves data

around internally within the chip. This is sometimes also referred to as the

internal data bus.

• Address bus: The address bus is the set of wires that carries the addressing

information used to describe the memory location to which the data is being

sent or from which the data is being retrieved

• Addressable memory: Addressable memory refers to the amount of memory

addresses that can be executed by the memory

•

• Virtual Memory: A memory technique that allows several programs to run

simultaneously even though the system does not have enough actual memory

installed to do this.

•

• Cycles per Instruction: Cycles per instruction refers to the time taken for

instructions to be executed in one second. The time required for an

instruction to be executed (in cycles) varies due to the different systems

clock speed or number of cycles per second

Other special characteristics of these CPU’s include the following:

The processing of data and storing it in the RAM.

Assigning of the addresses for the execution of the instructions that are needed to

process a task.

CPU Clock

Speed

Internal

Register

External

Databus

Address

Bus

Addressable

memory

Virtual

memory

Cycles /

instruction

AT PC Intel

Pentium

III

1.13GHz 32-bit 32-bit 32-bit 4GB 64TB 2

ATX PC Intel

Pentium

III


Laptop Intel®

Core™

Duo

Processor

T2400




7. Motherboard Chip Set The following diagram illustrates the relationship of the chipset components:

7.1 AT Motherboard

ATX Motherboard



The following table summarises the chipset components:

North Bridge South Bridge Super I/O Other

AT PC SiS 85C47 PIIX4M IDE Controller

ATX PC UM 8881F UM886BF Microprocessor

Laptop ICX4M ICX9R

The functions of the various members of the chipset are as follows:

• North Bridge: The North bridge is the connection between the high – speed

processor bus (200/133/100/66MHz) and the slower AGP (66MHz) and PCI

(33MHz) buses. It contains the cache, main memory and AGP controllers as

well as the interface between the high – speed (normally 66MHz or 100MHz)

processor bus and the 33Mhz PCI (Peripheral Component Interconnect) or

66MHz AGP (Accelerated Graphics Port) buses.

• South Bridge: The Southbridge is the bridge between the PCI bus (33MHz)

and the even slower ISA bus (8MHz). It contains the IDE interface ports and

the interface to the 8MHz ISA bus. The South Bridge normally contains the

USB interface and all of the components that make up the UAS bus, including

the interrupt and DMA controllers

• Super I/O Chip: The super I/O chip is separate chip attached to the ISA bus

that is not really considered part of the chipset, and often comes to a third

party such as National Semiconductor or SMSc (Standard Microsystems

Corp.) It also holds commonly used peripherals items all combined into a

single chip. The Super I/O chip is connected to the 8MHz ISA bus and

contains all the standard peripherals that is built into a motherboard. For

example, most I/O chips contain the serial ports, parallel port, floppy

controller, and keyboard/mouse interface. Optionally they may also contain

the CMOS RAM/ clock, IDE controllers and game port face as well.

• Other: Processor interface

Memory controllers

Bus controllers

I/O controllers and others

8. BIOS and the Setup Utility

BIOS

Manufacturer

Production

Date

CMOS chip

AT PC AMIBIOS 12/15/1993 Type 47

ATX PC AWARD

SOFTWARE

03/21/1997 Unable to

identify

Laptop Intel 24/07/2003

If this information is not readily available, use Nuts & Bolts.



The function of the CMOS setup utility is to determine the types of devices and

options installed in the system

The CMOS setup utility on the diagnostic PC is accessed by pressing a special key or

a key combination. Typical keys and key combinations include the DELETE key, the

ESC key, the F2 function key, the CTRL and ESC keys and the CTRL-ALT-ESC key

combination. The keys or key combination used to access the set up menus vary from

one BIOS manufacturer to another. For the set up utility, the pause button is pressed

to halt the boot up process and enter the CMOS set up utility.

The function of the CMOS ROM: The CMOS ROM is special chip that had a simple

digital clock, which used 10 bytes of RAM and an additional 54 more bytes of

leftover RAM in which anything could store. The designers used these extra 54 bytes

to store the system configuration

The real time clock setting on a PC can be changed by activating the standard CMOS

settings and clicking on the Date and Time utilities to set system date and time can

change the real time clock setting on a PC. Several keys or key combinations like the

page up and page down keys or the +/ - keys enables the setting of times on the real

time clock.

The errors to halt the boot process on can be changed by pressing a special key or a

combination of keys. Typical key combinations include the CTRL- ALT – DEL and

the ESC or F2 function key. The PAUSE button can also be pressed to halt the boot

process.

RAM Modules Bank Size

AT PC 256 MB 2

ATX PC 512 MB 2

Laptop 1 GB 2

10. Floppy Disk Drive Specifications

The following specifications were obtained, using PCCHECK or other diagnostic

software, for the floppy disk drive on the Diagnostic PC:

General Information: Value

Drive Class Removable

Logical Drive:

Sectors per cluster

Bytes per sector 512

Cluster size

Total clusters 2847

Physical

Cylinders 180

Heads 2

Sectors per track 18




Describe how to identify and attach the data cables for the FDD. How will you

know if the FDD is functioning?

The Floppy Disk Drive can be identified by its 34 – pin data cable which has the

controller connection at one end and a drive connection at the other end. When

attaching the cables, the red or pinkish - stripped line outlining the side of the 34 -pin

cable indicates the direction into which the P1 on the IDE controller connection will

connect to on the system board. The other end of the 34 – pin data cable, which is the

floppy disk drive connection end with the twist in it, connects to the floppy disk drive.

11. Hard Disk Drive Specifications The following specifications were obtained, using the CMOS Setup utility or other

diagnostic software, for the hard drive on the Diagnostic PC:

Field Value General Drive Information

Manufacturer: Fujistu (Thailand) Co, Ltd

Model: MI612TAU

Date: 1996 – 4

Rating: 12 V – 029A

Volume Information

File system FAT (Hard drive– 6 bits)

Serial number 2664.OEC5

Volume Properties

Maximum Filename Length 255 chars

Preserves Filename case YES

Logical Drive

Sectors per cluster 16


Cluster size 8kB

Total Free Clusters 5271

Disk Cache

Current size 2032kB

Maximum size 10MB

Minimum size 484kB

Typical Role Desktop Computer

For the hardware PC find what you can from labels on the HDD.

Hardware PC Hard Disk Drive

Brand name: Caviar 2420

Type: AT Compatible Intelligent Drive

Drive Parameters: 989 cyl. 15 heads 56spt. 425.3 MB

Describe how to identify and attach the data cables for the HDD. How will you

know if the HDD is functioning?



The Hard Disk Drive IDE 40 – pin data cable can be identified by the red or pink

striped lines on the cable that connects into P1 on the IDE connector on a system

board. The 40 – pin data cable connector that is furthest from the Hard Disk Drive

connector is often connected onto the system board. The other 40 – pin data cable

connector end, which is closer to the connection for a second drive, is usually

connected to the hard disk drive (p238).

The LED (Light Emitting Device) test that is carried out during the POST (Power On

Self-Test) during the boot-up process often indicates whether the Hard Disk Drive is

functioning or not.

12. System Resources

IRQ INFORMATION

Processor 486DX4

Speed 100.6 MHz

Co –Processor Internal

Bus Type (s) ISA, IDE

Internal Cache 16KB

External Cache 256 KB

BIOS Type AMI

Release Date 12/15/93

IRQ Device

0 System Timer

1 Keyboard

2 Cascade

3 COM 1

4 Unused

5 Sound Blaster

6 Floppy

7 Unused

8 Real Time Clock

9 Cascade

10 Unused

11 Unused

12 Mouse

13 Co-Processor

14 Hard Disk CDROM

13. Power Supply The power supply voltage on the Diagnostic PC was tested with an analogue

voltmeter and the following voltages were obtained:



Voltage across Voltage

Red & Black (+5 volts) & (0 volts)

Yellow & Black (+12 volts) & (0

volts)

P8


Red & Black (+5 volts) & (0 volts)

Black & white (0 volts) & (-5 volts)

P9


Black & Blue (0 volts) & -(12 volts)

Yellow & Black (+12 volts) & (0

volts)

The voltage converter on the motherboard is used to convert high voltages to lower

voltages so that the acceptable amount of current is used in the machine. The small

wires that are attached to it identify it and it is located just next to the CPU on the PC

motherboard.

13. Video Card Identify your video card and the video chipset using the following diagram for

reference.



14. Other Expansion Cards

AT PC Sound Card 15-pin 3 row Video card,

ATX PC 15-pin 3 row video

expansion card

Identify components on your various expansion cards.

15. Conclusion

Both PC’s prescribed for study in the Unit PC Architecture have been described to a

level expected of a first semester Diploma 1 student. A lot has been learnt about PC’s

and their architecture, and familiarity has been gained in the physical process of

assembling and dismantling of a PC. All in all, the combination of skills and

knowledge of dismantling and using different software on a PC can be very helpful

for the end user themselves because the repair work would be much easier to them.



References Andrews, J., (2001). Enhanced A+ Guide to Managing and Maintaining Your PC,

Course Technology, Thomson Learning.

Bigelow, S.J. (2000). Troubleshooting, Maintaining & Repairing PCs, Berkely:

McGraw-Hill.

Brooks, C.J. (2000). A+ Certification Concepts & Practice, NJ: Prentice Hall.

Computer Hope (n.d.). SIO. Retrieved May 21st, 2013 from

http://www.computerhope.com/jargon/s/sio.htm

Mueller, S. (2000). Upgrading and Repairing PC’s (12th

Ed.), Indiana:Que.

Mueller S, Edward M (2001). Microprocessor Types and Specifications. Retrieved

May 25, 2013 from

http://www.informit.com/articles/article.aspx?p=130978&seqNum=4\

Wiley Publishing (n.d.). The North Bridge and South Bridge Chips on a

Motherboard. Retrieved April 16th

, 2013 from

http://www.howstuffworks.com/motherboard-north-bridge-south-bridge.htm.

Mueller S, Edward M (2001). Microprocessor Types and Specifications. Retrieved

May 25, 2013 from

http://www.informit.com/articles/article.aspx?p=130978&seqNum=4\

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