What is DirectX? by Madison Lockwood
DirectX is a family of "application program interfaces" (APIs) that are designed by Microsoft to make graphics functionality of Microsoft compatible software -especially videogames - function smoothly and at their highest level. There have been DirectX versions 3,5,6,7,8,9 and now, concurrent... It will be the first Microsoft operating system designed to run on both 32 bit and the new generation of 64 bit chips - a quantum step forward in computer speed and sophistication. ... That means a lot less interchange of information between the computer's central functioning units and the video...

Laptop CPU's-A General Guide by Darren Blythe
The central processing unit (CPU) is probably the most important chip in the computer. It contains the arithmetic and logic unit (ALU), so the computer can do calculations, and the control unit that controls the flow of data between the CPU and other components. ... Money saved on processors might more usefully be spent on memory or better graphics. ... They work in a different way which makes them operate just as fast but at a lower MHz speed. ... A fine example of this is the Pentium Mobile (Centrino) 1.6 GHz which is equivalent in speed to a Desktop P4 3.0 GHz!!

RAM - What is It & Why You Need Plenty by Steve Perlow
This is the first article in the Understanding Your Computer series from aworldofhelp.com. Our goal is to help people understand how their computer works, not simply tell them what they need to buy or use. When you know how your computer works, buying the right system or upgrade is easy. ... RAM - What is it & why you need plenty Many people picture a computer as consisting in part of a Processor - CPU Memory - RAM Hard Drive The way these three components interact is important to understanding how a computer works, and ultimately to understanding why you need enough RAM for your...

Dual Core Computer Processors: Luxury or Necessity? by Peter Stewart
Most of the talk going on in the computer processor industry is revolving around dual core processors. But what advantages do they actually give and is it worth it in terms of price? All processors have a core. A processor contains some memory, often referred to as cache, either L1, L2 or L3,... As modern programs make much heavier use of other computer parts like memory, and there are often many running at the same time, another approach was needed. ... Unlike the multitasking environment that is usual for a computer either at home or at the office, games rely on the brute force of a...

We Know Why You Haven’t Decided Yet To Purchase A Security Product! by Liuba Ceban
There are many people, who heared about the security tools, available for data protection. But it is not an easy issue to understand to those who are not software literate. In this article we will look at this issue in order to understand that. With the growth of information technologies,... USB (universal serial bus) tokens are smaller token-style cards that plug directly into the USB port of a computer. ... Dekart Key Manager Utility can help determining the memory usage of the card, performing backups and duplicating the data stored on the hardware keys.

Hardware Inside Xbox3 Reviewed and Explained by Aaron Brooks
Gaming has reached new levels with newer and meaner machines coming into the market. The Xbox 360, PSP3, and Wii are all set to fulfill gaming dreams. What makes a console powerful and state-of-art is its hardware. The Xbox 360 has a 20GB hard drive; wireless controllers; headset; DVD remote;... • The memory system is GenX and has a 512 MB of 700 megahertz GDDR3 RAM on a 128-bit bus. ... • Inside the mean gaming machine, the Xbox 360 is a powerful computer. ... The system has a unified memory architecture which is shared by the CPU and GPU.

War of the Disks: A Close-in Analysis of the Hard Disk Drive vs. the Solid State Disk by Joanne De Peralta
Much has been written about solid state disks (SSDs) becoming the next big thing1 in the IT industry(1). But as to whether or not we have enough knowledge of how it will revolutionize the industry is a different question. How much do we really know about SSDs? ... Although the most common Flash chips have around 300,000 write cycles, the best Flash chips are rated at 1,000,000 write cycles per block. ... SSD components include either DRAM or flash memory boards, a memory bus board, a CPU, and a battery card.

Tale of Two Phones by Chin Wong
By now, the whole world knows about the iPhone, Apple’s first stab at the mobile phone business. Not even on sale yet, the phone has stirred up a feeding frenzy in the press on the strength of Apple’s remarkable success with the iPod and Steve Jobs’ legendary marketing skills. ... It will have no camera, but it will have a replaceable battery and a micro-SD slot for extra memory. ... “But this concept is limiting; a mobile phone has the potential to be a platform that can do anything that a small computer with broadband access can do.

Data Loss - The 7 Most Common Symptoms of a Failed Hard Drive by Jason Perry
If your hard drive is clicking or making grinding noises, you are experiencing system blue screens or system freezes, an error message greets you with ‘drive not formatted’ or ‘operating system not found’, or lastly you are in a never ending loop of computer reboots…there is a very good chance... Computer Keeps Re-Booting The most common reason a computer keeps re-booting over and over is because the boot sector has been hijacked by a virus that creates a continuous loop. ... It can be caused by a corrupt file or shared program files that have conflicting call procedures or too many...

Data Recovery - Hard Drive Crash? How to Recover Your Lost Data, Quickly! by Tony Roberts
Due to the advancements in technology, computers have become an essential tool used both for business and personal purposes. It is quite difficult to keep up with the times without a computer with an Internet connection which will keep you updated. With the onslaught of the Internet, it has... You see a blue screen while booting up your computer. ... This may mean that your computer’s OS or operating system is corrupted or damaged. ... Your computer often re-boots, restarts, hangs, or freezes. ... A bad sector causes your computer to freeze or hang while processing data.