Peter_M.

Peter M.



Bryan's Wiki

Emmanuals Wiki --

Wiki you are reviewing:
** || **Student Reviewer Feedback ** || ||  || ||   || ||   || ||   ||
 * **Criteria Descriptors
 * **Quality of Content**
 * Does the content (writing) make sense? ||  ||
 * Can you identify any areas which need clarification? ||  ||
 * Pose three questions that arise from your reading ||  ||
 * **Communication**
 * Look at the Discussion pages of the wiki pages - effective communication? ||  ||
 * Do they need more? ||  ||
 * Are they clear in their messages to each other? ||  ||
 * Is there a sense of negotiation and collaboration? ||  ||
 * **Collaboration**
 * Does the work appear to be equally shared? ||  ||
 * Does there appear to be any difficulties by one or more members of the team? ||  ||
 * **Presentation - Layout and Design**
 * Amount and relevance of graphics and media - comment on that ||  ||
 * Recommendations? ||  ||

Information Technology Global Society

//Hardware+Networks// Identify

-Encryption: a way to make a digital object secret

-Compatibility: The ability for newer objects to work with older objects

-ASCII: A special format for text

-Peripheral: A device, A piece of hardware

-Trojan Horse: A Malicious digital object that is perceived by the end user as a harmless object

Define

__Storage__(IT): A piece of hardware that a computer uses to keep digital information. An example is a hard drive. That nowadays is one of the most important storage device in computers. That is where you save your documents, the Operating System is located along with other information of a computer. __Memory__(IT):Mostly computer components, devices and recording media that retain digital data used for computing for some interval of time. An example of this is RAM (Random Access Memory). Although in some ways similar to HDD memory, once a computer is turned off, any data that was stored on the RAM DIMM is erased when the computer is off.

__FIrewall__: A firewall's basic task is to regulate the flow of traffic between computer networks of different trust levels. Typical examples are the Internet which is a zone with no trust and an internal network which is a zone of higher trust.

__Ethernet:__ It is a cable used to network two computers or connect one to the internet. Its appearance can be described as a fat phone cable.

__Baud:__ The number of distinct symbol changes (signalling events) made to the transmission medium per second in a digitally modulated signal.

The first video card, which was released with the first IBM PC, was developed by IBM in 1981. The MDA (Monochrome Display Adapter) could only work in text mode representing 25x80 lines in the screen. It had a 4KB video memory and just one color.[1] Timeline of popular display technologies
 * 1981 || Monochrome Display adapter developed ||
 * 1982 || Color Graphics Adapter introduced in 1981 by IBM, as the first color display standard for the IBM PC[[[|http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBM_PC|].]] The standard CGA graphics cards were equipped with 16 KB video RAM. ||
 * 1984 || - Hercules A monochrome display capable of sharp text and graphics for its time of introduction. Very popular with the Lotus 1-2-3 spreadsheet, which was one of the PC's first Killer apps Introduced in 1982.

-Enhanced Graphics Adapter (EGA) Introduced in 1984 by IBM. A resolution of 640 × 350 pixels of 16 different colors (4 bits per pixel, or //bpp//), selectable from a 64-color pallette (2 bits per each of red-green-blue).

-Professional Graphics Controller (PGC)With on-board 2D and 3D acceleration introduced in 1984 for the 8-bit PC-bus, intended for CAD applications, a triple-board display adapter with built-in processor, and displaying video with a 60 Hz frame rate. ||
 * 1987 || -Multicolor Graphics Adapter (MCGA) Introduced on selected PS/2 models [[[|http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1987|]is]] 1984, with reduced cost compared to VGA MCGA had a 320x200 256 color (from a 262,144 color palette mode, and a 640x480 mode only in monochrome due to 64k video memory, compared to the 256k memory of VGA.

-Video Graphics Array (VGA) Introduced in 1987[|] by IBM. VGA is actually a set of different resolutions, but is most commonly used today to refer to 640 × 480 pixel displays with 16 colors (4 bits per pixel) and a 4:3 aspect ratio. Other display modes are also defined as VGA, such as 320 × 200 at 256 colors (8 bits per pixel) and a text mode with 720 × 400 pixels. VGA displays and adapters are generally capable of Mode X graphics, an undocumented mode to allow increased non-standard resolutions. || media type="custom" key="454889" As of now the state of the art display adapter that is available to the market is three or four Nvidia 8800Ultra (Overclocked if available) in SLI. HW: 3 annotated sources Source: Hardware, Toms. "Desktop VGA Charts 2007." __Toms Hardware__. 2007. 17 Dec 2007 <[|http://www23.tomshardware.com/graphics_2007.html?modelx=33&model1=853&model2=722&chart=275]
 * 1989 || Super Video Graphics Array (SVGA) video display standard created by VESA[|] for IBM PC compatible personal computers. Introduced in 1989 ||
 * 1990 || Extended Graphics Array (XGA) An IBM display standard introduced in 1990. XGA-2 added 1024 × 768 support for high color and higher refresh rates, improved performance, and support for 1360 × 1024 in 16 colors (4 bits per pixel). ||
 * 1990+ || Widescreen Extended Graphics Array (WXGA) A version of the XGA format. This display aspect ratio is becoming popular in some recent notebook computers. ||
 * Today || Super XGA (Super Extended Graphics Array) A widely used //de facto// 32 bit Truecolor standard, with an unusual aspect ratioof 5:4 instead of the more common 4:3 which means, if scaled, images appear wider on SXGA displays than most other resolutions. This is generally the physical aspect ratio & native resolution of 17" LCD monitors. * Some manufacturers, noting that the //de facto// industry standard was VGA (Video Graphics Array), termed this the Extended Video Graphics Array or XVGA.
 * Widescreen Extended Graphics Array PLUS (WXGA+) A version of the WXGA format. This display aspect ratio is becoming popular in some recent notebook computers, as well as 19" widescreen LCD monitors where it is the native resolution ||

This source shows benchmarks (test) of current demanding 3D games. The units are measured in FPS (Frames Per Second). The higher the FPS the smoother the game will run and the lower FPS, the game will look like a slideshow.

The first video cards used in the earliest machines conformed to the //MDA// standard, established by IBM as part of the original PC. MDA is a monochrome-only, text-only standard, allowing text display at 80x25 characters. Each character is made up of a matrix that is 9 dots wide by 14 dots high, yielding an effective resolution of 720x350 at a refresh rate of 50 Hz (of course it is text-only so these dots are not individually addressable).

Kozierok, Charles. "Monochrome Display Adapter (MDA)." __pcguide.com__. 4/17/2001. 18 Dec 2007 <[|http://www.pcguide.com/ref/video/stdMDA-c.html>.]

This is a decsription of the first type of display adapters for computers.

" Nvidia & ATI Graphic Cards: List." __Icronitic Forums__. 3/26/2006. 19 Dec 2007 <[|http://icrontic.com/forum/showthread.php?t=43899>.]

This shows a list of past and present Nvidia and ATi Video cards./

"What is DirectX?." __Developer.com__. 21 Dec 2007 <[|http://www.developer.com/open/article.php/968461>.] This is the technology that all modern display adapters use to enhance 3d applications.

Kozierok., Charles. "Hercules Graphics Card." __PCGuide__. 11 APR 2001. 21 Dec 2007 <[|http://www.pcguide.com/ref/video/std.htm>.]

This was one of the first popular video cards.

"Color Graphics Adapter (CGA)." __PC Guide__. 17 APR 2001. 21 Dec 2007 <[|http://www.pcguide.com/ref/video/stdCGA-c.html>.]

This was the first display adapter that could output color images, It contained 16kb of video memory.

"Video Graphics Adapter (VGA)." __PC Guide__. 17 APR 2001. 21 Dec 2007 <[|http://www.pcguide.com/ref/video/stdVGA-c.html>.]

This was the first mainstream video display technonlogy that is still used today. It could handle a resolution of 640x480, which was a very high one.

Extended Graphics Array (XGA) Kozierok., Charles M.. "Super VGA (SVGA) and Other Standards Beyond VGA." __PC Guide__. 17 APR 2007. 21 Dec 2007 <[|http://www.pcguide.com/ref/video/std.htm>.]

This is one of the most popular type of resolutions used today.

Kozierok., Charles M.. "VESA Super VGA Standards." __PC Guide__. 17 APR 2007. 21 Dec 2007 <[|http://www.pcguide.com/ref/video/std.htm>.]

Engdahl, Tomi. "VGA Cable Pinout." __http://www.tkk.fi/Misc/Electronics/faq/__. 06 May 2006. 21 Dec 2007 <[|http://www.tkk.fi/Misc/Electronics/faq/vga2rgb/scart.html>.]

This is the schematic that shows which pin on the 15-pin VGA cable does.