Monday, February 24, 2014

pc ports


What is a Port?

  •     A computer port is a physical docking point using which an external device can be connected to the computer.
  •     A computer port can also be programmatic docking point through which information flows from a program to computer or over the internet.

Characteristics


  •     External devices are connected to a computer using cables and ports.
  •     Ports are slots on the motherboard into which a cable of external device is plugged in.
  •     Examples of external devices attached via ports are mouse, keyboard, monitor, microphone , speakers, etc.



Ports



Following are few important types of ports:

 

 

Serial Port

  • Used for external modems and older computer mouse.
  • Two versions: 9 pin, 25 pin model.
  • Data travels at 115 kilobits per second.


     

 

 

Parallel Port

  • Used for scanners and printers
  • Also called printer port.
  • 25 pin model.
  • Also known as IEEE 1284-compliant Centronics port.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

PS/2 Port

  • Used for old computer keyboard and mouse
  • Also called mouse port.
  • Most of the old computers provide two PS/2 ports, each for mouse and keyboard.
  • Also known as IEEE 1284-compliant Centronics port.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Universal Serial Bus (or USB) Port

  • Can connect all kinds of external USB devices such as external hard disk, printer, scanner, mouse, keyboard, etc.
  • Introduced in 1997.
  • Most of the computers provide two USB ports as minimum.
  • Data travels at 12 megabits per second.
  • USB compliant devices can get power from a USB port.
     

 

VGA Port

  • Connects monitor to a computer's video card.
  • Has 15 holes.
  • Similar to serial port connector but serial port connector has pins, it has holes. 

 

Power Connector

  • Three-pronged plug
  • Connects to the computer's power cable that plugs into a power bar or wall socket.

     

 

 

Firewire Port

  • Transfer large amounts of data at very fast speed.
  • Connects camcorders and video equipments to the computer
  • Data travels at 400 to 800 megabits per second.
  • Invented by Apple
  • Three variants: 4-Pin FireWire 400 connector, 6-Pin FireWire 400 connector and 9-Pin FireWire 800 connector

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Modem

  • Connects a PC's modem to the telephone network.
    • Computer Modern is the family of typefaces used by default by the typesetting program TeX. It was created by Donald Knuth with his Metafont program, and was most recently updated in 1992. Computer Modern, or variants of it, remain very widely used in scientific publishing, especially in disciplines that make frequent use of mathematical notation.

 

Ethernet Port

  • Connects to a network and high speed Internet.
  • Connects network cable to a computer.
  • This port resides on an Ethernet Card.
  • Data travels at 10 megabits to 1000 megabits per second depending upon the network bandwidth
     
    .

 

Game Port

  • Connect a PC to a joystick.
  • Now replaced by USB.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Digital Video Interface, DVI port

  • Connects a Flat panel LCD monitor to the computer's high-end video graphic cards.
  • Very popular among video card manufacturers.
     

 

Sockets

  • Connect microphone, speakers to sound card of the computer 

No comments:

Post a Comment