Things U Need 2 Know....

The images you see on your monitor are made of tiny dots called pixels. At most common resolution settings, a screen displays over a million pixels, and the computer has to decide what to do with every one in order to create an image. To do this, it needs a translator -- something to take binary data from the CPU and turn it into a picture you can see. Unless a computer has graphics capability built into the motherboard, that translation takes place on the graphics card.
A graphics card's job is complex, but its principles and components are easy to understand. In this article, we will look at the basic parts of a video card and what they do. We'll also examine the factors that work together to make a fast, efficient graphics card.

­ Think of a computer as a company with its own art department. When people in the company want a piece of artwork, they send a request to the art department. The art department decides how to create the image and then puts it on paper. The end result is that someone's idea becomes an actual, viewable picture.
A graphics card works along the same principles. The CPU, working in conjunction with software applications, sends information about the image to the graphics card. The graphics card decides how to use the pixels on the screen to create the image. It then sends that information to the monitor through a cable. ­
Creating an image out of binary data is a demanding process. To make a 3-D image, the graphics card first creates a wire frame out of straight lines. Then, it rasterizes the image (fills in the remaining pixels). It also adds lighting, texture and color. For fast-paced games, the computer has to go through this process about sixty times per second. Without a graphics card to perform the necessary calculations, the workload would be too much for the computer to handle.
The graphics card accomplishes this task using four main components:

• A motherboard connection for data and power
• A processor to decide what to do with each pixel on the screen
• Memory to hold information about each pixel and to temporarily store completed pictures
• A monitor connection so you can see the final result

Next, we'll look at the processor and memory in more detail.
Like a motherboard, a graphics card is a printed circuit board that houses a processor and RAM. It also has an input/output system (BIOS) chip, which stores the card's settings and performs diagnostics on the memory, input and output at startup. A graphics card's processor, called a graphics processing unit (GPU), is similar to a computer's CPU. A GPU, however, is designed specifically for performing the complex mathematical and geometric calculations that are necessary for graphics rendering. Some of the fastest GPUs have more transistors than the average CPU. A GPU produces a lot of heat, so it is usually located under a heat sink or a fan.
In addition to its processing power, a GPU uses special programming to help it analyze and use data. ATI and nVidia produce the vast majority of GPUs on the market, and both companies have developed their own enhancements for GPU performance. To improve image quality, the processors use:

• Full scene anti aliasing (FSAA), which smoothes the edges of 3-D objects
• Anisotropic filtering (AF), which makes images look crisper

­ Each company has also developed specific techniques to help the GPU apply colors, shading, textures and patterns.

­ As the GPU creates images, it needs somewhere to hold information and completed pictures. It uses the card's RAM for this purpose, storing data about each pixel, its color and its location on the screen. Part of the RAM can also act as a frame buffer, meaning that it holds completed images until it is time to display them. Typically, video RAM operates at very high speeds and is dual ported, meaning that the system can read from it and write to it at the same time.
­ The RAM connects directly to the digital-to-analog converter, called the DAC. This converter, also called the RAMDAC, translates the image into an analog signal that the monitor can use. Some cards have multiple RAMDACs, which can improve performance and support more than one monitor. You can learn more about this process in How Analog and Digital Recording Works.
The RAMDAC sends the final picture to the monitor through a cable. We'll look at this connection and other interfaces in the next section.



­Graphics cards connect to the computer through the motherboard. The motherboard supplies power to the card and lets it communicate with the CPU. Newer graphics cards often require more power than the motherboard can provide, so they also have a direct connection to the computer's power supply.
Connections to the motherboard are usually through one of three interfaces:

• Peripheral component interconnect (PCI)
• Advanced graphics port (AGP)
• PCI Express (PCIe)

PCI Express is the newest of the three and provides the fastest transfer rates between the graphics card and the motherboard. PCIe also supports the use of two graphics cards in the same computer.­Most graphics cards have two monitor connections. Often, one is a DVI connector, which supports LCD screens, and the other is a VGA connector, which supports CRT(cathode ray tube) screens. Some graphics cards have two DVI connectors instead. But that doesn't rule out using a CRT screen; CRT screens can connect to DVI ports through an adapter. At one time, Apple made monitors that used the proprietary Apple Display Connector (ADC). Although these monitors are still in use, new Apple monitors use a DVI connection.
Most people use only one of their two monitor connections. People who need to use two monitors can purchase a graphics card with dual head capability, which splits the display between the two screens. A computer with two dual head, PCIe-enabled video cards could theoretically support four monitors.
In addition to connections for the motherboard and monitor, some graphics cards have connections for:

• TV display: TV-out or S-video
• Analog video cameras: ViVo or video in/video out
• Digital cameras: FireWire or USB

Some cards also incorporate TV tuners. Next, we'll look at how to choose a good graphics card.


A top-of-the-line graphics card is easy to spot. It has lots of memory and a fast processor. Often, it's also more visually appealing than anything else that's intended to go inside a computer's case. Lots of high-performance video cards are illustrated or have decorative fans or heat sinks.
But a high-end card provides more power than most people really need. People who use their computers primarily for e-mail, word processing or Web surfing can find all the necessary graphics support on a motherboard with integrated graphics. A mid-range card is sufficient for most casual gamers. People who need the power of a high-end card include gaming enthusiasts and people who do lots of 3-D graphic work.

Some cards, like the ATI All-in-Wonder, include connections for televisions and video as well as a TV tuner.

A good overall measurement of a card's performance is its frame rate, measured in frames per second (FPS). The frame rate describes how many complete images the card can display per second. The human eye can process about 25 frames every second, but fast-action games require a frame rate of at least 60 FPS to provide smooth animation and scrolling. Components of the frame rate are:

• Triangles or vertices per second: 3-D images are made of triangles, or polygons. This measurement describes how quickly the GPU can calculate the whole polygon or the vertices that define it. In general, it describes how quickly the card builds a wire frame image.
• Pixel fill rate: This measurement describes how many pixels the GPU can process in a second, which translates to how quickly it can rasterize the image.

The graphics card's hardware directly affects its speed. These are the hardware specifications that most affect the card's speed and the units in which they are measured:

• GPU clock speed (MHz)
• Size of the memory bus (bits)
• Amount of available memory (MB)
• Memory clock rate (MHz)
• Memory bandwidth (GB/s)
• RAMDAC speed (MHz)

­ The computer's CPU and motherboard also play a part, since a very fast graphics card can't compensate for a motherboard's inability to deliver data quickly. Similarly, the card's connection to the motherboard and the speed at which it can get instructions from the CPU affect its performance.

Many motherboards have integrated graphics capabilities and function without a separate graphics card. These motherboards handle 2-D images easily, so they are ideal for productivity and Internet applications. Plugging a separate graphics card into one of these motherboards overrides the onboard graphics functions.

BOOTING UP

It is useful to understand what happens behind the scenes when you switch on your computer from a cold idle machine to an operable and functional system. There are essentially two forms of booting - the soft boot and the hard boot.
The cold boot or hard boot involves powering the computer up from an initial zero power supply.
A warm boot on the other hand takes place when a software application or operating system triggers the computer to perform a reboot.
A successful boot is dependent on 3 conditions - the hardware, BIOS and operating system files to function without errors. When an error occurs, you will be notified by error messages, beeping sounds or in the worst scenario, a blank screen.

BOOTUP PROCESS

The bootup process is a list of detailed procedures that the system undergoes to perform all system checks and load all necessary files to bring the computer to an operable state.

The Windows XP bootup process comprises of the following procedures:

A.THE POWER-ON SELF TEST PHASE

As soon as you power up your computer, a self-test is performed by the power supply to ensure that the volume and current levels are correct before the Power Good signal is sent to the processor. When this first stage is cleared, the microprocessor will then trigger the BIOS to perform a series of operations.
 

B. BIOS ROM PHASE

The BIOS, also known as the Basic Input Output System is a firmware or set of instructions that resides on a ROM chip as contained in the motherboard.
It first carries out the P.O.S.T that performs and verifies all initial hardware checks, such as checking if the system is initialized by a warm or cold start, detecting the presence of peripheral devices and the amount of memory present.
It then accesses the information stored in the CMOS chip, DIP switches, jumpers and assigns the necessary system resources. After this, the hardware' firmware will individually carry out its own diagnostic test such as S.M.A.R.T.
The system will now attempt to determine the sequence of devices to load based on the settings stored in the BIOS to start the operating system. It will start by reading from the first bootup device. If it points to the floppy drive, it then searches for a floppy disk. If it does not detect a bootable diskette in the floppy drive, the system displays an error message.
If the floppy drive does not contain a diskette, it bypasses the first bootup device and detects the second device, which is usually the hard disk. It'll then start by reading the boot code instructions located in the master boot record and copies all execution into the memory when the instructions are validated and no errors are found.

C. BOOT LOADER PHASE

Control is then passed on to the partition loader code which accesses the partition table to identify the primary partition, extended partitions and active partition which is needed to determine the file system and locate the operating system loader file - NTLDR. NTLDR will then switch the processor from real-mode to 32 bit protected mode which memory paging is enabled.
NTLDR will call upon the boot.ini file which is located at the root directory to determine the location and entries of the operating system boot partition. At this point in time, the bootup menu is displayed on the screen to allow you to select an operating system to start from if you have more than 2 operating systems installed in your computer.
NTLDR will pass all information from the Windows registry and Boot.ini file into Ntoskrnl.exe.

D. OPERATING SYSTEM CONFIGURATION PHASE

Ntoskrnl will begin to load the XP kernel, hardware abstraction layer and registry information. After this is completed, the control is passed over to the DOS based Ntdetect.com program which collects and configures all installed hardware devices such as the video adapters and communication ports.
Ntdetect.com then searches for hardware profiles information and load the essential software drivers to control the hardware devices.

E. SECURITY & LOGON PHASE

Lastly, Ntoskrnl.exe will start up Winlogon.exe which triggers the Lsass.exe or Local Security Administration which is the logon dialog interface that prompts you to select your user profile and verifies your necessary credentials before you are transferred to the Windows desktop.