PC Hardware in a Nutshell: A Desktop Quick Reference (In a Nutshell (O'Reilly))

PC Hardware in a Nutshell is a comprehensive guide to buying, building, upgrading, and repairing Intel-based PCs for novices and seasoned professionals alike. The three major thrusts of the book are:

Buying guidelines: how to choose optimum systems and components; focuses on evaluating alternatives rather than on recommending specific productsHow-to advice: practical, hands-on information about how to install, configure, and troubleshoot specific componentsReference: features numerous tables and organization by topic for easy access to specifications and steps necessary for discrete tasks

In addition to the fundamentals and general tips about working on PCs, this book covers motherboards, processors, memory, disks (floppies, hard drives, and optical drives); tape, video, and input devices; plus audio components, communications, power supplies, and maintenance. The last chapter is a complete case study in building a PC from components.

PC Hardware in a Nutshell: A Desktop Quick Reference relies on an eternal truth of the computer industry: legacy systems never die. This book focuses on the technologies that have provided Wintel personal computers with various capabilities over the years. Like most of its competitors, this book addresses the PC on a subsystem level, and deals with video cards, hard-disk interfaces, memory, and other pieces of the componentry puzzle that hardware integrators need to figure out. The authors do a great job of explaining the differences between (and relative merits of) IDE and SCSI hard-drive interfaces, various video buses, competing processors, and other technologies. They also prove themselves adept at explaining general assembly procedures and troubleshooting strategies.

This book distinguishes itself from its most popular competitors by emphasizing the authors' opinions on hardware products. It's refreshing to see authors recommend Product A for high-performance systems in which price is not an issue, Product B for economical home systems, and Product C for organizational workstations. On the other hand, the recommendations, prices, and similar values will change over time. The authors maintain a great Web site, at which you can find their current recommendations. (The Web site, on the other hand, doesn't include the book's high-quality tutorial on designing and assembling a system from zero.) Even the photographs that appear in this book--traditionally a weak point among hardware books--are clear. --David Wall

Topics covered: Personal computers that comply with Microsoft Windows and Intel compatibility requirements. The authors address processors, memory, hard disks, optical media, removable magnetic disks, video cards, power supplies, and more. Also, there are instructions for assembling a machine from scratch, and some coverage of troubleshooting problems.