Hey everyone I’m sorry if this post seems a little Off-Topic.

But I would like to learn more about computer hardware to improve my knowledge in areas like troubleshooting and even to know how some kind of hardware works properly.

Could you suggest me your top choices related to youtube channels, websites or even books. I want it all.

I know, there’s a lot of this at the internet.

But i want to hear your opinion. It matters for me.

Thanks in advance!

What's the best (free) software for reporting what's in a computer? cpu specs, ram. hd, etc... gpu type, gpu ram...

either something i can screenshot or a report?

I'm looking for all in one software, that can do cpu and gpu, etc.

I have had a pc for awhile and I need some help upgrading it. I do not know where things are so I need someone to tell me what is what. I have discord so If you could dm me to add I would love the help.

I'm looking for a database or website that lists all specifications of all/mainstream computer hardware, like CPU, SSDs, GPUs, RAM, Mainboards etc.I recall having found one some years ago but I can't find it anymore.It should have all specs listed.

Anyone knowing a continuously updated website?

The best so far:
https://icecat.biz/en

Hey guys just wondering is there any websites where i can find info about certain hardware, like hard disks, and see what year the model was made? Thank you.

Is there an application or program that can tell me what my hardware is?

like once a month or year

additionally, for the current progress of the best compact computer:

what's the main use of the best compact computer?

• the #1 use would be chrome

things pretty much decided + things undecided

1 - case size - get an stx over an itx

you want a compact computer because you have to pack it in your luggage / backpack (when moving / travelling)

• https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mini-STX

• https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mini-ITX

key reasons

• stx has a ~30% decrease in size compared to itx

• price increase i dunno but guessing at most if it would be say ~30% increase in net price

• the net is that you end up with a more compact computer

• from a reddit post

the ratio of

( size : price + performance via what parts it allows ) seems to make stx the optimal option

the size is the most important size to decide on, but nobody had told me this

things undecided - what's the highest rated stx currently? or within the next year? what is best and why?

2 - no gpu

why? because i dont expect any significant gains/uses for gpu / hardware acceleration

• https://www.reddit.com/r/buildapc/comments/6s37tl/hey_if_you_know_about_what_gpu_does_could_we_get/

heuristic in life: if you dont know if something would helpful/useful, they likely won't be helpful/useful

any good computer is long-term, 5+

• had this old computer for ~5y and ongoing

• had the desktop before that for ~10+ years

3 - get an ssd

• generally faster than hdd, unsure faster by what %

• faster for coding stuff, unsure exactly what specific things/action

• https://www.quora.com/Is-an-SSD-worth-it-for-a-laptop-used-for-programming ('15 .6 / 30*100 = 2.0)

things undecided - any highly rated ssd on amazon should be fine?

• not sure if anything else would matter http://thewirecutter.com/reviews/best-ssds/#who

why get ssd?

heuristic in life: always get/replace what would give the highest gains

heuristic in life: always make easier, faster, better the #1 limits

• https://www.quora.com/What-practical-advantage-would-32GB-of-RAM-in-a-laptop-provide-over-16GB-Would-this-also-depend-on-the-other-specs-of-the-machine (.02 / 20*100 = 0.1)

4 - someone said m2 would not prevent airflow like ssd would

things unknown - what's the % decrease in airflow from ssd, or does not significantly matter?

heuristic in life: if you dont know if something would helpful/useful, they likely won't be helpful/useful

5 - get 16g ram

• 8gb is not enough for chrome

• ram costs pretty much nothing

• "Not when you value time against the truly trifling cost of adding that extra 8GB of RAM"

• https://www.quora.com/Is-16-GB-of-RAM-overkill/answer/Stan-Hanks

get 1 large stick > many smaller sticks

• https://www.quora.com/What-practical-advantage-would-32GB-of-RAM-in-a-laptop-provide-over-16GB-Would-this-also-depend-on-the-other-specs-of-the-machine (.01 / 5*100 = 0.2)

get ddr3 (what type?)

• why? performance is same with ddr4 and higher

• https://www.quora.com/Which-is-better-8gb-ddr4-or-16-ddr3-for-gaming

ddr4 or higher may reduce heat

things unknown: but do you know of any tests/links that shows the % decrease of heat?

speed > latency

• http://blog.logicalincrements.com/2016/08/ddr4-ram-speeds-recommend-ram/

• this is for ddr4 but do you know if it's for ddr3 also?

things undecided: what's the fastest ddr3? is it the highest rated ones on amazon?

else, others: https://www.quora.com/How-noticeable-is-it-using-a-laptop-with-16GB-RAM-Vs-32GB-RAM https://www.quora.com/Is-16-GB-of-RAM-overkill

things undecided

6 - mobo undecided

7 - cpu undecided

8 - powerbox undecided

9 - dont think there's anything...

if there's something that would be helpful for me to clarify, please let me know

suggest any other sites/summaries for other topics you may be fascinated in as well, having awareness of relevant/helpful is good

Hi,

I have a report that i run on workstations that isn't overly useful:

import-module activedirectory
Get-ADComputer -filter * -SearchBase "OU=MyOU,DC=MyDC" -properties Name,OperatingSystem,LastLogonDate,IPv4Address | Select Name,OperatingSystem,LastLogonDate,IPv4Address | Export-csv 'f:\computers.csv'

I would like to get the RAM, CPU, and disk space, disk usage. I am thinking I'll need a utility other than Powershell but was wondering if anyone does have a script that does something like this.

Challenges I see are:

I would want it to keep the hardware information when the workstation is offline as our workstations are only on the network about 75% of the time.

I would probably schedule it to run twice a day, daily.

Anyone do anything similar?

I've come into possession of a pc after a friend passed away. I'm looking to sell it, but i don't know the specs. I don't want to take it apart to find out. Is there a way to find the specs through the BIOS?

edit: without logging on. I don't know the password

i have an old pc and i want to know his specs like motherboard name and ram type without opening it and see

I had a presentation I had to give to a bunch of business majors, in under three minutes. I decided to give an overview of PCs. Hopefully this also helps beginners or those who at curious, because I really wish I had something like this to teach me about PCs when I was building my first.

PC Exploded view, Annotated hardware pictures here

Personal Computer (PC) overview:

Intro: PCs, laptops, and servers are widely used throughout the world, every second of every day. They have shaped our world immensely, affecting almost every aspect of our lives. Computers have revolutionized how we share information, the content we consume, and how we organize, store, and interpret data. However, very few people know how PCs and laptops work. While they may seem like magic, PCs can be broken down into a few main components.

Think of a PC almost like an airport or a city; each part has a certain purpose that is interconnected.

• The motherboard is like the system of pipes, powerlines, and tunnels under a city connecting everything together. It transfers data, delivers power, controls fans, and serves as a standardized foundation for each component.

• The CPU (Central Processing Unit) is like the air traffic control tower of the PC. It tells everything where to go and what to do. It also performs all the mathematical calculations. (Such as Excel formulas, or the arc of a mortar fired in Battlefield 1).

• The GPU (Graphics Processing Unit) is like the runway for the airport. It sends all the information to the screen. It also renders images and three-dimensional objects. This is the component that makes games look life-like. (Elaborate if there is time: It actively powers programs like an engine. It is NOT passive!)

• The Hard Disk Drive (Spinning disk) or Solid-State Drive (SSD) is like the hangar on an airbase, storing all information for the long term. This is where all of the data is stored when your PC, laptop, or phone* is off.

• RAM (Random Access Memory) is similar to loading terminals for airplanes: It holds the information in the short term and can be delivered quickly to the runway (GPU), traffic control tower (CPU), or hangar (HDD/SSD).

• The PSU (Power Supply Unit) is like an energy substation for the airport: it converts power to Direct Current, then supplies the power in the right amounts to each component.

Path of data:

1. Hard drive

2. Motherboard

3. CPU/RAM

4. Data sent through GPU to monitor

Extra time: ATX formfactor (a standard for all PC components),

SSD vs HDD: Hard Disk Drives have a slower, spinning disk, Solid State Drives have no moving parts. SSDs can be broken down into two catagories:

AHCI and NVMe (grossly generalized)

Correction courtesy of u/computix, Permalink to detailed explanation here.

HDDs and SATA SSDs do not use AHCI, they use SATA. It's very important to distinguish those, because a SATA M.2 drive isn't the same as an AHCI M.2 drive. One uses SATA, just like on those wires to a SATA drive, the other uses AHCI over PCIe. AHCI M.2 drives were a stopgap solution until the NVMe stack was fully operational in BIOSes and OSes. It basically uses the same software stack components as a SATA drive, by emulating a SATA drive + host adapter (secretly running at a much higher speed than SATA 6 Gbps). Please do not confuse SATA and AHCI. SATA is a protocol drives use to communicate with a SATA host adapter. AHCI is a hardware level interface for the software that can be used to connect a SATA host adapter to a system. SATA host adapters can also use a legacy IDE hardware to software interface. AHCI can also be used by PCIe SSDs to offer a legacy compatible interface, but no new PCIe SSDs doing that are made on a large scale, they all use NVMe now.

(Old generalization below, now a bit more convoluted but corrected!)

AHCI is a storage technology that is used for HDDs and SATA SSDs, which is slower, and NVMe is a newer standard that allows for much faster data transfer rates. SATA AHCI and PCIe NVME-based devices come in multiple form factors, such as PCIe (Slots, or M.2 slots), 3.5in, and 2.5in, which makes it difficult to visually tell them apart.) HDDs only use SATA data cables, and typically use AHCI as a hardware interface, but SSDs can use SATA and AHCI, ^{AHCI over PCIe} or PCIe with NVMe. You can learn more about these in this quick video here.

Most common configurations:

• HDD using a SATA data cable and AHCI as a protocol

• 2.5 inch SSD using SATA cable and AHCI as a protocol

• M.2 SSD using PCIe as a data slot and NVME as a protocol

Footnote to readers in the future: You won't need to worry about getting a slow SSD in the M.2 or PCIe formfactor. All that BS with AHCI + SSDs was a bridge technology during the early years. HDDs will always be slow, and M.2 SSDs are fast.

Conclusion:

PCs are complex machines, and each part is interconnected. Although they visually look complicated, PCs in this day in age have been so simplified due to universal standards, that they are sometimes referred to as “Legos for adults.” Although this knowledge may not be applicable for everyday life, understanding how computers work can shed light on common issues. It can also make purchases and repairs much less expensive when you are an informed consumer that can parse company buzzwords from the cold, hard facts. ^{Such as a VR ready PSU. A PSU supplies power, and doesn't have a processor. Likewise, an ebay or craigslist ad that advertises a "gaming" PC without a GPU is a total ripoff.}

Not sure if it's the right place to ask, but...

All sorts of benchmarking tools and sites tend to have extensive collections of hardware specs and performance data. Is there a place where i can download this type of data raw? Specifically, i'm interested in one on CPU specs and performance.

The closest thing i found is http://cpudb.stanford.edu/ , but it's half a decade out of date and rather sparse.

Hello folks

I have recently come across a requirement to find the hardware device used by the user to connect to Virtual desktops.

Apart from reading the connection server logs, is there any other way to find this out ?

Can vROPS do this ? SQL DB ?

I mean this in terms of CPU, RAM, and other information. I know that I could search up these things individually or something, but I would like to know if there's any resource I could use that is all encompassing, videos, an interactive game, etc.

I would like to learn this because I want to better understand computer requirements when it comes to games or software, and understand why my computer might be having an internal problem and how to fix it.

Does this exist? I bought a prebuilt rig over the summer just so I could have a PC of my own (has been working wonderfully besides a small hitch in september when the original hard drive shit itself) but I don't really know how good it is compared to what I see other people talking about

Is there any good alternatives to Speccy(sadly not updated anymore)? I know there are much better HW info programs but im looking nice clean HW summary. HWiNFO is not bad but in summary there is only cpu, ram and gpu. AIDA64- too much info.

AIDA 64 is probably the closest, but I'm about to run out of trial time and don't want to pay $50 for it when I won't use it after I get my OC dialed in, and I'm mostly interested in the monitoring aspect.

• HWMonitor has all the specs I could want , but only shows current, and max/min. Without an average the data isn't that helpful.

• Intel Extreme Tuning Utility is nice, but shows few pertinent spec

I've tried several others that don't show all the specs, like temps, frequencies, load, voltages, etc., for both CPU and GPU. And many are only real time monitoring.

Edit: Just get HWiNFO64, thanks.