motherboard the motherboard is a flat board with many circuits and connectors where you put the other computer components on it is considered the heart of the computer because it allows electrical current to flow composing data to connect to all the computer parts but despite arguably being the most important it's usually much cheaper than the rest of the components CPU the central processing unit or processor is a small square chip that sits on the motherboard usually covered by a cooling fan it's of called the brain of the computer because it handles every single calculation and instruction needed to make everything work real quick for example when you type something and it shows the words you type opening a program or doing things like browsing the internet it's all CPUs role despite its tiny size the CPU is one of the most expensive and Powerful parts of a computer graphics card the graphics card also called a GPU is a rectangular board with a large chip in the center usually covered by a fan to keep it cool unlike the CPU the graphics card is designed to handle the graphics and visualization of tasks like when you play video games or do video editing and 3D rendering think of it like the CPU as The Logical thinker and the GPU as the artistic painter and it's one of the most expensive components of a computer but there's another one that's relatively cheaper and it's called integrated Graphics or igpu so unlike the dedicated graphics card the GPU becomes one with the CPU and uses the processor's power which makes it cost efficient but often weaker performance so when you play Heavy games you have to use lower Graphics settings to avoid lagging hard drive the hard drive is a box shaped storage device usually made of metal it holds all the computer's data including the operating system programs and personal files like photos and videos inside it has a spinning magnetic disc and a tiny moving arm that reads and writes data the hard drive is also able to hold lots of data but it is very slow at accessing it since it flows through a small wire and it doesn't always give you the right data therefore we need RAM to handle this Ram a Ram or random access memory is a thin rectangular stick that plugs into the motherboard it only stores some data from the hard drive that's needed by the CPU to access it more quickly to make it simple imagine the hard drive is a garage full of various items and the ram is your tool bag since you have so many scattered things in your garage it's going to take some time to search and grab the tools you need but if you store it inside your tool bag you can't store as much but you can grab the things you need real quick without having to go back and forth just to get the things you need that's how Ram works but one thing you need to remember unlike a hard drive which stores data permanently Ram is short-term memory that clears everything once the computer's turned off SSD the solid state drive has the same function as a hard drive but it's faster and more durable because it doesn't use a spinning disc and small wire but a memory chip in some computers it is used with the hard drive or just the SSD alone it's more expensive than a hard drive but it has become the standard due to its quality cooling fan some areas like the CPU can be very hot so we need a cooling fan it's usually attached to the processor or placed inside the case to push out hot air and bring in cool air to prevent slowing down performance or damage some high performance setups use liquid cooling as an upgrade for better heat management power supply unit the power supply unit is a rectangular box that converts electricity from your wall outlet to power the previous computer components we've talked about for your information laptops have a power supply as well despite also having a battery inside it as a portable power wireless card the wireless card is a small component that allows a computer to connect to Wi-Fi networks without the need for a physical ethernet cable if a computer doesn't have a wireless card it can only connect to the internet through through a wired ethernet connection case the case is the outer shell of the computer that houses and protects all the components we talked about the case also plays an important role in cooling as it has vents or openings to allow air flow and help cool the components also there are different sizes and styles of cases from compact ones for small builds to larger ones for gaming or high performance PCS oh yeah before you go previously I made an awesome video about every major operating system explained so don't forget to watch it okay