Daily Blog Sept 30/2013

Well today was filled with many tasks and many a laugh

     To start off the day we dove right into A+ talking about Adapter cards involving display and audio output. This was particularly fun for me seeing as I pose a high interest in the latest Video Cards and how nice I can get my picture to look all while retaining optimal performance. For all you people looking to get out in the video output world or upgrading an older machine here's a Link showing you a 6 step guide(With pictures!) to chosing the right video card for you!
   
     In one of many tasks we had to perform, we did a little shopping to see what we could get Video Card wise on a 400$ budget, then on a 700$ budget. My results are as follow:




Complete with links on where to buy them.
Next off We had to do a flyer on a touch screen plasma display:

Note: This is my first time using MS Publisher so don't expect an amazing flyer just yet
   
     Thirdly, we had to use MS Paint to make a purposely bad 7.1 souround sound livingroom setup where it can be viewed Here or just on my blog.

     Next we did a colab word document on the differences and similarities of CRT, LCD and LED monitors:

     Lastly we downloaded an audio editing software called Sony ACID. I'd never heard of it before till today and man, no wonder I havent heard of it before. Lets just say it's no Pro Tools. Back on topic, we were supposed to make a quick 1 minute clip of music with provided samples and I came up with this (extremely simple but still fits the criteria) doo hicky:


        Like it? I hope so but I wont be upset if you don't. Its my first day!

     But yeah, this post is chock full of stuff and hope you enjoyed it or even if you lightly skimmed through it, that's okay too!!
 Lets see what tomorrow brings us
    Peace!

7.1 Surround Sound Setup

Daily Blog Sept 26/2013

Well today marks the day I officially hate excel.

     Today we messed around in excel quite a bit trying to finally get our GANTT charts working which was excruciatingly painful and frustrating. I think Thomas and Corey were the only ones to actually get their charts working without too too much hick ups. Mine however had this weird problem where it kept on staying on a date waaaaay before the date I wanted the axis set at. Not even McNeil know how it happened. (stumped the teacher. score!) However I got the jist of the chart completed and if it wasn't for that weird axis problem, I probably would of had it done. But not without this video that I watched while making it during class.

This is what got me as far as I did today. (this is our little secret. no one else is supposed to know about this video)

As for A+ subject today, we went over on how to be a proper and efficient technician looking at the do's and don'ts which followed the filming of a 2 minute video on how to be a good technician that we spit out in 30 minutes. 

That's pretty much it for today. 

Until tomorrow,

Quinn

   

Daily Blog Sept 24/ 2013

Well hello there,

   Today being a half day, we focused mostly on A+ stuff involving the last bit of CPU info and a lot on power supplies. With the CPU info we mainly focused on the FDE cycle which stands for Fetch Decode Execute. All aout how the CPU grabs data, reads it and executes the command that was read. Here is quite an in depth video on how this works

 After a bit we started on Power Supplies. I was surprised on how much I actually knew on PSU's and how i wasn't completely lost while taking notes. We learned the do's and dont's of power supplies as well all the electrical specs. We also learned about UPS's and how bloody expensive they are. But definitely the most important part about today's power supply lesson was don't try to play god with electricity or THIS will happen. And you don't want that.

See you tomorrow,

Quinn

Daily Blog Sept 23/ 2013

Well Hello there,

     Today in class we mostly did a lot of work in excel learning more functions and formulas and how to execute them. Things like the confusing VLOOKUP and the easier SUM option that does exactly what it's called. The most frustrating thing was this next thing we did was to make a GANT chart. its a sideways chart that constantly updates when you input data. Trying to do this truly made me want to throw my fist through the screen.

     In the afternoon we got onto the A+ topic of the day, the CPU. It was a lot of notes talking about the different functions of the CPU and how they effect your computer and its performance. We also learned ow to propperly apply Thermal paste. Which McNeil wasnt lying that you can find almost everyone making a video about how to do it.
     This one is pretty straight forward and of the most home video quality.

Until the eve of moro,

Quinn

Daily Blog Sept 18/ 2013

     Oh boy what a day.

     First and foremost, I am terrible with Microsoft excel. Which is exactly what we were learning today for our IC3 section today. We learned all about how to make something like a purchase order in the program.  And man, was I ever lucky to get that done. Excel is definitely not my forte. That's why I was looking around the web to see if I could find some help with my lack of spreadsheet knowledge. I came across this Guide all about excel. It's really good and I would recommend looking at it if you're anything like me when it comes to the program.

     Later on in the day we got to our A+ stuff for the day and it was all about RAM. From how it works to the specks and pin numbers for specific types. My notes were filled to the brim with numbers, clock speeds and anagrams like nobody's business. Looking up some more RAM info I found a site talking about a special type of RAM we didn't learn about in class today. Small little read but definitely worth checking out.

    Time for bed,


   Quinn.

Daily Blog Sept 17/2013

Evening all,

     So today we learned about the mother of the whole computer. Conveniently named the Motherboard. We learned about all the different types as well the history of the form factors and how they got smaller and smaller. As well as the functions with relaying power to one section to another. Looking up online, I came across this neat little Trivia site about motherboards and related subjects. I did alright at it. 

     Think you got what it takes to be the Mobo trivia master? Check it out if you have time

   Thanks again

         Quinn