hardware

I'm preparing to upgrade my computer. When I bought it 3 years ago I didn't think I'd be playing games so I just bought a graphics controller that was integrated into the motherboard.

For the first time in my life I walked into a computer games shop and bought a game, The Rise of Nations, which is recommended by James Gee in his Gamasutra article, Learning by Design: Games as Learning Machines [03.24.04] (you have to join to read but it's free) as the best 2003 exemplar for illustrating learning principles.

When I installed it on my computer it wouldn't run because of my poor graphics.

So, I've spent time this week getting my head around hardware - not something that I'm very good at.

PC Worlds "Build Your Own PC" (October 2004) has been very useful for explaining new hardware features. Also this tutorial (January 2005) by Deb Burge of the Macedon Ranges Computer Club is great.

Probably the most important thing I've learnt is that midway through 2004 a new type of bus slot, PCI Express (PCIe) was introduced, designed to replace both the PCI (white) and AGP (graphics, brown) slots. PCIe slots (white) vary in length depending on their speed: 1x, 2x, 4x, 8x, 16x, 32x. A graphics card, for instance, might require a 16x slot.

PCIe motherboards have both PCI and PCIe slots.

I'm hoping to buy my new computer in the next day or so.