Input Output Devices

Input DevIces

Keyboard

A keyboard is the most common input device designed for the input of text and characters,
and also to control the operation of the computer. The keyboard is designed to resemble a
regular typewriter with a few additional keys. It contains rectangular or near-rectangular
buttons, or "keys". The number of keys on a typical keyboard varies from 82 keys to 108
keys.

The layout of a keyboard comes in various styles. QWERTY is the most common layout in
English language computer keyboard. It takes its name from the first six letters shown on
the keyboard’s top row of letters. Similarly, French language keyboards use A and Z in place
of Q and W. These are known as AZERTY keyboards.

The keyboard contains a microprocessor to which all the switches are connected. When a
key is pressed, a signal is sent to the microprocessor. Depending upon which key’s circuit
carries a signal to the microprocessor; the processor generates the associative code, known
as scan code, of the key and sends it to the operating system. A copy of this code is also
stored in the keyboard’s memory. When the operating system reads the scan code, it
informs the same to the keyboard and the scan code stored in the keyboard’s memory is
then erased.

Mouse

Mouse is a small hand-held pointing device, which is rectangular-shaped with a rubber ball
embedded at its lower side and buttons on the top. Usually a mouse contains two or three
buttons, which can be used to input commands or information. The mouse may be
classified as a mechanical or an optical mouse, based on the technology it uses. A
mechanical mouse uses a rubber ball at the bottom surface, which rotates as the mouse is
moved along a flat surface, to move the cursor. Mechanical mouse is the most common and
least expensive pointing device. An optical mouse uses a light beam instead of a rotating ball
to detect movement across a specially patterned mouse pad. As the user rolls the mouse
across the flat surface, the cursor on the screen also moves. Being costlier, modern optical
mouse is accurate and often does not need a mouse pad.

A mouse allows us to create graphic elements on the screen, such as lines, curves, and
freehand shapes. It is easier and convenient to work with a mouse as compared to a
keyboard. The mouse cannot easily be used with laptop, notebook or palmtop computers.
These types of computers need a track ball or a touch sensitive pad called a touch pad.

Scanner

At its most basic level, a scanner is just another input device, much like a keyboard or
mouse, except that it takes its input in graphical form (images). These images could be
photographs for retouching, correction or use in DTP (Desk Top Publishing). They could be
hand-drawn logos required for document letterheads. They could even be pages of text
which suitable software could read and save as an editable text file. Scanners use a light
beam to scan the input data.

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Scanners are divided into two types:

1. Hand-held scanner: This scanner consists of light emitting diodes (LEDs), which are
placed over the material to be scanned. This scanner performs the scanning of the
document very slowly form the top to bottom, with its light on. The scanner has to be
dragged very steadily and carefully over the document and it should move at a uniform
speed without stopping or jerking in order to obtain the best results. These devices read the
data on the price tags, shipping labels, inventory part number, book ISBNs, and so on.

2. Flat-bed scanner: This scanner looks similar to a photocopier machine. It consists of a box
containing a glass plate on its top and a lid that covers the glass plate. This glass plate is
used for placing the document to be scanned. The light beam placed below the glass plate
moves from top to bottom to scan line by line. These scanners can scan black and white as
well as color images. The flat-bed scanners are larger in size and more expensive that the
hand-held scanners. However, they produce high quality images due to their scanning
technology.

Trackball

A trackball is a pointing device consisting of a ball housed in a socket containing sensors to

The principal advantages of trackballs over mice is that since it is stationary, it requires less
space to use, and it can be operated on any type of surface, including the user's lap. These
attributes make a trackball particularly suitable for use with portable computers, and they
were widely used on laptop PCs before the advent of the touchpad. It also requires less
space than a mouse for operation. In general the trackball is used by graphic designers and
the game players.

Touch Screen

A touch screen is a special kind of display screen device, which is placed on the computer
monitor in order to allow the direct selection or activation of the computer when somebody
touches the screen. Basically, it registers the input when a finger or object is touched to the
screen. Touch screen is normally used when information has to be accessed with minimum
effort. However, the touch screen is not suitable for input of large amount of data. Normally,
they are used in information-providing systems like the hospitals, airlines and railway
reservation counters, amusement parks, and in most of the Automated Teller Machines
(ATMs).

A basic touch screen has three main components: a touch sensor, a controller, and a
software driver. The touch sensor is a clear glass panel with a touch responsive surface. The
panel generally has an electrical current going through it and touching the screen causes a
voltage change, which is used to determine the location of the touch to the screen. The
controller connects the touch sensor and the computer. It takes information from the touch
sensor and translates it into information that a computer can understand. The driver is a
software component that allows the touch screen and computer work together. It tells the
operating system how to interpret the touch event information that is sent from the
controller.

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Output DevIces

Output is data that has been processed into useful information. The output can be
displayed on a monitor, printed on a paper, or listened through speakers or headset. In
general, there are two basic categories of output: the output, which can be readily,
understood and used by the humans, and which is stored on secondary storage devices so
that the data can be used as input for further processing. The two forms of output are:

1. Hard Copy: The physical form of output is known as hard copy. In general, it refers to the
recorded information copied from a computer onto paper or some other durable surface,
such as microfilm. Hard copy output is permanent and a relatively stable form of output.
Paper is one of the most widely used hard copy output media. The examples are printouts
from printers which contains text or graphics.

2. Soft Copy: The electronic version of an output, which usually resides in computer
memory and/or on disk, is known as soft copy. Unlike hard copy, soft copy is not a
permanent form of output. It is transient and is usually displayed on the screen. This kind
of output is intangible, that is, it cannot be touched. Soft copy output includes audio and
visual form of output, which is generated using a computer. In addition, textual or graphical
information displayed on a computer monitor is also a soft copy form of output.

Based on the hardcopy and softcopy outputs, the output devices are classified into: hard
copy output devices and soft copy output devices. Printers and Plotters are hard copy
output devices. Monitors, Projectors and Audio devices are soft copy output devices.

Printers

A printer prints information and data from the computer onto a paper. It is a hard copy
output device. Some printers produce only textual information, whereas others can produce
graphics as well. The quality of a printer is determined by how detailed a print it can
produce, that is, its resolution. Resolution is used to describe the sharpness and clarity of
an image. Higher the resolution better is the image. For printers, the resolution is measured
in dpi (dots per inch). The more dots per inch better the quality of image.

Printers are divided into two basic categories:

1. Impact printers: The impact printers work by physically striking a head or needle against
an ink ribbon to make a mark on the paper. Dot matrix, Daisy wheel, and Drum printers are
examples of impact printers.

2. Non-impact printers: The non-impact printers use techniques (a nozzle to spray ink or a
laser to form characters) without striking the page to transfer ink onto the page. Ink-jet and
Laser printers are the examples of non-impact printers.

Dot Matrix Printer

Dot matrix printer is the oldest printing technology and it prints one character at a time.
Dot matrix printers produce characters and illustrations by striking pins against an ink
ribbon to print closely spaced dots in the appropriate shape. They can print any shape of
character specified by a user. This allows the printer to print many special character, charts
and graphs. Print speeds, specified in characters per second (cps), vary from about 50 to
over 500cps. Most dot-matrix printers offer different speeds depending on the quality of
print desired. Print quality is determined by the number of pins (the mechanisms that print

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the dots). Typically, this varies from between 9 to 24. The best dot-matrix printers (24 pins)
are capable of near letter-quality type.

Dot matrix printers are inexpensive and have low operating costs. Many dot matrix printers
are bi-directional, that is, they can print the characters from directions, left or right. The
major limitation of dot matrix printer is that it prints only in black and white. These printers
may not be able to print graphic objects (images) adequately but can handle applications
such as accounting, personnel, and payroll very well. These are limited to situations where
carbon copies are needed and the quality is not too important.

Ink-Jet Printers

The most common type of printer found in homes today is the ink-jet printer. An ink-jet
printer is a printer that places extremely small droplets of ink onto paper to create an image.
Being a non-impact printer, it does not touch the paper while creating an image. Instead, it
uses a series of nozzles to spray drops of ink directly onto the paper. The nozzles
accommodate the colors cyan, magenta, yellow, and black. It allows for printing images of
different colors with nearly the same quality as a photograph.

Being costlier than dot matrix printers, they produce quality output. They are also
affordable, which appeals to small businesses and home offices. These printers can print
about 6 pages per a minute. The down side is that although ink-jets are generally cheaper to
buy than lasers, they are more expensive to maintain. Cartridges need to be changed more
frequently and the special coated paper required to produce high-quality output is very
expensive. When it comes to comparing the cost per page, inkjets work out about ten times
more expensive than laser printers.

Laser Printers

A laser printer provides the highest quality text and images for personal computers. It is a
very fast printer, which operates on the same principle as that of a photocopy (Xerox)
machine. They are also known as page printers because they process and store the entire
page before they actually print it. They produce sharp, crisp images of both text and
graphics, providing resolutions from 300 to 1200 dpi. They are quiet and fast, able to print
4-32 text-only pages per minute for individual microcomputers and up to 200 pages per
minute for mainframes.

Most laser printers are specifically designed to print in only black ink. However, there are
some laser printers that can print in color. Like inkjet printers, colored laser printers have
four colors-cyan, magenta, yellow, and black. Using different combinations of these four
colors, all the colors in a color spectrum can be created.

The core component of laser printing system is the photoreceptor. This is a small rotating
drum that has a coating on it. This coating allows it to hold either a positive or a negative
electrostatic charge. Initially, the photoreceptor is given a positive charge. It gets this
positive charge by a special electrically charged wire called the charge corona wire.

With a complex system of mirrors and lenses, a laser beam is shined on the photoreceptor
as it revolves. This beam discharges areas of the positively charged drum. The areas that the
beam discharges are made to resemble the characters and letters that are to be printed.
Then, as the drum continues to rotate, it moves into the laser toner, which is a fine black
powder. The toner is positively charged, and thus is attracted to the portions of the
photoreceptor that have been discharged by the laser. The drum then rolls over a sheet of
paper. The toner then sticks to the paper, and thus the image to be printed is transferred
onto a sheet of paper.
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 Input Output Devices

Monitor

The monitor is the most frequently used soft copy output device. A computer monitor is a TV
like display attached to the computer on which the output can be viewed. The computer
monitor can either be a monochrome (only one colour) or a colour display. The size of the
display is described based on two parameters: aspect ratio and screen size. Aspect ratio is
the ratio of the width of the display screen to its height. Generally, computer displays have
an aspect ratio of 4:3. Like televisions, screen size is normally measured diagonally (in
inches), the distance from one corner to the opposite corner. Available monitor screen sizes
are 14, 15, 17, 19, and 21 inches.

Aspect ratio Screen size

Based on the technology used, the monitors are classified into two categories: Cathode Ray
Tube (CRT) monitors and Liquid Crystal Display (LCD) monitors.

CRT Monitors

Nowadays, most of the computer monitors are based on CRT technology. The CRT
technology used in most televisions and computer display screens. A CRT works by moving
an electron beam back and forth across the back of the screen. Each time the beam makes
a pass across the screen, it lights up phosphor dots on the inside of the glass tube, thereby
illuminating the active portions of the screen. By drawing many such lines from the top to
the bottom of the screen, it creates an entire screenful of images.

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LCD Monitors

With the widespread use of smaller computers like PDAs and laptops, the LCD has made a
big impact on computer screen market. The LCD technology is used in digital watches and
many portable computers. LCD displays utilize two sheets of polarizing material with a
liquid crystal solution between them. An electric current passed through the liquid causes
the crystals to align so that light cannot pass through them. Each crystal, therefore, is like a
shutter, either allowing light to pass through or blocking the light.

Differences between LCD and CRT

1. Size: LCD is lightweight and compact, which saves desktop space as compared to a CRT.

2. Brightness: The illuminated phosphor of a CRT is not clearly as bright as what the LCD
can produce with its florescent backlight.

3. Power Consumption: LCD consumes significantly less power than CRT and has a low
emission risk. Typically, a LCD consumes approximately half of the power of a typical CRT.

4. Viewing Angle: CRT can be viewed at almost any angle, but LCD is the best viewed ‘head
on’. Even when viewing a LCD head on, narrow viewing angles can appear to have
inconsistent color and brightness.

5. Cost: Prices for LCD screens are quite high, but they are coming down. They are still
much more costly than a CRT.

Plotters

A Plotter is a pen-based output device that is attached to a computer for producing images
created by a series of many straight lines. It is used to draw high-resolution charts, graphs,
blueprints, maps, circuit diagrams, and other line-based diagrams. Plotters are similar to
printers, but they draw lines using a pen. As a result, they can produce continuous lines,
whereas printers can simulate lines by printing a closely spaced series of dots. Multicolor
plotters use four pens (cyan, magenta, yellow, and black) to different colors and need no
human intervention to change them.

The plotter tends to draw much crisper lines and graphics. The lines drawn by these devices
are continuous and very accurate. However, plotter is considered a very slow output device
because it requires excessive mechanical movement to plot. Furthermore, it is unable to
produce solid fills and shading. Plotters are relatively expensive than printers. They are
mainly used for Computer Aided Design (CAD) and Computer Aided Manufacturing (CAM)
applications such as printing out plans for houses and vehicle parts.

You cannot change your future, but you can change your habits, and
surely your habits will change your future. ….Marco Polo

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