How does Computer Hardware Work? 💻🛠🔬 [3D Animated Teardown] — Transcript

Full transcript

1. 0:00Throughout this video we’re going to do a desktop computer dissection using 3D animation.
2. 0:06Kind of like a dissection lab in biology class, but instead, we’ll journey through the inside
3. 0:12of this computer and disassemble every piece of hardware.  We’ll then use a microscope
4. 0:18and zoom in to give you a nanoscopic view of the transistors and other structures inside.
5. 0:24To make this video we disassembled all the hardware inside a typical desktop computer,
6. 0:30we desoldered and removed the components from each of the printed circuit boards and took
7. 0:35thousands of pictures.  Then using these pictures, we meticulously 3D modeled every
8. 0:42single component from the computer case down to the tiniest resistor.  As a result, here’s
9. 0:48all the hardware that we’ll explore throughout this video.  It kind of looks like a crime
10. 0:53scene where someone viciously destroyed a computer and arranged all the components,
11. 0:59but anyways let’s dive right in.   We’ll begin this journey with the  Central
12. 1:04Processing Unit or CPU which is the brain of the computer.  On top we have the cover,
13. 1:11called an integrated heat spreader, and inside is a smaller metal package that holds the
14. 1:16integrated circuit which is technically called a die. This die is mounted on a printed circuit
15. 1:23board that distributes the 1200 connection points to landing pads that interface with
16. 1:28the landing grid array on the motherboard. The integrated circuit inside has a few different
17. 1:35sections, but perhaps the most recognizable are the 10 cores where programs and instructions
18. 1:40are run.  Each core is quite  complicated, so here’s a diagram laying out the different
19. 1:46functional sections.  There are dozens of rather complicated elements in this diagram,
20. 1:52and you can look forward to a series of videos we’re currently planning which will explore
21. 1:57computer architecture and how each of these sections work.
22. 2:00Let’s zoom into a nanoscopic view of the integrated circuit so we can see individual
23. 2:06transistors.  These transistors are incredibly small, only a few nanometers wide  and in
24. 2:12this die there are approximately 8 to 10 billion.  On top of the transistors are multiple layers
25. 2:19of metal wires with vias rising vertically between the layers.  Together these transistors
26. 2:26and wires create a multilayer labyrinth or highway resulting in a computer that can execute
27. 2:32billions of operations every second.   Let’s now zoom out and look at other sections
28. 2:38of the CPU.  To the side of each core is the shared L3 memory cache and ring interconnect.
29. 2:45On the far right is an integrated graphics processor which functions as a less powerful
30. 2:50GPU; in the top left is the memory controller which sends data to and from the DRAM; and
31. 2:57finally on the far left is the system agent and platform I/O, which communicates with
32. 3:03the Chipset on the motherboard and manages the flow of data between many of the other
33. 3:08components in your PC.  So, with that in mind, let’s move on and look at the motherboard.
34. 3:14This motherboard is a massive, printed circuit board with thousands of wires running inside
35. 3:20and a variety of microchips, components, sockets, ports, slots, headers and connectors
36. 3:27soldered to it.  Perhaps the single most important and expensive component, aside from
37. 3:32the bare PCB, is the Chipset, which is this integrated circuit found underneath a heat
38. 3:38sink down here and is connected directly to the system agent section in the CPU.  Here’s
39. 3:44a diagram illustrating how the CPU and chipset are connected to everything else.  As seen
40. 3:51here, the CPU connects directly to the DRAM, one or two displays, the GPU, and perhaps
41. 3:58a few SSDs plugged into the M2 slots.  The Chipset manages most everything else: data
42. 4:05flowing through the ethernet or Wi-Fi, data going to and from solid state drives and hard
43. 4:11drives plugged into the SATA ports, some of the PCIe slots, your keyboard and mouse, USB
44. 4:18devices, and the audio sent to the speakers or from the microphone.
45. 4:23Just a quick note, computer hardware has evolved immensely over the past 65 years and continues
46. 4:30to evolve, so the details we show should be thought of as a current day example PC and
47. 4:36not as how all computers work. Let’s move on and skip over the many different
48. 4:41sockets and connectors throughout the motherboard and focus on the voltage regulator module
49. 4:47or VRM found near the CPU.  These components are used to drop the voltage coming from the
50. 4:53power supply down to the 1.3 volts used by the CPU.  As a result of all the power flowing
51. 5:00through these components and their 80 to 90 percent efficiency,  heat sinks need to be
52. 5:06placed on top. While we’re on the topic of power, this
53. 5:10CPU consumes power equivalent to approximately 16 LED bulbs, thus generating a considerable
54. 5:18amount of heat which is taken away by the CPU cooler.  This particular cooler uses
55. 5:24a pump to circulate liquid through these tubes and into the radiator’s channels which transfers
56. 5:30heat to the radiator fins.  The fans then help transfer the heat to the air and the
57. 5:35cooled liquid returns to the pump via the return loop.  The pump is a brushless DC
58. 5:41motor constructed from a PCB, a control chip and a stator on the dry side, a barrier in
59. 5:48the middle, and then the permanent magnet rotor and impeller on the liquid side.  There’s
60. 5:54no mechanical connection between the rotor and stator, thereby preventing any leaks of
61. 5:59the cooling liquid.  Let’s move onto the power supply which distributes
62. 6:03power throughout the computer.  In here, the main transformer reduces the voltage and
63. 6:09bridges the isolation boundary between the primary side high voltage and the secondary
64. 6:14side lower voltages used throughout your computer.  Here’s the control PCB that ensures a stable
65. 6:21output voltage and sends adjustment signals to the switching power transistor on the primary
66. 6:27side using opto-isolators.  There are dozens of other components used to filter the input
67. 6:33voltage and generate various output voltages which are then sent to all the different hardware
68. 6:39in your computer.  For example, an SSD consumes just a few watts, and the connector uses these
69. 6:46voltages, whereas your GPU can consume hundreds of watts using these connectors and these
70. 6:52voltages. Next, we’ll explore the GPU, but before
71. 6:57that, let’s take a step back and consider the technology we’ve covered thus far.
72. 7:02Alone, each of these components doesn’t do much at all, but when united, they combine
73. 7:07to form a powerful system.  Similarly, this video is a multidisciplinary combination of
74. 7:14engineering, technology, art and animation inspired by the Magic School Bus.  We can’t
75. 7:20emphasize enough how important it is to be a multidisciplinary student.  And to help
76. 7:25you do that, the sponsor of this video is Brilliant.org.  Brilliant is a multidisciplinary
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78. 7:37ways.  Here are two courses from different disciplines that you might think were entirely
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87. 8:22on quantum circuits and algorithms for a future video that dives into Quantum Computers.
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91. 8:45link is in the description below.   Let’s get back to dissecting this computer
92. 8:50and move onto the graphics card and GPU which is also the brain of the computer… well…
93. 8:57actually this analogy doesn’t really work very well but anyway…  Opening the graphics
94. 9:02card we see another PCB, with the GPU’s integrated circuit in the center, VRAM chips
95. 9:09all around, and the voltage regulator module on the side.  Above the IC is a heat sink
96. 9:15with a fan to dissipate heat, and on the side of the graphics card are HDMI and Display
97. 9:21Ports, a PCIe Interface and then on the other side is the input power connector.
98. 9:27Let’s focus on the GPU integrated circuit which, similar to the CPU, has more than a
99. 9:33thousand solder pads that connect it to the PCB.  Opening the packaging we find the GPU
100. 9:40die which is noticeably different from the CPU.  In here are approximately 11.8 billion
101. 9:46transistors organized into 6 graphics processing clusters, totaling 28 streaming multiprocessors.
102. 9:55Each streaming multiprocessor is composed of 128 cores, resulting in a total of 3,584
103. 10:03cores.  Each core has sections for integer and floating-point arithmetic, and sections
104. 10:09for queueing in the operands and collecting the results and is far simpler than a CPU
105. 10:15core.  Additionally, on the die is an L2 memory cache shared among all the graphics
106. 10:22processing clusters, a set of memory controllers that connect to the VRAM located around the
107. 10:27processor, and a PCIe interface for connecting to the CPU.
108. 10:32When we zoom in to see a nanoscopic view of the integrated circuit we find something very
109. 10:37similar to what we saw in the CPU, with the transistors on the bottom and a labyrinth
110. 10:43of multiple layers of metal wires above.  All these structures are manufactured in multibillion
111. 10:49dollar semiconductor fabrication plants or fabs but that’s a topic for a whole different
112. 10:55video, so let’s move on.  GPUs and CPUs are similar in many ways, however, GPUs have
113. 11:03thousands of cores that are limited to basic arithmetic, whereas CPUs have only a handful
114. 11:09of cores that perform far more complicated operations.  Additionally, CPUs have branch
115. 11:17prediction and deep pipelines that optimize the execution of code.    Here’s a quick
116. 11:22example of what GPUs can do.  Take this image comprised of 16 million pixels each with RGB
117. 11:30values for each pixel.  A simple way to brighten the image is to add 20 to each of these numbers.
118. 11:36A CPU has 10 cores and thus performs arithmetic 10 numbers at a time whereas GPUs distribute
119. 11:44the data to thousands of cores thus performing magnitudes more parallel processing.
120. 11:50Let’s close this graphics card and talk briefly about the 3D model.  Note that this
121. 11:55is a slightly older model graphics card because we buy most of our hardware as non-functioning
122. 12:01parts from eBay, and then, as shown earlier, we tear them down rather destructively in
123. 12:08order to accurately model everything.  Additionally, sometimes components shown aren’t compatible,
124. 12:15such as this motherboard that says DDR4, while the DRAM is DDR5.
125. 12:22That said, modeling and animating everything to make it feel like you’re actually inside
126. 12:27a computer took us around 500 hours and we would greatly appreciate it if you could take
127. 12:33a few seconds to hit that like button, subscribe if you haven’t already, type up a quick
128. 12:38comment below, and share this video with someone who will enjoy it.  Also, we have a Patreon
129. 12:44and would appreciate any support.  We’re planning more videos on computer architecture
130. 12:50and other related topics and can’t do it without your help, so thank you for doing
131. 12:55these 4 quick things. It helps a ton. Let’s move on and look at the DRAM, Solid
132. 13:01State Drives, and Hard Drives.  We’re not going to spend too long, because we have an
133. 13:06entire series of videos on solid state drives, and then separate videos covering DRAM, and
134. 13:12Hard Drives.  But quickly, the CPU communicates directly with the DRAM through memory channels
135. 13:18running inside the motherboard.  Inside each of these 8 DRAM chips is an integrated circuit
136. 13:25composed of 32 memory banks each 8192 columns wide by 65536 rows tall.  The DRAM temporarily
137. 13:38stores data using capacitors and transistors called 1T1C memory cells in 2D arrays that
138. 13:45look like this.  Data can be accessed within nanoseconds, however, among these 8 chips,
139. 13:51only 16 Gigabytes of data can be temporarily stored.    Take a look at our 35-minute
140. 13:57video on DRAM, but for now let’s move on to SSDs which permanently store data in 3D
141. 14:05arrays called 3D NAND.  This array is 100 to 200 layers tall, 32 to 64 thousand columns
142. 14:13wide and 32 to 64 thousand rows deep.  Additionally, within a single SSD chip such as this one,
143. 14:22are multiple 3D NAND arrays stacked one on top of the other.  As a result, a single
144. 14:28microchip can store terabytes of data, however reading or writing data takes 50 or so microseconds,
145. 14:35which is 3000 times slower than DRAM.  Zooming in on a single SSD memory cell we find a charge
146. 14:43trap which stores different levels of charge allowing for 3 bits of data to be more permanently
147. 14:49saved.  Looking at the NVMe and SATA SSD, both have a few 3D NAND data storage chips,
148. 14:57a DRAM chip for buffering and holding the data mapping table and a controller chip.
149. 15:03Let’s move on and dissect the hard disk drive.  Here we have a disk mounted to a
150. 15:08spindle with a motor that rotates the disk at thousands of rpm.  A read write head moves
151. 15:14across the disk in order to access a single track out of half a million other data tracks.
152. 15:20Let’s zoom in on the read write head.  The write head changes the direction of localized
153. 15:25magnetic domains in a small layer on the disk whereas the read head senses these changes
154. 15:30in magnetic domains.  This disk drive is even slower than the SSD, taking a few milliseconds
155. 15:37to access, thus resulting in slower read and write times, but costing less per terabyte
156. 15:43of storage. Thus far we’ve covered all the hardware
157. 15:46inside your computer.  So, thanks for watching this far, and as a bonus here’s what it
158. 15:52looks like inside a computer mouse, with the scroll wheel up top, the infrared light, image
159. 15:58sensor, and multiple lenses down here and the battery and processor in the middle.
160. 16:04For computer mice we have separate dedicated videos exploring the image sensor and scroll
161. 16:09wheel with incredible details. Additionally, here’s what it looks like
162. 16:14inside a basic keyboard, with plastic traces that carry electricity to each key and, when
163. 16:20pressed, that key completes a circuit which is sensed by the processor up here.
164. 16:26That’s pretty much it for what it looks like inside your computer.  We believe the
165. 16:30future will require a strong emphasis on engineering education and we’re thankful to all our
166. 16:37Patreon and YouTube Membership Sponsors for supporting this dream.  If you want to support
167. 16:42us on YouTube Memberships, or Patreon, you can find the links in the description.  Also,
168. 16:49thank you again to Brilliant for sponsoring this video.
169. 16:52This is Branch Education, and we create 3D animations that dive deep into the technology
170. 16:58that drives our modern world.  Watch another Branch video by clicking one of these cards
171. 17:04or click here to subscribe.  Thanks for watching to the end!