This tutorial describes common computer terms and operations. Definitions of computer parts include photos, and computer operations are demonstrated in the video.

For other computer tutorials and articles, click the link below this video. If the link is not shown, pause this tutorial and write down the web address shown on the display, then type it into your browser.

A typical home computer system has these parts:

Monitor - display device connected to your computer. It looks like a small TV set (some systems use actual TV sets as their monitor). 

Speakers - These reproduce the sounds from programs or files stored on your computer.

Keyboard - this is where you type text for documents, or text needed for computer commands.

Mouse - control used to select files or programs on your computer, so they can be opened, copied, moved or deleted.

Here's a closeup of an apple mouse and a windows mouse. The windows mouse has 2 buttons on the left and right side. These are used for different functions. There's a thumbwheel between them for scroling text windows.

The apple mouse can be used on a windows computer. You press down on the left or right sides to use the buttons, and you scroll text by moving your finger down the top surface. On an apple computer, you can perform the same gestures on the top of the mouse, as you can use on apple touchpad, touch screen, or on ipads.

Back to the computer system.

Tower contains the all the computer electronics. All the other devices are either plugged into the tower, or connect to it with bluetooth (which uses radio).

An all-in-one computer looks very much like a monitor, but it has the speakers and the computer electronics built into the monitor. Theres no separate tower for the all-in-onecomputer. All other parts are the same as for the tower computer.

Other devices you may find useful for your computer.

Microphone - You can record on your computer, make phone calls, etc.

Headphones - Another way to listen to sounds from your computer, and it makes spouses happier than the speakers do.
Gaming headsets like this one have an attached microphone for recording.

Thumb drives (or flash drives). Small portable storage devices. As large as 128 GB presently. Plug into the computer's USB port, or into a USB hub which is like an octopus plug for USB connections.

External hard drives. There are 2 here and 1 here. They provide extra storage for your computer. Smaller ones are powered through the USB connection. Larger ones like these have a separate power cord. Like thumb drives, you can connect these to another computer to transfer data.

We've described the physical parts of a computer system. Now we'll describe how the items stored on the computer (files, shortcuts, and programs) are represented on the display. Then we'll demonstrate computer operations. to copy, delete, move, or open the stored items.