CPU (central processing unit) - The CPU is commonly referred to as the "brains" of the computer, it carries out instructions for the device such performing the basic arithmetic, logical, control and input/output. The better the CPU you have the faster the device will be able to run and perform tasks. When CPU's were first being made they could only clock up to a certain amount of MHz which is very low especially for todays standards, this would mean a computer wouldn't be able to run fast and would be quite slow. One of the most famous processor series would be the Pentium series developed by Intel, they have been created since 1993 and were at one point the dominating processors for devices such as custom built PC's. The series ranges from 60MHz to 3.8GHz showing how far technology has grown since the beginning. Originally CPU's would only use a single core processor but as the years have gone by and gaming has increased people began to use dual and multi core processors so they could run their games and other applications at a higher speed. CPU's don't just stop at 3.8GHz either, they can clock up to numbers such as 8.9GHz. Without CPU's we wouldn't be able to play games at all due to the fact they need something to run off of which is what the CPU is there to do.
The limitations of CPU's are that they are growing rapidly as the years go by making them go out of date very quickly and if you have a custom PC you want to have the best hardware you can acquire so you have a guaranteed spot of running the newest blockbuster game without it crashing, it also makes consoles go out of date very fast meaning they have to be updated with a new model every few years. They are also not going to be guaranteed to be compatible with all motherboards meaning that if you are building a PC and you are quite new to it then you can mess up by buying a mother board and CPU that aren't compatible with one another.
GPU (graphics processing unit) - A graphics processing unit is a piece of hardware used to display graphical images on screen, without it games wouldn't be able to render their visual aspects making gaming useless because we wouldn't be able to see anything. The GPU is part of something known as the graphics card, the graphics card is what gives the output to the screen and the GPU is what decodes the binary instructions for the graphics card to output. The most notable graphics card developers are the NVidia cooperation which was founded in 1993, they were the first company to bring 3D rendering into the gaming world with the first GeForce NV10 graphics card brought out the same year as the founding of the company. The card clocked up to 120MHz which is once again very low compared to modern technology. The newest graphics card by them is the GeForce GTX 1080 which use GDDR5X and can display very high graphics, however it is a very expensive piece of technology due to what it gives the payer.
Limitations of a GPU are that if you get an integrated GPU, it can drain the main RAM and cause your computer to begin to slow down which can interrupt the gaming experience and players will begin to experience something known as lag. Another disadvantage is the price, as I stated about the GeForced GTX 1080 it is a expensive piece of hardware with the price being up to $600, this means that you will need a lot of money if you want to have the highest end PC with the very best graphics possible.
RAM (Random Access memory) - RAM is a memory device used to memorise open applications or data items, it read these items and writes them in real time. Without RAM we wouldn't be able to have multiple open data items at once. The difference between RAM and storage (even though they are both memory devices) and that RAM can lose the memory it is associated with. An example of this would be if I were to do to work in a word document then whatever is being done is recorded by the RAM, if my laptop/PC loses power and I haven't saved then RAM will store this information for a limited amount of time and if not recovered by this time limit then it will be lost forever. There are different types of RAM available such as DRAM (Dynamic RAM, used to separate bit of data in a separate capacitor,) SRAM (Static RAM, which is faster and uses less power than a usual DRAM) and RDRAM (Rambus direct RAM which is made to work with the front side bus and has a high transfer rate of over 1.6GHz.) Different companies will utilise these different types of RAM for their devices mainly for what will suit it and be best for it, some companies may even use more than one type of RAM.
Without RAM games would slow down insignificantly as games would take a longer time to process the information, also better RAM allows for people like PC gamers to have both their game and another application (such as Skype for sociability) to be able to run without anything slowing down.
The limitations are that like I said before, once the device has been shut down then any information is prone to being lost. This can make important work become lost forever or mean that some tasks will have to be performed again for the person to get back to where they were before the device went off. Another limitation is that it needs to be checked every so often, due to RAM being cheap and has a short life cycle it can become damaged very easily and must be looked after by the owner or else they will have to buy a new one.
Display/screens - To play video games you need a display or screen or else you won't be able to see whats going on, for this there are multiple forms of display technology such as TVs or monitors which will display the game for the player. The display of the TV can also change depending on a few factors, one could be the resolution that has been built with it. Resolution is a huge part of gaming to offer this amazing experience but components have to be compatible if you want to display certain graphics. An example of this is with the new generation of consoles, if your TV can only go up to a resolution of 720p but the game you are playing can support 1080p then it will only show 720p due to the hardware involved in the TV. Say it is vice versa with the TV having 1080p then the TV will only display 720p graphics because it can't change the programming of the game and its graphics. Other display factors could be things like 3D TVs which can show a 3D image to bring a more immersive experience, LCD (liquid crystal definition) and more.
Limitations of a TV are the size of it, they are quite big and bulky so this means that you have to take out a portion of your room just to fit the device into their and if you want to have a bigger TV for a better gaming experience then you need to make sure you have the room size for it. For better graphics they can be quite expensive such as the new 4K resolution TVs which are selling for around £2,000 and is approximately £1,600 more than the console which makes it seem quite worthless for you to spend that much just to game.
Sound/Audio - Sound and Audio is a huge part of gaming, it is what can make a game go from being intense to being one of the most cheerful pieces of musical art you have ever heard. For gaming devices a sound card is needed, the sound card provides input and output audio signals to and from a device. You can buy better sound cards to hear more distinct and high quality sounds from video games such as X-Fi titanium HD which produces HD sounds for PC. Another piece of hardware which is compatible with another device is the sound card because if you have this HD sound card but £2 speakers bought off of Ebay then you aren't going to hear that HD sound, instead it will be replaced with the best sound that the speaker can output. There are different types of sounds you can experience such as monophonic output, stereo output and surround sound and each one can create a different experience for the player.
The limitations of a sound card are that it is very hard to hear any difference between very high end sound card quality compare to medium sound card quality making that extra amount of cash you splashed out useless, another limitation is that not all sound cards are compatible with the mother board you buy because most motherboards already have this built in sound card with it making the sound card you bought utterly useless.
Storage - Storage has come a long way from when it first started, memory was only very small with computers only being able to operate with about 100MB if that. Now there is a huge amount of storage available with people being able to use devices like hard drives with other 2TB of memory to store there games or applications on. There are multiple ways to store information however such as on a disc like a DVD which can only be read by DVD players due to its technology and laser reading hardware, or CDs which are used by radios to listen to music and can only be used by CD laser reading hardware. CDs and DVDs only offer very little amount of data though with about 10GB being the highest amount, CDs are also what hold game data and are needed to play video games. Another form of storage is USBs which are portable devices, they work like hard drives but can be transported from device to device allowing for people to take work from one computer to another. Storage is important for gaming because without it we wouldn't be able to save the progress we make within video games meaning we'd have to complete all video game walkthroughs on one go.
The limitations of storage depend on the type of storage you are dealing with, for example, the hard drive storage can hold a high amount of data with over 2TBs being available for purchase. However, the higher the amount of data you want then the higher the price will be. USBs are small devices and even though they are portable they can be misplaced or forgotten about easily making work and stuff get lost easily due to a stupid mistake. The advantages of hard drives are that you can buy the required space you wish to have leaving it in your full control, the advantage of USB devices are the portability. This makes it so information can be easily carried from location to location allowing work to be done faster without a middle inconvenience.
Interface devices - Interface devices are the devices which allow a person to interact with the device that is positioned in front of them, there are different types of interface devices for different types of platforms. For PC you can use a mouse and keyboard, these items are usually wried (although can be wireless by using USB connectors) up to the computer and allow the user to have full control over what they wish to do on said computer. As for consoles they usually have controllers that are wireless, if we take the PS4 controller as an then we can see that there is a bluetooth device in both the controller and console that allow them to be connected, once they are synched up the player can use the controller to have full control over the UI and any characters that they play as in game. They can change though with some controllers for some devices being both wireless or wired, with controllers like the PS4 they will eventually have to be wired up to charge the battery within the controller but it is completely optional whether the players wish to stay wired or not. Without interface devices then gaming wouldn't be able to happen because there would be no way for people to control the characters in game or traverse through menus to get onto said games.
The limitations are that depending on the controller you buy the length of a wired one can change meaning that if you aren't careful enough you can buy a short wire which makes for an inconvenience and uncomfortable gaming experience. Another limitation is if it is wired then the wires can be tangled up easily making it a tedious job to untangle them and wires can become damaged from several factors such as them repeatedly getting tangle up or a mouse chewing through them. With wireless controllers, they have to be charged every once in a while which can be quite frustrating, especially when playing online and the controller disconnecting which could ruin something you was winning at.
Gaming connectivity - Connectivity has become an increasing factor in gaming since the 7th generation of consoles with many games becoming multiplayer and developers looking to concentrate on multiplayer game titles. Before consoles could connect to the internet they were known as stand alone devices, they are not dependable on any other add ons, bundles or pieces of equipment. An example of this would be the PS1 which had no online available for it, once it was sold that was it there could be no software/system updates, it would stay the way it was until an update version was later released or a new console came out. Games also offer two types of modes, offline and online connectivity, offline connectivity would also be known as local play and would be a split screen type mode where two people would connect two controllers in the same room and either cooperate or battle it out against each other. The online aspects allowed for huge connections to all over the world (using WAN, wide area network) or simple close by connections (LAN, local area network.) LAN uses small areas for its connectivity allowing friends who live in the same area as you to connect to you easier, WAN uses satellites and radio signals to allow for multiplayer to taker place and connections from countries to countries. To access the internet you would need broadband connection, the more worse the broadband connection was then the more worse your connection to the internet was making for laggy gameplay with friends. With upgraded packages and better broadband you can have faster gameplay in multiplayer matches. The newest best type of broadband is fibre optic which allows insanely high speeds of download.
The limitations of gaming connectivity is that with consoles the consumer has to pay a yearly or monthly subscription just to play online, if the consumer fails to do so then they will be restricted with online gaming and talking to their friends in party chat. Another limitation is the download and upload speed varying, the quality of these speeds can vary over different factors, the company you are with, the router you have been supplied with, the positioning of your router and console and more, all these compile together and can make it so that you can either have a worse or better gaming experience, it is undeterminable each day.
Power supply - Power supplies are used to supply the power our devices need, without power supplies we wouldn't be able to turn on our devices at all. There are two types of power supply, you can have an external power supply which is outside of the console or you can have an internal power supply. Power supplies will typically be AC power supplies which take voltage from outside the wall sockets and convert them into a lower more desired voltage for the console. As for controllers there can be two types of powered controllers, the first is one that is powered by batteries such as the xbox controller, it uses the juice from the batteries and converts it to power for the controller to use, once the batteries have ran out then the controller will also die. The other is a rechargeable battery just like the PS4's which is a built in battery for the controller that can be recharged using a power supply that connects from the USB port on the back of the controller to a device that is capable of being plugged into and charging the controller.
Sources:
http://computerdays.com/cpu-definition/
http://www.anandtech.com/show/7765/nvidias-geforce-gtx-titan-black-no-compromises-for-gaming-compute
https://www.androidpit.com/increase-phone-ram
https://www.pinterest.com/pin/445856431830362535/
http://en.community.dell.com/support-forums/desktop/f/3513/t/19616317
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hard_disk_drive
http://plugable.com/products/usb-kmb1/
http://www.longmai.net/solutions/online-game/
http://www.best-off-grid-computers.com/the-truth-about-power-supply-computer.html
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