Input and Output Devices
What input and output devices do, the main categories - keying, pointing, scanning and imaging, audio and video - devices that are both input and output, and the idea of ports and device drivers.
What you will be able to do
- Define input and output devices and give examples of each.
- Classify input devices by how they capture data.
- Identify devices that act as both input and output.
- Explain what a port and a device driver do.
What is inside this lesson
- 1Input, output and peripherals
- 2Categories of input device
- 3Categories of output device
- 4Devices that do both
- 5Ports and drivers
- 6Common confusions
- 7Quick revision
- 8Worked example: classify the device
- 9Practice
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Input, output and peripherals
An input device converts data or instructions from a form a person can produce into the computer's internal form and sends it in. An output device takes results from the computer's internal form and presents them in a form a person can use.
Both are peripherals - devices attached to, but outside, the core processor and memory. A peripheral connects through a port and is managed by a small piece of system software called a device driver.
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