1.1.1 Structure Of The Processor

Question 1

ALU

Answer 1

The ALU performs arithmetic and logical operations on the data

Question 2

Control unit

Answer 2

The control unit controls and coordinates the activities of the CPU, directing the flow of data between the CPU and other devices

Question 3

Register

Answer 3

Tiny areas of extremely fast memory, located in the CPU, normally designed for a specific purpose

Question 4

PC (Program Counter)

Answer 4

A register in the control unit that holds the address of the next instruction to be executed

Question 5

ACC (Accumulator)

Answer 5

A general purpose register that is used to hold the results of operations carried out in the ALU

Question 6

MAR (Memory address register)

Answer 6

A register in the CPU that stores the address of the memory location currently in use.

Question 7

MDR (Memory data register)

Answer 7

A register in the CPU that is used to temporarily store the data read from or written to memory.

Question 8

CIR (Current instruction register)

Answer 8

A register in the control unit that stores the current instruction being executed, divided into operand and opcode

Question 9

Busses

Answer 9

A bus is a set of parallel wires connecting two or more components of a computer.
Typically consists of 8, 16, 32 or 64 lines

Question 10

Data bus

Answer 10

A bi-directional bus, transports data and instructions to and from system components

Question 11

Address bus

Answer 11

Used to transmit the memory addresses specifying where data is to be sent to or retrieved from

Question 12

Control bus

Answer 12

Carries control and command signals to and from component of a computer

Question 13

Fetch-Decode-Execute

Answer 13

The complete process of retrieving an instruction from store, decoding it and carrying it out

Question 14

CPU (Central processing unit)

Answer 14

The main part of the computer consisting of the registers, ALU and control unit

Question 15

Clock speed

Answer 15

The number of clock cycles completed per second. The higher the clock speed the faster the computer may work

Question 16

Core

Answer 16

A core is a complete processing unit within the CPU

Question 17

Cache

Answer 17

A small, but extremely fast type of RAM, located in the CPU chip

Question 18

Pipelining

Answer 18

Concurrently completing the fetch-decode-execute cycle of 3 separate instructions

Question 19

Von Neumann Architecture

Answer 19

Traditional computer architecture that has a shared memory and data bus used for both data and instructions

Question 20

Harvard architecture

Answer 20

A computer architecture with physically separate memories for instructions and data

Question 21

Contemporary architecture

Answer 21

Processing that uses Von Neumann architecture for main memory and Harvard architecture for cache, divided into instruction and data cache