COMPUTER ORGANIZATION AND HARDWARE PART 1

Question 1

Most computer processing takes place in a component called the

Answer 1

CPU. When talking about personal computers, the CPU (Central Processing Unit) is synonymous with the silicon chip known as the microprocessor, which is programmed to perform various tasks on the data it receives.

Question 2

The CPU consists of the control unit, the __________/logic unit (ALU) and the registers (high speed storage areas).

Answer 2

Arithmetic. The ALU is an area of the CPU optimized to handle math calculations (i.e. Add and Subtract) as well as logic comparisons (i.e. AND, NOT, and OR).

Question 3

The _____-Execute Cycle describes the steps the CPU (Central Processing Unit) follows to do its job (Processing).

Answer 3

Fetch. The first step in the cycle for the CPU is to Fetch the data and instructions from memory (RAM) and store them in its own internal temporary memory areas (Registers). Remember that we said that the CPU consists of the control unit, ALU, and the registers.

Question 4

In the Fetch step of the Fetch-Execute Cycle, the data moves from main memory (RAM) to the CPU along a hardware path known as the ________.

Answer 4

Data bus. The subsystem of the motherboard that allows data transfer to and from the CPU is called the data bus

Question 5

Input, output, and storage equipment that can be added to a computer to enhance its functionality are called __________ devices.

Answer 5

Peripheral. A peripheral device is an external device that provides input, output, storage, or other additional functionality to the computer. Examples of peripheral devices are the keyboard, mouse, monitor, printer, scanner, and speakers

Question 6

An expansion slot is a slot on the ___________ where the user can plug in an expansion card

Answer 6

Motherboard. Expansion slots allow for plug in of expansion cards for additional memory or control of peripheral devices. Common expansion cards include network cards, graphic cards, and memory cards. Most PC computers include 4 to 8 expansion slots.

Question 7

_____ memory drives plug into the computer’s USB ports and have memory capacities of up to several gigabytes.

Answer 7

Flash. When plugged into a USB port, flash memory drives show up as an external drive and are a convenient way to transport and transfer data.

Question 8

_________ Memory chips contain fixed computer start up instructions, are loaded at the factory, and are nonvolatile

Answer 8

READ ONLY

Question 9

With virtual memory, free _________ space is used to extend the capacity of RAM

Answer 9

Hard disk. Virtual memory uses the hard disk to mimic primary storage (RAM). If a program exceeds its available RAM, the Operating System can use an area of hard disk called virtual memory to store parts of data files or programs until needed, thereby gaining almost unlimited memory capacity.

Question 10

Computer cache temporarily stores instructions and data that the processor is likely to use __________.

Answer 10

Frequently. Cache is lost when the computer power is turned off. Examples of cache include L1, L2, and L3. In all cases, cache is storage located closer to the processor than RAM and therefore can be accessed much more quickly. Cache speeds up processing

Question 11

The contents of ________ memory, which includes RAM, are lost when the power is turned off.

Answer 11

Volatile.

Question 12

The computer’s main ______ typically consists of high speed RAM which stores instructions and data.

Answer 12

Memory. RAM, which stands for Random Access Memory, stores temporary data which is waiting to be stored, processed, or output, and this data is lost if the computer is turned off. RAM usually consists of several circuit boards (chips) that plug directly into the computer’s system board.

Question 13

One reason a tape drive takes longer to access data than a ____ drive is that tape drives use sequential access.

Answer 13

Hard. A tape drive is an example of a sequential access device; it retrieves data by starting at the beginning of the tape and reading each record until the required data is found. A hard drive, on the other hand, is a random access device, which allows it to go directly to the requested data.

Question 14

_____________ storage allows access to any location in any order

Answer 14

Random access. Random access storage devices are able to go directly to the requested data. Examples of random access storage include computer hard disk drives, RAM, flash drives, floppy drives and CD-ROM drives. Random access is much faster than sequential access storage (tape

Question 15

A ________ is a unit of measurement equaling 1024 bytes of data

Answer 15

Kilobyte. The prefix “kilo” means a thousand. A kilobyte is generally abbreviated as KB

Question 16

A megabyte is a unit of measurement roughly equaling one _______ bytes.

Answer 16

Million. The prefix “mega” means a million. A megabyte is often abbreviated as MB

Question 17

A gigabyte is a unit of measurement roughly equaling one _______ bytes.

Answer 17

Billion.

Question 18

Using a technology called pipelining, the processor can start executing an instruction before the previous instruction completes. This can enhance computer ___________.

Answer 18

Performance

Question 19

With serial processing, the CPU must complete all steps in the instruction _____ before it begins to execute the next instruction

Answer 19

Cycle. With serial processing, instructions are executed sequentially in the order received

Question 20

A unit of measure equaling one ______ digit is a bit. This is the smallest unit of data that a system can handle.

Answer 20

Binary. In everyday life, we generally use a base 10 system, meaning that we have 10 digits to choose from when we are expressing a number (i.e. 0 through 9). A computer uses a binary system (base 2). That means that it only has 2 digits to choose from (i.e. 0 and 1).

Question 21

The number of bits limits how big of a number can be expressed. To calculate this limit, simply do 2n, where n is the number of ____.

Answer 21

Bits. For example, the largest number an 8-bit variable can hold is 255 (28 equals 256, but a computer starts at 0, so it can express anywhere from 0 through 255). Note that this is why, for instance, an 8 bit video card is limited to displaying 256 colors

Question 22

A unit of measure equaling 8 ____ is a byte.

Answer 22

Bits.

Question 23

A computer’s ____ size is the number of bits that the processor may process at any one time

Answer 23

Word. The more bits in a word, the faster the computer. Examples of word size in modern computers include 16, 32, and 64 bits.

Question 24

A computer with a __ bit word size will transfer data within the microprocessor at 8 bytes at a time

Answer 24

64. To convert from word size to bytes, you must divide by 8 because there are 8 bits in a byte. Therefore, when we’re dealing with a 64 bit word size, we divide by 8 and the result is 8 bytes

Question 25

Computers and other digital devices have a code they use to represent character data. For example, in the code used by most computers, _____, an uppercase ‘A’ would be represented by 1000001.

Answer 25

ASCII. There are three main codes used by digital devices – ASCII (American Standard Code for Information Interchange, pronounced ASK ee), EBCDIC (Extended Binary-Coded Decimal Interchange Code), and Unicode.

Question 26

A device driver is system software used by the computer to control __________ devices.

Answer 26

Peripheral. Device drivers refer to software that allows a peripheral device to communicate with the computer. They are small programs which run in the background and are used by devices such as modems, storage devices, mice, keyboards, monitors, printers, sound cards, network cards

Question 27

The series of events which takes place in a set order and at specified intervals, that occurs when the CPU retrieves an instruction from storage and executes it, is called the ___________ cycle.

Answer 27

Instruction. The instruction cycle is also often referred to as the machine cycle or the Fetch-Execute Cycle

Question 28

Fragmentation occurs when stored files on a hard drive are _________ across noncontiguous sectors.

Answer 28

Scattered. When a file is saved to disk, it isn’t always saved in adjacent sectors; in other words, the data making up the file is spread out over the hard drive. This is called fragmentation. Fragmentation slows down file retrieval

Question 29

By using a defragmentation utility, files on a disk are rearranged so that they are stored in __________ clusters.

Answer 29

Contiguous. Defragmentation can improve disk drive performance by helping the computer operate more efficiently.

Question 30

____________ software detects and corrects certain types of common problems on hard disks and DVDs. It also searches for and removes unnecessary files (temp files).

Answer 30

Disk scanner.

Question 31

File ___________ is a method of removing repetitive elements of a file causing the file to require less storage space and less time to transmit.

Answer 31

Compression. Decompression is used to restore the file to its original condition by replacing the repeated patterns that were removed during file compression.

Question 32

Multiple files which have been consolidated into one file and compressed to reduce size and download time are said to be ______.

Answer 32

Zipped. Zipped files are unzipped as part of the installation process