Computer science Flashcards
What is the CPU?
It stands for Central processing unit and it is the hardware that controls the manipulation of data
What is the ALU?
The Arithmetic logic unit is the circuit that performs the operations on the data.
What is the control unit?
Coordinates the activities of the CPU
What are registers?
Quick, small stores of data within the CPU
In the von Newman architecture, how are instructions executed?
Instructions are executed sequencially, one instruction at a time is fetched from memory and passed to the CPU
How are CPUs designed?
They are designed to operate at a specific frequency - and the system clock is raised to this rate by the processor, giving the clock speed(Hz)
How does the fetch decode execute cycle work?
The instruction is retrieved by the CPU from the main memory, the instruction is broken down into its individual components to determine what the instruction is, and what data is being used. The control unit activates the necessary circuity/data transfers. The output of this stage is stored in a register, and data may be read or written from or to the main memory during the stage.
What is the main memory
Any memory device that is directly accessible by the CPU. Examples of these are RAM ROM and Cach.
What is a volatile memory
Memory that loses its data when power is lost.
What is non-volatile memory
Memory that retains its data when power is lost
What else is the main memory refrred to as?
Primary storage
What is RAM?
It has quick read/write times, and its function is to load open programs and operating system data currently in use from the slower secondary storage, so it can be accessed direcly by the CPU.
What does RAM stand for?
Random access memory
Is RAM volatile or non-volatile?
Volatile
What does ROM stand for?
Read only memory
What is ROM?
It can only be read not changed once programmed. It is used in small amounts in computers to store essential programs, like those needed to be run in order to boot the computer.
Is ROM volatile or non-volatile?
Non-volatile
Is flash storage Volatile or non-volatile?
Non-volatile
What is Cache?
A type of memory that stores copies if frequently used data
Which is faster Cache or RAM?
Cache is much faster but has a much lower capacity
Is Cache volatile or non-volatile?
Cache is volatile
What is the clock speed measure in?
measured in Hz meaning cycles per second
What is the clock speed?
The clock speed measures the number of cycles your CPU executes per second.
How many instructions would be executed in a second if your computer had a clock speed of 3.2 GHz
3.2 billion cycles per second.
The faster the cycles, the …………
more instructions that can be executed per second.
What do multiple cores(processors) allow you to do?
Multiple cores allow multiple intructions to be executed simultaneously which increases the clock speed.
What is an embedded system?
A special-purpose computer that has a specific function inside another system. Some examples are digital watches and dishwashers.
