Hardware

Question 1

What is the ALU

Answer 1

Short for Arithmetic Logic Unit, the ALU is a complex digital circuit; one of many components within a computer’s central processing unit. It performs both bitwise and mathematical operations on binary numbers and is the last component to perform calculations in the processor.

Question 2

Name all the Registers

Answer 2

PC - Program Counter

ACC - Accumlator

MAR - Memory Address Register

MDR - Memory Data Register

CIR - Current Instruction Register

Question 3

Name all of the Buses and their purpose

Answer 3

Data Bus - Carries information

Control Bus - Determines the operation.

Address Bus - Determines where the data should be sent

Question 4

Whad does IAS stand for and what does it do?

Answer 4

Immediate access store

It works the same way as the ram, and can be accessed in any order.

Question 5

What is Clock Speed?

Answer 5

The clock speed tells you how many cycles the cpu can perform each second, most cpu’s are measured in GigaHertz

Question 6

What is Cache?

Answer 6

Cache is similar to ram but it is faster to read from, it stores data that needs to be accessed more than once. It is faster but it is also smaller, the larger it gets the slower it becomes

Question 7

What are Cores?

Answer 7

A core is a processor with its own cache, so a dual-core cpu has two processors and a quad-code has four processors

Question 8

What is Word Size?

Answer 8

32-bit and 64-bit, These are the number of bits that the cpu can work with in one cycle, the more bits there are the more the processor is able to handle.

Question 9

What does RISC Stand For and what does it do?

Answer 9

Simpler processors, harder to compile, requires a custom compiler.

Lightweight, smaller systems but are power efficient so they run fairly fast, they also have a faster clock speed. They’re mainly used for smaller devices such as mobile phones because of their traits.

They have a reduced instruction set and debugging is slower and harder.

Question 10

What does CISC Stand For and what does it do?

Answer 10

Complex operations can be carried out by one instruction, it may take more than one cycle to perform the instruction, but it is a reduced instruction set and the instructions are easier to use.

It is backwards compatible and It gives you more control. Easier to compile. More instructions can be added but they eventually may never be used in future versions but it has to be imported due to backwards compatibility

Question 11

What is Harvard architecture?

Answer 11

Harvard architecture has separate data and instruction busses, allowing transfers to be performed simultaneously on both busses.

Question 12

What is von Neumann architecture?

Answer 12

von Neumann architecture has only one bus which is used for both data transfers and instruction fetches, and therefore data transfers and instruction fetches must be scheduled - they can not be performed at the same time

Question 13

What is a Multicore Processor?

Answer 13

A multi-core processor is a single computing component with two or more independent processing units called cores, which read and execute program instructions. The instructions are ordinary CPU instructions (such as add, move data, and branch) but the single processor can run multiple instructions on separate cores at the same time

Question 14

What is Parallel Computing

Answer 14

IBM’s Blue Gene/P massively parallel supercomputer.
Parallel computing is a type of computation in which many calculations or the execution of processes are carried out concurrently. Large problems can often be divided into smaller ones, which can then be solved at the same time. There are several different forms of parallel computing

Question 15

What are the Types of Storage?

Answer 15

Magnetic
Flash
Optical
SSD

Question 16

What is Magnetic Storage?

Answer 16

Is stored on a magnetized medium, and uses different forms of magnetization. It is a non-volatile memory.

Magnetic storage can be affected by other magnetic fields and heat, making it not that robust

Is seen as the most cost effective way of storing data.

Magnetic tape is fairly small and can be portable. Data can easily be erased many times. Each tape does have a limited lifespan though, about 15 years.

Question 17

What is Flash Storage?

Answer 17

They’re small, lightweight, removable and rewritable. They are made of a small printed circuit board which normally has a plastic or metal casing.

They can easily be lost due to their size, but they have no moving parts so they can’t be damaged as easily. However, the metal part which is inserted into the usb port can be broken off.

They’re more expensive than a CD or DVD

They can be written to multiple times without much issue. They’re the perfect portable storage device.

Question 18

What is Optical Storage?

Answer 18

Data is recorded using specific marks in a patterns, and is read by a laser when the disk is spun. CD and DVD’s are examples of optical storage.

They require special devices to be able to read and write and can have compatibility issues with different devices…

A single disk is fairly cheap but it doesn’t have much storage room on it, so you would have to buy multiple disks for the same amount of storage as a hard drive

DVD and CD’s can be written to easily. However they are fairly flimsy and can easily be broken, as well if scratched it can damage a all the information stored on the disk.

Question 19

What is SSD Storage?

Answer 19

SSD’s are based on Silicon technology, meaning it has no moving parts and has silicon memory chips on the memory card.

There are a very few large ssd and can drain laptop battery power faster than normal.

The price per GB is fairly expensive. So the larger the memory the more expensive it is

As an SSD has no moving parts it is mush harder to damage, as if it did have moving parts, the disk could be damaged by the pin.

Question 20

What is RAM?

Answer 20

Ram is the memory of the computer and it is used to store programs while they are running. It stores information the program need to do their job. Ram can be read and written to fairly fast in any particular order. Ram is volatile memory as when the computer is turned off it is emptied.

Question 21

What is ROM?

Answer 21

Rom is memory that stores instructions that the computer uses when it boots up. It is the BIOS (basic input output system) Rom is non-volatile so it isn’t lost upon the computer being turned off. It is needed because the computer needs to obtain instructions upon boot up. Because it is read only iot cannot be changed by the user.

Question 22

What Factors Effect the CPU’s Speed?

Answer 22

Cache Size
Clock Speed
Cores
Other intensive Programs

Question 23

What is Disk Thrashing?

Answer 23

This is an effect of Paging and Segmentation, It is where the main memory isn’t big enough to fit all the currently active data, so the CPU is constantly having to swap files back and fourth, this can lead to more time being spent swapping files back and fourth, causing the system to slow or crash.

Question 24

What is Paging?

Answer 24

This is where instructions are broken down into equal data sizes to fit into the memory, The sizes do sometimes vary but most of the time they’re 4kb.

Question 25

What is Segmentation?

Answer 25

Segments are broken up into dynamic and logical chunks that don’t break up parts of the code meaning there is less chance of errors due to the splitting of instructions, however this is more complex to code.