Prelim Revision <3 Flashcards
What is a Binary number?
A numeric system that only uses two digits (0 and 1)
What is a Denary number
Standard number system (0,1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9)
What is an Integer?
A whole number (-ve, +ve or 0)
What is Floating Point Representation (FPR) ?
Numbers with a decimal point
What is a Real number??
ANY number (-ve, +ve, 0, decimals, fractions etc)
What is negative in Two’s Complement?
If the most significant bit (MSB) is +ve or -ve depends on left number (1 is negative 0 is positive)
What is the Range?
The difference from lowest to highest in a set of numbers
Example: 8 bits
-2^8-1 to (2^8-1)-1
What is a Mantissa?
The number located after the point
What is the Exponent?
The power that is used to determine how far the point has moved
What is the Precision?
How accurate it can reproduce the original number
What is ASCII?
American Standard Code (for) Information Interchange
ASCII uses 7-bits and so can store up to 128 characters
What is Extended ASCII?
Extended ASCII uses 8-bits and so can store up to 256 characters
SCOTT’S NUMBER
What is Unicode?
16-bits per character! Meaning it can store a maximum of 65 536 different character.
What is a Printable Character?
Literally the stuff you print (letters, numbers, punctuation)
What is a Character Set?
Characters that can be stored in a particular representation
What is standardised?? ASCII or Unicode
Unicode
What is a Pixel?
The most basic component of a computer graphic
What is Bitmap?
A map of pixels, each pixel has a binary number that determines its colour
What is Resolution?
A measure of the number of pixels in an image
What is Colour Depth?
The number of bits assigned to each pixel (hence the max amount of colours that can be used in an image)
What is Vector Graphics?
2D point located polygons to represent images in computer graphics
Use of Bitmap??
Usually used to depict lifelike images
Use of Vector??
Used for abstract images (like logos)
What is a Bus?
A collection of wires inside the computer that can transfer info and send signals
What is an Address Bus?
Wires connecting the Processor to the Memory - tells memory which address location is being used. Address buses are UNI-DIRECTIONAL and made up of parallel wires each carrying a single bit
What is a Data Bus?
Wires connecting the Processor to the Memory - tells memory what data is to be sent. Data buses are BI-DIRECTIONAL and made up of parallel wires each carrying a single bit
What is a Control Bus?
Made of individual lines with specific functions giving instructions to the rest of the system from the control unit
What is the READ Line?
Memory READ operation - reads the contents of the memory location to the processor
What is the WRITE Line?
Memory WRITE operation - writes an item of data from the processor into a memory location
What is the Clock Line?
Sends a series of pluses into the processor to synchronise events
What is a Register?
Storage locations inside the processor that are used to hold instructions or data
What is the Memory Address Register (MAR) ?
Also lowkey MDR too :)
Used to hold the address of the next instruction or piece of data to be received or sent from memory
What is an Instruction Register?
A register used to keep track of where a program is in its execution
What are the 4 functions of the CPU?
- Fetch
- Decode
- Execute
- Respond (Write Back)
What is Cache?
Stores data so it can be served faster in the future
How does increasing number of cores improve performance of a computer system?
The more cores, the more sets of instructions the processor can receive and process at the same time
How does increasing the width of a data bus improve performance of a computer system?
Transfers more information at once
How does increasing cache memory improve performance of a computer system?
Gets required instructions to the CPU faster - fast access in cache compared to home (main memory)
How does increasing clock speed improve performance of a computer system?
The higher the clock rate, the faster the instructions may complete a series of instructions
