Unit 5 - Hardware and Computer Architectures

Question 1

What is the standard computer architecture used today called?

Answer 1

Von Neumann architecture

Question 2

What are the basic components of a computer?

Answer 2

A processor and memory storage, input and output.

Question 3

What are the two types of functions that bits have in memory?

Answer 3

Data and instructions. Context tells a computer which is which.

Question 4

Which part of the CPU performs calculations and executes logic operations?

Answer 4

The Arithmetic and Logic Unit (ALU).

Question 5

What does the Control Unit of a processor do?

Answer 5

It controls operation of the ALU and communication with input and output. It also interprets and carries out processor instructions.

Question 6

What is a register?

Answer 6

Internal memory storage for a CPU. They are very small, 64 bits for newer processors.

Question 7

Name five design registers in the Von Neumann architecture

Answer 7

Program counter (PC), contains the memory address of the next instruction to read from memory

Memory Address Register (MAR), contains the address of the current instruction in memory

Memory Data Register (MDR) Contains the contents of the memory address that the MAR is pointing to, and data to be transferred.

Accumulator (AC) contains data that have been processed or about to be processed.

Current Instruction Register (CIR) contains the current binary instruction being executed.

Question 8

What is a data bus?

Answer 8

A connection used for data transfer between CPU and input/output.

Question 9

What is the address bus?

Answer 9

A bus that is used for data transfer, sending memory addresses.

Question 10

What is a control bus?

Answer 10

Carries instructions and special signals from devices such as their status.

Question 11

What is a data bus?

Answer 11

It sends and receives data to the CPU.

Question 12

What is the input output system?

Answer 12

It is the architecture of CPU, memory, input and output and the system buses that connect them: control bus, address bus, data bus.

Question 13

What can memory be used for?

Answer 13

Data and instructions.

Question 14

What is a CPU memory cache used for?

Answer 14

Small data storage that is very close to the CPU and thus very fast.

Question 15

What are keyboards used for?

Answer 15

Converting keystrokes into electrical signals, and then into binary code.

Question 16

What is the mouse used for?

Answer 16

Moving the mouse creates electrical signals which are converted into binary coordinates.

Question 17

What is IOP?

Answer 17

Input output processing. It’s processing the data e.g. from a keyboard or microphone before being sent to the computer. It’s an interface between system and devices.

Question 18

What are the functions of an operating system?

Answer 18

Provide an interface

Control the hardware

Run applications

Question 19

What is a Command Line Interface?

Answer 19

CLI, later became the GUI (Graphical User Interface). CLI is a screen where all input and output is text.

Question 20

What are drivers?

Answer 20

They let the Operating System talk to devices.

Long ago you had to specify the IRQ (interrupt request) and I/O port address. A standard PC design had up to 16 IRQ’s.

Question 21

What does the device controller do?

Answer 21

Signal the interrupt, is responsible for the binary input and output to a device.

Question 22

What is a cluster?

Answer 22

Used for high performance computing. It is a group of identical servers sharing the workload. If you supersize it, you get a supercomputer.

Question 23

What is parallel processing?

Answer 23

Breaking down tasks into subtasks and assigning them to different CPU’s. They are linked in parallel.

Question 24

What are FLOPS?

Answer 24

Floating point operations per second. It is how you measure computing power. Modern desktops clock 1100 gigaFLOPs. The SuperMUC-NG clocks at 26 petaFLOPS.

Question 25

What does the Program Counter register do?

Answer 25

Program counter (PC), contains the memory address of the next instruction to read from memory

Question 26

What does the Memory Address Register do?

Answer 26

Memory Address Register (MAR), contains the address of the current instruction in memory

Question 27

What does the Memory Data Register do?

Answer 27

Memory Data Register (MDR) Contains the contents of the memory address that the MAR is pointing to, and data to be transferred.

Question 28

What does the Accumulator register do?

Answer 28

Accumulator (AC) contains data that have been processed or about to be processed.

Question 29

What does the Current Instruction Register do?

Answer 29

Current Instruction Register (CIR) contains the current binary instruction being executed.