Von Neumann Architecture

Question 1

What are the 3 main components of the Von Neumann architecture and what do they do?

Answer 1

• Arithmetic Logic Unit (ALU) | performs all of the logical operations of the CPU, essentially, the execution of the instruction
• Control Unit (CU) | Decodes the instruction and sends out control signals around the CPU
• Registers | Used to store small amounts of data that are needed during processing

Question 2

What does the MDR hold?

Answer 2

Holds the data that has been retrieved from memory, or about to be stored in memory

Question 3

What does MAR hold?

Answer 3

Holds the address of the location in memory where data is to be retrieved or stored

Question 4

What does the ACC hold?

Answer 4

Intermediate ALU results

Question 5

What does the PC hold?

Answer 5

Holds the memory location address of the next instruction that is to be performed by the CPU

Question 6

What do multiple cores allow a CPU to do?

Answer 6

Multiple cores will allow the CPU to process multiple instructions simultaneously

Question 7

What does a higher clock speed mean?

Answer 7

The higher the clock speed which means more pulses are sent per second, so more instructions can be executed per second.

Question 8

What is Cache memory and why do we have it?

Answer 8

Cache memory is a small amount of very fast memory inside the CPU. It stores frequently accessed data and instructions.

Question 9

Stored program concept

Answer 9

• Instructions and data stored in the same memory
• Instructions fetched and executed in order