CSC 101 Introduction to Computers Spring 2005 Lecture Four What's in the Box

Course Home Page Syllabus Assignments - Monday Class Assignments - Tues/Thurs Class

Basic parts of the computer

• What can a computer do?
  • Receive Input
  • Process Data
  • Produce Output
  • Store Data
    • Primary Storage - RAM, Random Access Memory
    • Secondary Storage - Hard Drive, Floppy Disk, CD, DVD, Flash Drive
  
  
  
• How does a computer store information
  • Humans - Analog
  • Bit - Binary Digit
  • Byte - 8 Bits
  • Bits can represent 3 types of data
    • Numbers
    • Characters - ASCII, ANSI, Unicode
    • Instructions
  • Bits represented in different ways
    • Ram - electronic circuits
    • Hard Drive/Magnetic Disks - magnetic coating
    • CD/DVD - pits
    • Fiber Optic Cable - pulses of light
  
  
  
• Quantifying bits
  • KB - Kilobyte, Thousand
  • MB - Megabyte, Million
  • GB - Gigabyte, Billion
  • TB - Terabyte, Trillion
  • PB - Petabyte, Quadrillion
  
  
  
• The motherboard - Circuit board on which system compenents at attached.
  
  
• Chipset - Supportive circuitry on the motherboard
  
  
• Bus - Moves information
  
  
• Computer Memory
  • RAM - Random Access Memory
  • ROM - Read Only Memory
  • CMOS - Complementary Metal Oxide Semiconductor
  • PROM - Flash Memory
  • Volatile vs. Nonvolatile
  
  
  
• The CPU - Central Processing Unit
  • What is the CPU
    • Collection of circuits on a chip
    • Converts Input to Output - gives data a meaning
    • Add, compare, and move
    • Communicates through memory
    • Housed on the motherboard
    
    
    
  • 

    Parts of the CPU

    • Control Unit
      • Prefetch unit
      • Decoder
      • Instruction Register
      • Program Register
    • ALU - Arithmetic Logic Unit
      • Accumulator
      • General Registers
    • Cache Memory
    
    
    
  • Compatibility
    • CISC - Complex Instruction Set Computer
    • RISC - Reduced Instruction Set Computer
    • Backward compatibility
    
    
    
  • Instruction Cycle
    • Fetch
    • Decode
    • Execute
    • Store
    • Pipelining
    
    
    
  • CPU Performance
    • Clock Speed/Processor Speed
      • MegaHertz - Millions
      • GigaHertz - Billions
      • MIPS - Millions per Second (Workstations)
      • FLOPS - Floating Point Instructions Per Second (Supercomputers)
    • Bus Speed
    • Word Size
    • Multiprocessors
  
  
  
• The other stuff
  • Expansion Slots

    Expansion Cards

    PC Cards

    • Graphics
    • Sound
    • Fax/Modem
    • NIC - Network Interface Card
    • SCSI
    • USB - Universal Serial Bus
    • Video Capture Card
    • FireWire
    • PCMCIA - Laptop
    
    
    
  • Busses and Ports
    • PCI - Peripheral Components Interconnect (PC Standard)
    • AGP - Accelerated Graphics Port (Not as common as PCI)
    • Monitor/Mouse Port - Round, 6 pin
    • SCSI - Small Computer System Interface
    • * USB - Universal Serial Bus
    • * FireWire/1394 Bus
    • Serial Port (Legacy)
    • Parallel Port (Legacy)
    • IrDa Port - Infrared Port

Computers; Information Technology in Perspective - Chapter 4, Sections 1-3 - pgs. 153 - 177

Links for Further Study

Computer Processor Information and History - http://www.computerhope.com/help/cpu.htm

Basics of the Computer - http://www.OSdata.com/system/physical/basics.htm

Basics of Computer Hardware - The Processor - http://www.osdata.com/system/physical/processr.htm

Basics of Computer Hardware - The Bus - http://www.OSdata.com/system/physical/bus.htm

PC-Hardware Overview - http://www.build-your-own-computers.com/pc-hardware-overview.html

Guide to CPUs - http://www.karbosguide.com/hardware/module3a1.htm

Clock Speed - Clock Doubling - http://www.karbosguide.com/hardware/module3b1.htm

How Memory Works - http://computer.howstuffworks.com/computer-memory.htm

Information about the computer bus - http://www.computerhope.com/help/bus.htm

The computer bus - http://www.fact-index.com/c/co/computer_bus_1.html

Last Updated: 2/21/05