Basic components of a computer
Main parts of a PC or workstation:
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CPU
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memory
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busses
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external devices:
user input
keyboard, mouse
screen output
graphic card
permanent storage
hard disks
other
sound card, printer, cdrom, network devices, ...
CPU
: ``Central Processing Unit'', consists of:
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arithmetic and logic unit = ALU (addition, multiplication, comparison etc.)
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registers (extremely fast special memory for commands and operands)
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control unit (gets commands, moves data to/from ALU and memory)
Type of commands, a CPU understands:
data movement
``get data from memory cell 4228 into register r3''
computation
``add content of registers r1 and r2 and store the sum in r3''
program flow
``get the next command from memory cell 2001, if register r1 contains 0''
Peter Junglas 8.3.2000