The CPUs purpose is to
Fetch, Decode and Execute
instructions
Registers
Small amounts of high speed
dedicated memory
Tend to hold one
piece of data
Types Of Registers
MAR (Memory Address Register)
Controls the which pieces of data are fetched
Holds the address of the data to be fetched
PC (Program Counter)
Keeps track of memory location for the next instruction
Usually incremented to next location unless manipulated
CU (Control Unit)
Preforms all decoding of the instructions
and how data moves around the CPU and
memory interaction
MDR (Memory Data Register)
Stores any fetched data or any data
which is to be transferred to memory
ALU (Arithmetic Logic Unit)
Preforms all the calculations and
decisions required by the instruction
E.g - Boolean operations
ACC (Accumulator)
Register that stores the results of
any calculation from the ALU
CIR (Current Instruction Register)
Register which stores the most recent instructions
whilst it is waiting to be decoded and executed
Also known as the processor,
"Brains of the CPU"
Processes data and
carries out instructions
Has a clock speed
measured in Hertz
Cores
Each processor
has a core
Processors can
be multi-core
Dual core
Quad core
8 core (+)
Each core executes
instructions independently
For example, Dual cores can execute instructions
twice as fast, (2 instructions at the same time
CPU Performance
Three things effect
CPU performance
Cache size
Increasing cache size will reduce the number of memory to disk
transfers and thus speed up the processing of instructions
Cache
Stores next instructions
Very fast
memory
Dedicated connections to CPU
Instructions copied from RAM
Multiple levels (L1, L2, L3)
Relatively expensive
Speeds up the computer, if has large capacity. This is
because it can store frequently used instructions
Cores
Quadrupling the number of cores, may quadruple the
number of instructions exectued per second
Cores
A multiple core CPU will have a higher
performance than a CPU with less cores
2 cores == 2 instructions able
to be ran at the same time
Clock speed
Doubling the clock speed will double
the number of instructions
executing per second
Clock Speed
A CPU with a higher clock speed will
process more instructions per second
It will have a higher performance than an
equivalent CPU with a lower clock speed
Fetch, Decode and Execute
1. The Pc has the address of the next instruction to fetch
2. The value in the PC is copied to the MAR
3. The CU locates data
4. If it is instruction, it is placed in CIR, PC is incremented by 1, The instruction in CIR is
decoded by the CU, The instruction is executed by placing any request for data in MAR for
it to be collected and copied to MDR
Buses
A communication channel which can move data E.g USB (Universal Series
Bus) transfers data between the computer system and a external device
Types Of
Bus
Data Bus
Carries the data from the memory to
the MDR (Memory Data Register)
Address Bus
Carries memory address from CPU to any memory
locations (MAR) Memory Address Register
Control Bus
Carries control signals from
processor to other compoments
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