Answer to Question #236669 in Computer Networks for Stephen Balgitra

Question

1. Describe the four main elements of a computer system.
2. Distinguish between two main categories of processor registers; and give examples to illustrate your answer.

Answer 1

Part 1

(1)Input units

These are all the devices which are used to key in information to a computer for example the keyboard

Each input device has its own hardware controller that connects to the CPU and primary memory, and it has a set of instructions that tells the CPU how to use it.

(2) Output units

These are devices that a computer uses to relay information to the user for example the printer and monitor.

For example, everything displayed on a computer monitor starts as machine code in the memory. The CPU takes that machine code and converts it into a format required by the monitor's hardware. The monitor's hardware then converts that information into different light intensities so that you see words or pictures.

(3) The central processing unit(CPU)

Its also known as the brain of a computer because this is where programs are executed. Therefore the CPU is further broken down into subcomponents;

a. The arithmetic unit which handles all the simple mathematical computations

b. The control unit which interprets the instructions in a computer program

c. instruction decoding unit which converts computer programming instructions into machine code.

(4) Memory unit

This is used for storage of machine code data or instructions.

Part 2

Address register contains the address for read and write eg the memory address register(MAR) while the buffer register contains the data to be written or the data that was read eg the memory data register (MDR)