Computer Architecture

&
Organization
 Chapter One

Lecture 1
Introduction to Computer
&
Computer Evolution

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 A Computer is
 A programmable machine. It can execute or run a pre-
recorded list of instructions which follow certain rules (a
program).

 Modern computers are electronic and digital. The actual

machinery -- wires, transistors , and circuits -- is called
hardware; the instructions and data are called software.
 Digital computers deal with data in binary form - all data is
represented using just two digits - 1 or 0. Letters and other
symbols are assigned unique binary codes.

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 Computer System

• Hardware
• Software
– OS
– Application SW

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 What are basic operations of a Computer ?

1 Input operation
2 Processing operation-CPU
3 Storage operation-primary / secondary
4 Output operation
5 Communication operations

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 Components of a Computer System
 Computer hardware provides the physical mechanisms to
process, store, and input /output data. Includes CPU,
memory, I/O devices.

 Software provides instructions to tell the hardware what

tasks to perform. It includes system (e.g. Windows 8) and
application (e.g. Excel) software.

 Data in the computer may be representing numbers,

characters, graphics etc. But is always kept in a form that
the hardware and software can manipulate.
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What are the major Hardware components
of the computer ?

 Common hardware components in the market today

are subdivided into four major device categories:
Input device hardware
Processing device hardware
Output device hardware
Storage device hardware

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 1 Hardware- the CPU

 CPU performs actual processing of data, according to instructions

from programs.
 Acting as the brain of the computer’
 Data and programs are stored in primary and secondary memory, and
moved to and from CPU as required.
 Currently the Intel microprocessor is the most common CPU though
there are many types

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 2 Hardware - memory
 Memory - Purpose of memory is data storage. Two major
types of memory :
 Primary memory - RAM.
 Secondary memory - Hard disk.
 Memory locations are called words. Words are 8 bits (one byte) in
size, or a multiple of 8.
 Common word sizes are 16, 32 and 64 bits.

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 Hardware - memory
 Memory is commonly measured in multiples of bits and
bytes.
1 bit = 1 binary digit (0 or 1).
1. 1 byte = 8 bits

2. 1KB = 1024 bytes = 210

3. 1MB = 1024 KB= 220

4. 1GB = 1024 MB = 230

5. 1TB = 1024 GB = 240 10

 3 Hardware – I/O

 Input devices: Keyboard accepts letters and numbers and

converts them to a binary code such as Unicode.
 Output devices :Monitor converts binary codes to characters
and images, whilst modem converts digital data to analog
form for transmission over telephone lines.

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 4 Hardware - I/O Modules

Interface between System Bus and other Peripherals

Example
 Sound cards
 Video cards
 Network cards
 PCI cards

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 5 Hardware - System Bus

 Series of electronic path ways and connecting other

components of the computer.

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 Types of computers

 Personal Computer
Microprocessor
 Mini computer
 Main frame
 Super computer

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 Types of computers
 Supercomputer : An extremely fast computer that can perform
hundreds of millions of instructions per second.
 IBM ASCI pic
 Mainframe : A powerful multi-user computer capable of supporting
many hundreds or thousands of users simultaneously.
 Banks air lines vp2400 pic
 Work stations minicomputer : A multi-user computer capable of
supporting from 10 to hundreds of users simultaneously.
 Designing , movies , Sun ws pic
 Microcomputers personal computer : A small, single-user computer
based on a microprocessor.
 Desktop PC
 Notebook pc (laptop)
 PDAs palmtops

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 What are Computer Ports ?

 Connection points
 Examples
Serial port (Com)
Parallel Port
USB port
Ethernet Port

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 Evolution & Performance
 History of computers:
 Mechanical Era (1600s-1940s)
Wilhelm Schickhard (1623)
Astronomer and mathematician
Automatically add, subtract, multiply, and divide
Blaise Pascal (1642)
Mathematician
Mass produced first working machine (50 copies)
Could only add and subtract
Maintenance and labour problems
Gottfried Liebniz (1673)
Mathematician and inventor
Improved on Pascal’s machine
Add, subtract, multiply, and divide
 History of Computers
 Charles Babbage (1822)
 Mathematician
 “Father of modern computer”
 Wanted more accuracy in calculations
 Difference engine
 Government / science agreement
 Automatic computation of math tables
 Analytic engine
 Perform any math operation
 Punch cards
 Modern structure: I/O, storage, ALU
 Add in 1 second, multiply in 1 minute
 Both engines plagued by mechanical problems
 History of Computers
George Boole (1847)
Mathematical analysis of logic
Investigation of laws of thought

Herman Hollerith (1889)

Modern day punched card machine
Formed Tabulating Machine Company (became IBM)
1880 census took 5 years to tabulate
Tabulation estimates
 1890: 7.5 years
 1900: 10+ years
Hollerith’s tabulating machine reduced the 7.5 year
estimate to 2 months
 History of Computers

Konrad Zuse (1938)

Built first working mechanical computer (running
programs): Z1
Binary machine
German government decided not to pursue development
W.W.II already started
Howard Aiken (1943)
Designed the Harvard Mark I
Implementation of Babbage’s machine
Built by IBM
 History of Computers

Mechanical era summary

 Mechanical computers were designed to reduce the time
required for calculations and increase accuracy of the results
 Two drawbacks
Speed of operation limited by the inertia of moving parts
(gears and pulleys)
Cumbersome, unreliable, and expensive
 History of Computers
The Electronic Era
 Generation 1 (1945 - 1958)
ENIAC
Electronic Numerical Integrator And Computer
Developed for calculating artillery firing tables
Designed by Mauchly and Echert of the University of
Pennsylvania
Generally regarded as the first electronic computer
Decimal number system used
Programmed by manually setting switches
 History of Computers
ENIAC – cont.
 Really big!
 18,000 tubes
 70,000 resistors
 10,000 capacitors
 6,000 switches
 30 tons
 15,000 square feet
 140 kW power
consumption
 5,000 additions
per second
 History of Computers
 Generation 2 (1958 - 1964)
Technological changes
Transistors
System software and high level languages
Floating point arithmetic

 Generation 3 (1964 - 1974)

Introduction of integrated circuits
Semiconductor memory
Microprogramming
Multiprogramming
 History of Computers
 Generation 4 (1974 - present)
Large scale integration / VLSI
Single board computers
 Generation 5 (? - ?)
VLSI / ULSI
Computer communications networks
Artificial intelligence
Massively parallel machines
Summary of Generations

26
 Components Evolution
 Vacuum tube: 1946-1957
 Transistor: 1958-1964
 Small scale integration: from 1965
 Up to 100 devices on a chip
 Medium scale integration: to 1971
 100 - 3,000 devices on a chip
 Large scale integration: 1971-1977
 3,000 - 100,000 devices on a chip
 Very large scale integration: 1978 -1991
 100,000 - 100,000,000 devices on a chip
 Ultra large scale integration: 1991 - ?
 Over 100,000,000 devices on a chip
 Applications
 Applications that drive computer performance:
 Weather forecasting
 Oceanography
 Seismic/petroleum exploration
 Medical research and diagnosis
 Aerodynamics and structure analysis
 Nuclear physics
 Artificial intelligence
 Military
 Socio-economics
How do computers work?
 Need to understand abstractions such as:
 Applications software
 Systems software
 Assembly language
 Machine language
 Architectural issues: i.e., caches, virtual
memory, pipelining
 Sequential logic, finite state machines
 Combinational logic, arithmetic circuits
 Boolean logic, 1s and 0s
 Transistors used to build logic gates (CMOS)
 Semiconductors used to build transistors
 Properties of atoms, electrons, and quantum
dynamics