Now, that we have understood the underlying software, lets look into the hardware.

• In a computer, the underlying hardware performs inputting data, outputting data,

processing data, and storing data.

Five classic components of a computer are:

1. Input
I/O
2. Output
3. Memory
4. Datapath
Processor
5. Control

• Organization is independent of hardware

technology.
 1. Input
- Mechanism through which
information is fed to the computer.
- Example: Keyboard, Mouse

2. Output
- Result of a computation to a user or
another computer
- Example: Screen

• Some devices, such as networks and disks,

provide both input and output to the
computer.
4. Datapath
- Performs arithmetic operations.

5. Control
– Brain of the computer
– Commands the datapath, memory, I/O
Components:

− Input (mouse, keyboard)

− Output (display, printer)
− Memory (Disk drives, DRAM, SRAM, CD)
− Network

Our primary focus: the processor (datapath and control)

− Implemented using billions of transistors.
− Impossible to understand by looking at each transistor.
 Pointing Device – Mouse

• The idea of a pointing device such as a mouse was first

shown by Engelbart using a research prototype in 1967.

• By the 1990s, all desktop computers included the mouse.

• The original mouse was electromechanical - used a large ball.

WORKING: when the ball is rolled across a surface it would cause an x and y
counter to be incremented. The amount of increase in each counter told how far the
mouse had been moved.
 Pointing Device – Mouse

• Replaced by the all-optical mouse.

• The optical mouse is a miniature optical processor

- an LED to provide lighting, a tiny black-and-white
camera, and a simple optical processor.

• WORKING: LED illuminates the surface underneath the mouse; the camera takes
1500 sample pictures a second under the illumination. A a simple optical processor
compares the successive images and determines whether the mouse has moved and
how far.

• The decreasing costs and higher reliability of electronics has caused an electronic
solution to replace the older electromechanical technology.
 Display Device – Liquid Crystal Displays

• LCD’s are thin, low-power display used in laptops and handheld devices –
computers, calculators, mobiles, etc.

• LCD is not the source of light; instead, it controls the transmission of light.

• LCD includes rod-shaped molecules in a liquid that form a twisting helix that bends
light entering the display, from either a light source behind the display or less often
from reflected light.

• WORKING: The rod straighten out when a current is applied and no longer bend the
light. Since the liquid crystal material is between two screens polarized at 90°, the
light cannot pass through unless it is bent.
 Display Device – Liquid Crystal Displays

• Today, most LCD displays use an active matrix that has a tiny transistor switch at
each pixel to precisely control current and make sharper images.

• A red-green-blue mask associated with each dot on the display determines the
intensity of the three colour components in the final image.

• In a colour active matrix LCD, there are three transistor switches at each point.
 Display Device – Liquid Crystal Displays

• Image is composed of a matrix of picture elements, or pixels, that can be represented

as a matrix of bits , called a bit map.

• Color display uses 8-bits for each of the three colors – 24 bits per pixel.

• The computer hardware support for graphics consists mainly of a raster refresh
buffer, or frame buffer, to store the bit map.

• The image to be represented on-screen is

stored in the frame buffer, and the bit pattern
per pixel is read out to the graphics display
at the refresh rate.
 INSIDE
THE
COMPUTER
INSIDE THE COMPUTER

Motherboard: A plastic board containing packages

of integrated circuits or chips, including processor,
cache, memory, and connectors for I/O devices such
as networks and disks.

Integrated Circuit: Also called chip. A device

combining dozens to millions of transistors.

Memory: The storage area in which programs are

kept when they are running and that contains the
data needed by the running programs.

Dynamic Random Access Memory(DRAM):

Memory built as an integrated circuit; it provides
random access to any location.
INSIDE THE COMPUTER
Static Random Access Memory (SRAM): Memory built as an integrated circuit; but faster and less
dense than DRAM.

DIMM (Dual Inline Memory Module): A small board that contains DRAM chips on both sides.
SIMMs have DRAMs on only one side. Both DIMMs and SIMMs are meant to be plugged into memory
slots, usually on a motherboard.

Cache Memory: A small, fast memory that acts as a buffer for a slower, larger memory.

Central Processor Unit (CPU): Also called processor. The active part of the computer, which contains
the datapath and control and which adds numbers, tests numbers, signals I/O devices to activate, and so
on.

Datapath: The component of the processor that performs arithmetic operations.

Control: The component of the processor that commands the datapath, memory, and I/O devices
according to the instructions of the program.
INSIDE THE COMPUTER

Abstraction: A model that renders lower-level

details of computer systems temporarily invisible in
order to facilitate design of sophisticated systems.

Instruction Set Architecture: Also called

architecture. An abstract interface between the
hardware and the lowest level software of a machine
that encompasses all the information necessary to
write a machine language program that will run
correctly, including instructions, registers, memory
access, I/O, and so on.

Application Binary Interface (ABI): The user

portion of the instruction set plus the operating
system interfaces used by application programmers.
Defines a standard for binary portability across
computers.
INSIDE THE COMPUTER

Memory: The storage area in which programs are kept when they are running and that contains the
data needed by the running programs.

Volatile Memory: Storage, such as DRAM, that only retains data only if it is receiving power.

Nonvolatile Memory: A form of memory that retains data even in the absence of a power source and
that is used to store programs between runs. Magnetic disk is nonvolatile and DRAM is not.

Primary Memory: Also called main memory. Volatile memory used to hold programs while they are
running; typically consists of DRAM in today’s computers.

Secondary memory: Nonvolatile memory used to store programs and data between runs; typically
consists of magnetic disks in today’s computers.

Magnetic Disk: Also called hard disk. A form of nonvolatile secondary memory com- posed of rotating
platters coated with a magnetic recording material.
COMMUNICATING WITH OTHER COMPUTERS

We have seen how to input, compute, display, and save data. Next – computer networks.

• Networks connect whole computers, allowing computer users to extend the power of computing by
including communication.

• Networks are the backbone of current computer systems; a new machine without an optional
network interface would be ridiculed.

• Networked computers have several major advantages:

ü Communication: Information is exchanged between computers at high speeds.

ü Resource sharing: Rather than each machine having its own I/O devices, devices can be
shared by computers on the network.

ü Nonlocal access: By connecting computers over long distances, users need not be near the
computer they are using.
COMMUNICATING WITH OTHER COMPUTERS

• Networks vary in length and performance. Cost of communication increases according to both the
speed of communication and the distance that information travels.

• The most popular type of network is the Ethernet.

• Local Area Network (LAN): A network designed to carry data within a geographically confined
area, typically within a single building.

• Wide Area Network (WAN): A network extended over hundreds of kilometres which can span a
continent.

• Wireless technologies different form wire-based networks – use airwaves to share information.

• IEEE standard name 802.11, allow transmission rates from nearly 1 to 100 million bits per second.