Chapter 3: Computer System

Hardware and Software

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 Computer Systems
• System is a group of components,
consisting of subsystems or procedures
that work in a coordinated fashion to
achieve some objective.
• A computer system is composed:
– Computer hardware or
– Computer software.

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 Computer Hardware
• physical part of the computer that you can
see and the parts you can touch.
• composed of a number of interacting
physical parts based on the need of the
information flow

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 Central Processing Unit (CPU)
• CPU - the actual hardware that interprets and executes the
program instructions and coordinates how all the other
hardware devices work together.
– Control unit - interprets software instructions and tells the
other hardware devices what to do, based on the software
instructions
– Arithmetic/logic unit (ALU) - performs all arithmetic
operations and all logic operations
– Registers are small, fast memory within the CPU
• CPU Speed
– Megahertz (MHz) - the number of millions of CPU cycles
per second
– Gigahertz (GHz) - the number of billions of CPU cycles per
second
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 CPU cycle
1. Fetch instruction
2. Interpret instruction
3. Fetch data
4. Process data
5. Write data

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Execution of an Instruction

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 Processing Characteristics and
Functions

• Machine cycle time: Time to execute the

instruction phase
• Clock speed:
– Rate at which electronic pulses are produces.
– Measured in MHz or GHz
• Word length
– Bit (Binary digiT): 0 or 1
– Unit for moving data
– Word length: The number of bits a CPU can process
in a unit time
– 32-64 bit processors
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Number of Bytes

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 Storage Units
• Classified as
– Primary, and
– Secondary storage units.

Storage is usually too large to be expressed in bytes or words. Instead we

use:

• Kilobyte (KB) = 1024 bytes (210 bytes)

• Megabyte (MB) = 1024 x 1024 bytes or one

million bytes (220 bytes)

• Gigabyte (GB) = 1024 x 1024 x 1024 bytes or one

trillion bytes (230 bytes)

• Terabyte (TB) = 1024 x 1024 x 1024 x 1024 bytes

one quadrillion bytes (240 bytes)

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 Types of Primary Memory

• Random access memory (RAM)

– Volatile
– is a work area or a temporary storage space
– holds the current information, the application
software currently being used, and the
operating system software
– Types of RAM
• Dynamic RAM (DRAM)
• Static RAM (SRAM)

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 Types of Memory
Read-only memory (ROM)
– Non-volatile
– Permanent data and instructions from
manufacturer
– Types
• Masked ROM
• PROM: Programmable
• EPROM: Erasable programmable
• EEPROM: Electrically EPROM
• Flash ROM
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 Secondary Storage Access Methods

• Sequential access
– Access in the same order it was written
– Ex: Need to access memory location 5. Then, you
need to go through 1, 2, 3, and 4 first.
– Example: Magnetic Tapes
• Direct/Random access
– Directly access the location
– Faster than sequential access
– Example: Magnetic Disks, Optical Disks, and Flash
Stick/Memory
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 Secondary Storage Devices

• Magnetic tapes: Similar to audio tapes

• Magnetic discs: Hard disk, Floppy disk
• Optical discs
– CD(Compact Disk)
– DVD(Digital Versatile Disk)
• Flash Stick/Memory
• SSD

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Hard Disc

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Digital Versatile Disc Player

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 Input Devices
• Personal computer input devices
– Keyboard
– Mouse
• Voice-recognition devices
– Microphone
– Software to convert voice into bits
• Digital computer cameras
– Record images and video
• Scanning devices
– Scanner
• Touch-sensitive Screens
• Badge Reader
• Bar-code Reader
• Disk Drives
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 Output Devices
• Display Monitors
– Cathode Ray Tube (CRT)
• Flat panel
– Liquid Crystal Displays (LCDs)
– Light Emanating Diodes (LED)
• Printers and Plotters
– Speed measured in pages (page printed per minute)
• Disk Drives
• Speaker
• Etc…

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 Overview of Software
• Computer programs: Sequences of instructions
• Program contains the instructions that the hardware
executes to perform an information processing task
• Software = Programs + Procedures +
Documentations
• Without the aid of software, the computer hardware
is useless
• Two categories of software
– Application
USER
– System
Software
Hardware
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 Systems Software
• System software controls how the various
technology tools work together along with the
application software
–Operating System controls application
software and manages how the hardware
devices work together
Example: Microsoft Windows, Mac OS, Linux, Ubuntu, Fedora,…

–Utility/Language Softwares
Uninstaller software, spyware software

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 Operating Systems

• Perform common computer hardware functions

– Ex: Get input from keyboard
• Provide a user interface
– Command-based user interface (ms-dos)
– Graphical-user interface (windows)
• Provide a degree of hardware independence
– Application program interface
• Manage system memory
– Convert logical view to physical view

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 Operating Systems

• Manage processing tasks

– Allocate computer resources
– Multitasking (run more than once application at a
time)
– Time-sharing (allow multiple access to a system)
• Provide networking capability
– Enable connection to the Internet
• Control access to system resources
– Authentication
• Manage files
– Access to files
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Role of the Operating System

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 Language Software
• Are software which are used by programmers to develop
application software’s and translate programs to machine
code
• Language software consists programs that serve as editors &
translators to develop programs in a number of programming
languages includes:- Translators, general purpose routines
and utilities & high level languages
• Translator:-is a program that converts one or more languages
to another language.
• Three types of translators are
– assemblers,
– Compilers &
– interpreters.

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 Programming Languages
• Low Level Languages
– Machine Language
– Assembly Language
• High Level Languages
– Uses English like words and statements
– Example: Pascal, C, Java, Basic, C++, VB,
C#, PHP, etc

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 Application Software

• Application software is used for specific

information processing needs, including:
– Word processor
– Spreadsheet
– Payroll
– Customer relationship management
– Project management
– Word processing and many others

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Word Processing Program

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Spreadsheet Program

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