Chapter 6

Question 1

motherboard

Answer 1

the main circuit board of the computer (allows communication between many of the crucial components)

Question 2

computer chip

Answer 2

a small piece of semiconducting material (silicon) on which integrated circuits are etched

Question 3

processor (CPU)

Answer 3

interprets and carries out the basic instructions that operate a computer

Question 4

control unit

Answer 4

the component of the processor that directs and coordinates most of the operations on the computer

Question 5

arithmetic logic unit (ALU)

Answer 5

performs arithmetic, comparison, and other operations

Question 6

4 basic operations of a processor

Answer 6

fetching, decoding, executing, and storing

Question 7

fetching

Answer 7

obtaining program or instruction form memory

Question 8

decoding

Answer 8

translating the instruction into signals the computer can execute

Question 9

excecuting

Answer 9

carrying out the commands

Question 10

storing

Answer 10

writing results to memory

Question 11

cloud computing

Answer 11

an environment of servers that house and provide access to resources users access via the internet

Question 12

analog signals

Answer 12

continuous and vary in strength and quantity

Question 13

digital signals

Answer 13

in one of two states: on or off

Question 14

binary system

Answer 14

number system that has 2 unique digits: 0 and 1

Question 15

bit

Answer 15

smallest unit of data the computer can process

Question 16

byte

Answer 16

8 bits that are formed together

Question 17

ASCII

Answer 17

most widely used coding scheme to represent a set of characters

Question 18

memory

Answer 18

consists of electrical components that store instructions waiting to be executed by the processor, data needed by those instructions, and the results of processing the data

Question 19

memory stores:

Answer 19

operating system, applications, data being processed and resulting info

Question 20

each memory location has:

Answer 20

an address measured in GB or TB

Question 21

volatile memory

Answer 21

loses contents when power removed (RAM)

Question 22

nonvolatile memory

Answer 22

doesn’t lose contents when power removed (ex. ROM, flash, CMOS)

Question 23

RAM

Answer 23

main memory and consists of chips that can be read from and written by the processor and other devices

Question 24

memory cache

Answer 24

high speed memory available inside the CPU in order to speed up access to data and instructions stored in RAM

Question 25

ROM

Answer 25

memory chips storing permanent data/instructions (firmware)

Question 26

flash memory

Answer 26

can be erased electronically and rewritten

Question 27

access time

Answer 27

amount of time it takes the processor to read from memory (measured in nanoseconds)