Computer

A computer is an electronic device that processes data and convert it into information.
Computer run programs which process data and perform tasks based on the instructions
contained in the program. Some examples for computer applications are:

1- Controlling space flight

Components of computer system:

 Computer Hardware
 Computer Software

Computer Hardware:

The physical parts of the computer system that you can touch and feel are known as
computer hardware. A computer can be divided into following hardware units:

 Input unit
 Output unit
 System unit

Input Unit:

Input unit of a computer system consists of input devices. Due to the diverse nature of the
data, variety of input devices exist to input data in different forms e.g. keyboard is used to
textual data, mouse is used as a pointing device and to trigger different commands in different
applications, microphone is used to enter voice data, and scanner is used to enter image data
etc. input unit of a computer may contain all or some of the above described devices, and
even can have many other.

Output Unit:

Output of a computer system consists of output devices. As data presented to the user can
take variety of forms, therefore different output devices are needed e.g. monitor is used to
display text and images on the screen, printer is used to get output on paper; speaker is used
to receive voice output etc.

System Unit:

System unit contains a number of other components which are enclosed in a rectangular
casing. The most important component of system unit is a rigid rectangular circuit board

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called mother board. All other components are attached onto it. An electronic pathway on the
mother board connects different components of system unit with each other. Other
components of system unit are RAM, hard disk drive, floppy disk drive, microprocessor etc.

Computer Software:

Computer software is a term used for organized collections of computer data and instructions.
A computer program is a set of instructions given to the computer to solve a particular
problem. Computer program specify a sequence of operations that computer will perform.
Computer software is further divided into two categories

 System software
 Application software

System Software:

System software refers to the programs that are responsible for controlling and managing the
actual operations of the computer hardware. Generally system software consists of an
operating system and some fundamental utilities such as file managers, display managers,
user authentication and network control software.

Application Software:

Application software is used to accomplish tasks specified by the user. Application software
may consist of a single program, such as an image viewer or a collection of programs that
work together to accomplish a task e.g. word processor, spreadsheet, database etc.

Organization of Computer:
In order to perform operations the computer system is divided into these units

 Central Processing Unit (CPU)

Central Processing Unit (CPU):

The Central Processing Unit is generally referred to as the brain of the computer. The primary
work of CPU is to convert data from input, process the data and output in useful information
that can be used by either user or other computer programs. It is like a really fast calculator
that has the ability to recall numbers from various locations in memory, perform arithmetic
and logical operations with them, such as addition or multiplication, and then store the
results. The CPU consists of two parts

 Control unit
 Arithmetic and Logic unit

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Arithmetic and Logic Unit (ALU):

The arithmetic and logic unit consists of electronic circuitry that executes all arithmetic and
logical operations. The arithmetic unit can perform addition, subtraction, multiplication and
division operations. The logical unit can perform logical operations. A logical operation is
usually a comparison of numbers, letters or special characters. The computer can then take
action based on the result of the comparison.

Control Unit (CU):

The Control Unit consists of circuitry that generates signals to direct the entire computer
system to carry out or execute the programs. The control unit itself does not execute program
instructions; rather, it directs other parts of the system to do so. The control unit must
communicate with the arithmetic and logic unit, memory and other parts of computer system.
It controls the flow of information through the processor, and coordinates the activities of the
other units.

System Bus:
The CPU must be able to communicate with all devices. The devices are connected together
by a communication channel called bus. A bus is composed of a set of communication lines
or wires. The bus is used to connect the following units

 Central Processing Unit (CPU)

Bus is the common path which is used to send / receive data and commands to / from CPU
and memory and all input / output devices. The capacity of a bus depends upon the number of
data lines it contains. Bus with 16 lines can carry 16 – bits at a time where as bus with 32
lines can carry 32 – bits at a time and so on. There are three different buses in the computer
system.

 Data bus
 Address bus
 Control bus

Data Bus:

The most common bus is the data bus. A data bus carries data. The bus contains parallel
group of lines. Busses are designed in such a way that they can communicate with the
components in an efficient way.

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Address Bus:

An address bus carries address information. It is a set of wires similar to the data bus but it
only connects central processing unit (CPU) and memory. Whenever the processor needs data
from the memory, it places the address of data on the address bus. The address is carried to
the memory where the data from the requested address is fetched and placed on the data bus.
The data bus carries it to the processor. The reason for the importance of address bus is that
the number of lines in the address bus determines the maximum number of memory
addresses. If an address bus has 8 lines, the maximum number of memory locations that can
be addressed are 28 = 256. Today’s computers have 32 bit address lines so they can access
4GB of memory.

Control Bus:

The control bus carries control information from the control unit to the other units. The
control information is used for directing the activities of all units. The control unit directs the
transfer of data to the ALU from the memory. This data is used by ALU for processing. The
control unit also controls the functioning of other units e.g. input / output devices, memory
etc.

Computer Memory:

Computer memory is used to store programs and data. There are two types of computer
memory.

 Main Memory
 Secondary Memory

Main memory is accessible directly by the processing unit. RAM is an example of main
memory. As soon as the computer is switched off the contents of the main memory are lost.
You can store and retrieve data much faster with main memory as compared to secondary
memory. The reason is that the main memory is present on the mother board. Secondary
memory such as floppy disks, magnetic disk etc. is located outside the mother board. Main
memory is more expensive than secondary memory. That is why the size of main memory is
less than of secondary memory.

As the storage capacity of the main memory is limited and often it is necessary to store
hundreds of millions of bytes of data for the CPU to process. Therefore, additional memory is
required in all the computer systems. This memory is called secondary memory.

Ports
A port can be define as a socket that enables external device such as a printer to be attached
to the computer. All communications between a computer and external devices the result of
properly connected ports. On every computer, a ports connectors are attached to a
motherboard.

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They are three basics type of ports

 Serial port
 Parallel port
 USB
Today’s computer have all these type of ports with each type a different function.

Serial port

A serial port allows a serial hardware device to communicate with a computer by transmitting
one bit information at a time. Serial devices such as, mouse, modem and key boards do not
require fast data transmitting rates. Serial port often referred to as communications (COM)
ports. It is an external ports on the back of the computer that attaches directly to the PC’s
motherboard. These ports were one of the early ports put on computer. Older serial ports also
use 25 pin connectors for their serial port, but most new computers which serial ports feature
only 9 pins.

Parallel ports

Parallel ports lets an external parallel device communication with a computer by transmitting
more bits (such as 8 or 25) of data at a time therefore it is much faster than a serial port more
devices that send or receive large amount of data, such as printers and scanners, use parallel
ports. Parallel ports are often referred to as line printers ports LPT. The parallel ports is a
largest port on the rare of your PC, comprising 25 lines that includes 17 signal line and 8
ground lines.

USB ports

USB (Universal Serial Bus) is a plug and play hardware interface or peripherals such as the
keyboard, mouse, joy stick, printer, scanner and modem. USB has a maximum band width of
12 Mbits/s and up to 127 devices can be attached. With USB, a new device can be added to
the computer without having to add an adopter card. It typically is located at the back of the
PC.