BASIC STRUCTURE OF

COMPUTERS

What is a computer?
Simply put, a computer is a sophisticated electronic
calculating machine that:
Accepts input information,
Processes the information according to a list of internally
stored instructions and
Produces the resulting output information.
Functions performed by a computer are:
Accepting information to be processed as input.
Storing a list of instructions to process the information.
Processing the information according to the list of
instructions.
Providing the results of the processing as output.
What are the functional units of a computer?
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Functional units of a computer

Arithmetic and logic unit(ALU):
Performs the desired
operations on the input
information as determined
by instructions in the memory

Input unit accepts

information:
Human operators,
Electromechanical devices
Other computers

Input

Output
I/O
Output unit sends
results of processing:
To a monitor display,
To a printer

Memory

Arithmetic

Instr1
Instr2
Instr3
Data1
Data2

& Logic

Stores
information:
Instructions,
Data

Control
Processor

Control unit coordinates

various actions
Input,
Output
Processing
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Information in a computer -- Instructions

Instructions specify commands to:
Transfer information within a computer (e.g., from memory to
ALU)
Transfer of information between the computer and I/O devices
(e.g., from keyboard to computer, or computer to printer)
Perform arithmetic and logic operations (e.g., Add two
numbers, Perform a logical AND).

A sequence of instructions to perform a task is called a

program, which is stored in the memory.
Processor fetches instructions that make up a program from
the memory and performs the operations stated in those
instructions.
What do the instructions operate upon?

Information in a computer -- Data

Data are the operands upon which instructions operate.
Data could be:

Numbers,

Encoded characters.

Data, in a broad sense means any digital information.

Computers use data that is encoded as a string of binary
digits called bits.

Input unit
Binary information must be presented to a computer in a specific format. This
task is performed by the input unit:
- Interfaces with input devices.
- Accepts binary information from the input devices.
- Presents this binary information in a format expected by the computer.
- Transfers this information to the memory or processor.

Real world

Computer
Memory

Keyboard
Audio input

Input Unit

Processor

Memory unit
Memory unit stores instructions and data.

Recall, data is represented as a series of bits.

To store data, memory unit thus stores bits.

Processor reads instructions and reads/writes data from/to

the memory during the execution of a program.
In theory, instructions and data could be fetched one bit at a
time.
In practice, a group of bits is fetched at a time.
Group of bits stored or retrieved at a time is termed as word
Number of bits in a word is termed as the word length of a
computer.

In order to read/write to and from memory, a processor

should know where to look:

Address is associated with each word location.

Memory unit (contd..)

Processor reads/writes to/from memory based on the
memory address:
Access any word location in a short and fixed amount of time
based on the address.
Random Access Memory (RAM) provides fixed access time
independent of the location of the word.
Access time is known as Memory Access Time.

Memory and processor have to communicate with each

other in order to read/write information.
In order to reduce communication time, a small amount of
RAM (known as Cache) is tightly coupled with the processor.
Modern computers have three to four levels of RAM units with
different speeds and sizes:
Fastest, smallest known as Cache
Slowest, largest known as Main memory.

Memory unit (contd..)

Primary storage of the computer consists of RAM units.
Fastest, smallest unit is Cache.
Slowest, largest unit is Main Memory.

Primary storage is insufficient to store large amounts of

data and programs.

Primary storage can be added, but it is expensive.

Store large amounts of data on secondary storage devices:

Magnetic disks and tapes,
Optical disks (CD-ROMS).
Access to the data stored in secondary storage is slower, but
takes advantage of the fact that some information may be
accessed infrequently.

Cost of a memory unit depends on its access time, lesser

access time implies higher cost.
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Arithmetic and logic unit (ALU)

Operations are executed in the Arithmetic and Logic Unit
(ALU).

Arithmetic operations such as addition, subtraction.

Logic operations such as comparison of numbers.

In order to execute an instruction, operands need to be

brought into the ALU from the memory.
Operands are stored in general purpose registers available in
the ALU.
Access times of general purpose registers are faster than the
cache.

Results of the operations are stored back in the memory or

retained in the processor for immediate use.

Output unit
Computers represent information in a specific binary form. Output units:
- Interface with output devices.
- Accept processed results provided by the computer in specific binary form.
- Convert the information in binary form to a form understood by an
output device.

Computer
Memory

Output Unit

Real world
Printer
Graphics display
Speakers

Processor

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Control unit
Operation of a computer can be summarized as:
Accepts information from the input units (Input unit).
Stores the information (Memory).
Processes the information (ALU).
Provides processed results through the output units (Output
unit).

Operations of Input unit, Memory, ALU and Output unit are

coordinated by Control unit.
Instructions control what operations take place (e.g. data
transfer, processing).
Control unit generates timing signals which determines
when a particular operation takes place.

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Execution of an instruction
Recall the steps involved in the execution of an instruction
by a processor:

Fetch an instruction from the memory.

Fetch the operands.
Execute the instruction.
Store the results.

Several issues:
Where is the address of the memory location from which the
present instruction is to be fetched?
Where is the present instruction stored while it is executed?
Where and what is the address of the memory location from
which the data is fetched?
......

Basic processor architecture has several registers to assist

in the execution of the instructions.
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Basic processor architecture(Fig A)

Address of the memory
location to be accessed
Memory

Address of the next

instruction to be fetched
and executed.

Data to be read into or

read out of the current
location

MAR

MDR
Control

PC

R0

General purpose
registers

R1
IR

Instruction that is
currently being
executed

ALU
R(n-1)
-

n general purpose
registers

Processor

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How are the functional units connected?

For a computer to achieve its operation, the functional units need to
communicate with each other.
In order to communicate, they need to be connected.

Input

Output

Memory

Processor

Bus
Functional units may be connected by a group of parallel wires.
The group of parallel wires is called a bus.
Each wire in a bus can transfer one bit of information.
The number of parallel wires in a bus is equal to the word length of
a computer
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Basic processor architecture (contd..)

Instruction and operand
fetch

Control
Path

MAR

MDR

Memory

execution

Data
Path

ALU
GPR

Processor

Control path is responsible for:

Instruction fetch and execution sequencing
Operand fetch
Saving results
Data path:
Contains general purpose registers
Contains ALU
Executes instructions
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Registers in the control path

Instruction Register (IR):

Instruction that is currently being executed.

Program Counter (PC):

Address of the next instruction to be fetched and executed.

Memory Address Register (MAR):

Address of the memory location to be accessed.

Memory Data Register (MDR):

Data to be read into or read out of the current memory

location, whose address is in the Memory Address Register
(MAR).

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Fetch/Execute cycle
Execution of an instruction takes place in two phases:

Instruction fetch.

Instruction execute.

Instruction fetch:
Fetch the instruction from the memory location whose address
is in the Program Counter (PC).
Place the instruction in the Instruction Register (IR).

Instruction execute:

Instruction in the IR is examined (decoded) to determine which

operation is to be performed.
Fetch the operands from the memory or registers.
Execute the operation.
Store the results in the destination location.

Basic fetch/execute cycle repeats indefinitely.

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Memory organization
Recall:
Information is stored in the memory as a collection of bits.
Collection of bits are stored or retrieved simultaneously is
called a word.
Number of bits in a word is called word length.

Word length can be 16 to 64 bits.

Another collection which is more basic than a word:

Collection of 8 bits known as a byte

Bytes are grouped into words, word length can also be

expressed as a number of bytes instead of the number of
bits:
Word length of 16 bits, is equivalent to word length of 2 bytes.
Words may be 2 bytes (older architectures), 4 bytes (current
architectures), or 8+ bytes (modern architectures).

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Memory organization (contd..)

Accessing the memory to obtain information requires
specifying the address of the memory location.
Recall that a memory has a sequence of bits:

Assigning addresses to each bit is impractical and unnecessary.

Typically, addresses are assigned to a single byte.

Byte addressable memory

Suppose k bits are used to hold the address of a memory

location:
k

Size of the memory in bytes is given by: 2

where k is the number of bits used to hold a memory address.
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E.g., for a 16-bit address, size of the memory is 2 = 65536 bytes
What is the size of the memory for a 24-bit address?

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Memory organization (contd..)

Byte 0

Memory is viewed as a sequence of

bytes.
Address of the first byte is 0
k
Address of the last byte is 2 - 1,
where k is the number of bits used
to hold memory address
E.g. when k = 16,
Address of the first byte is 0
Address of the last byte is 65535
E.g. when k = 2,
Address of the first byte is ?
Address of the last byte is ?

Byte 2 -1
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Memory organization (contd..)

Word #0

Byte 0
Byte 1
Byte 2

Word #1

Word #?

Byte 3
Byte 4

Consider a memory organization:

16-bit memory addresses
Size of the memory is ?
Word length is 4 bytes
Number of words = Memory size(bytes) = ?
Word length(bytes)
Word #0 starts at Byte #0.
Word #1 starts at Byte #4.
Last word (Word #?) starts at Byte#?

Byte 65532
Byte 65533
Byte 65534
Byte 65535
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Memory organization (contd..)

Byte 0
Byte 1

Word #0

Byte 2
Byte 3
Byte 4

MAR
MAR register
contains the
address of the
memory location
addressed

Addr 65532

Byte 65532
Byte 65533
Byte 65534
Byte 65535

Word #1

MDR

Word #16383
MDR contains either the
data to be written to that
address or read from that
address.
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Memory operations
Memory read or load:
Place address of the memory location to be read from into
MAR.
Issue a Memory_read command to the memory.
Data read from the memory is placed into MDR automatically
(by control logic).

Memory write or store:

Place address of the memory location to be written to into
MAR.
Place data to be written into MDR.
Issue Memory_write command to the memory.
Data in MDR is written to the memory automatically (by control
logic).

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Instruction types
Computer instructions must be capable of performing 4
types of operations.
Data transfer/movement between memory and processor
registers.

E.g., memory read, memory write

Arithmetic and logic operations:

E.g., addition, subtraction, comparison between two numbers.

Program sequencing and flow of control:

Branch instructions

Input/output transfers to transfer data to and from the

real world.

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Instruction types (contd..)

Examples of different types of instructions in assembly
language notation.
Data transfers between processor and memory.
Move A, B (B = A).
Move A, R1 (R1 = A).
Arithmetic and logic operation:
Add A, B, C (C = A + B)
Sequencing:
Jump Label (Jump to the subroutine which starts at Label).
Input/output data transfer:
Input PORT, R5 (Read from i/o port PORT to register R5).

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Specifying operands in instructions

Operands are the entities operated upon by the instructions.
Recall that operands may have to be fetched from a memory
location to execute an operation.

Memory locations have addresses using which they can be

accessed.

Operands may also be stored in the general purpose

registers.
Intermediate value of some computation which will be required
immediately for subsequent computations.
Registers also have addresses.

Specifying the operands on which the instruction is to

operate involves specifying the addresses of the operands.

Address can be of a memory location or a register.

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Source and destination operands

Operation may be specified as:
Operation source1, source2, destination
An operand is called a source operand if:
It appears on the right-hand side of an expression
E.g., Add A, B, C (C = A+ B)
A and B are source operands.

An operand is called a destination operand if:

It appears on the left-hand side of an expression.
E.g., Add A, B, C (C = A + B)
C is a destination operand.

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Source and destination operands (contd..)

In case of some instructions, the same operand serves as
both the source and the destination.
Same operand appears on the right and left side of an
expression.
E.g. Add A, B (B = A + B)
B is both the source and the destination operand.
Another classification of instructions is based on the
number of operand addresses in the instruction.

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Instruction types
Instructions can also be classified based on the number of
operand addresses they include.

3, 2, 1, 0 operand addresses.

3-address instructions are almost always instructions that

implement binary operations.
E.g. Add A, B, C (C = A + B)

k bits are used to specify the address of a memory location,

then 3-address instructions need 3*k bits to specify the
operand addresses.
3-address instructions, where operand addresses are memory
locations are too big to fit in one word.

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Instruction types (contd..)

2-address instructions one operand serves as a source and
destination:
E.g. Add A, B (B = A + B)
2-address instructions need 2*k bits to specify an instruction.
This may also be too big to fit into a word.

2-address instructions, where at least one operand is a

processor register:
E.g. Add A, R1 (R1 = A + R1)
1-address instructions require only one operand.
E.g. Clear A (A = 0)
0-address instructions do not operate on operands.
E.g. Halt (Halt the computer)
How are addresses of operands specified in the
instructions?
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Problems
List the steps needed to execute the machine instruction Add
LOCA, R0 in terms of transfer between the components shown in Fig
A

Transfer the contents of register PC to register MAR

Issue a Read command to memory, and then wait until it has
transferred the requested word into register MDR
Transfer the instruction from MDR into IR and decode it
Transfer the address LOCA from IR to MAR
Issue a Read command and wait until MDR is loaded
Transfer contents of MDR to the ALU
Transfer contents of R0 to the ALU
Perform addition of the two operands in the ALU and transfer
result into R0
Transfer contents of PC to ALU
Add 1 to operand in ALU and transfer incremented address to PC

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Repeat the above problem for the machine instruction Add R1, R2, R3

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Give a short sequence of machine instructions for the task: Add the
contents of memory location A to those of location B and place the
answer in location C.
a) Only Load LOC, Ri and Store Ri, LOC are available
b) Suppose that Move and Add instructions are available with the
format
Move/Add Location1, Location2, is it possible to use fewer
instructions to accomplish the task in Part a? If yes, give the
sequence

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Performance
The speed with which a computer executes programs is
affected by the design of its hardware and its machine
language instructions.
Because programs are usually written in a high-level
language, performance is also affected by the compiler that
translates programs into machine language.
For best performance, it is necessary to design the
compiler, the machine instruction set and the hardware in a
coordinated way.
Just as the elapsed time for the execution of a program
depends on all units in a computer system, the processor
time depends on the hardware involved in the execution of
individual machine instructions.
This hardware comprises the processor and the memory,
which are usually connected by a bus as shown in Fig.
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Organization of cache and main memory

Main
memory

Cache
memory Processor

Bus

Why is the access time of the cache memory lesser than the
access time of the main memory?

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Processor Clock

Processor circuits are controlled by a timing signal called a clock.

The clock defines regular time intervals, called clock cycles.

To execute a machine instruction, the processor divides the

action to be performed into a sequence of basic steps, such that
each step can be completed in one clock cycle.

The length P of one clock cycle is an important parameter that

affects processor performance.

Its inverse is the clock rate, R = 1/P, which is measured in cycles

per second.

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Basic Performance Equation

Let T be the processor time required to execute a program that has
been prepared in some high-level language.
The compiler generates a machine language object program that
corresponds to the source program.
Assume that complete execution of the program requires the
execution of N machine language instructions.
The number N is the actual number of instruction executions and is
not necessarily equal to the number of machine instructions in the
object program.
Suppose that the average number of basic steps needed to execute
one machine instruction is S, where each basic step is completed in
one clock cycle.
If the clock rate is R cycles per second, the program execution time
is given by
This is referred to as the basic performance equation
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Performance Measurement
Computer performance can be measured using benchmark programs.
To make comparisons possible, standardized programs must be used.
The performance measure is the time it takes a computer to
execute a given benchmark.
A nonprofit organization called System Performance Evaluation
Corporation (SPEC) selects and publishes representative application
programs for different application domains, together with test results
for many commercially available computers.
The selected program is compiled for the computer under test and
the running time on a real computer is measured.
The same program is also compiled and run on one computer selected
as a reference. The SPEC rating is computed as follows:

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The test is repeated for all the programs in the SPEC suite, and
the geometric mean of the results is computed. Let
be the rating for program I in the suite. The overall SPEC rating
for the computer is given by

Where n is the number of programs in the suite.

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