Program Name: BCS

Course Code: CSC1000

Course Name: Computer Architecture

Assignment: 1

Date of Submission: November 2021

Submitted By: Submitted To:

Student Name: Sakar Khatri Faculty Name: Mr. Amar Subedi
IUKL ID: Department: PO office
Semester: 1nd Semester
Intake: September 2021
i. Explain the FIVE (5) generation of the computer with technology used.

o Five generations of computer are as follow,

I. First generation of computer.

⇒ Vacuum tubes (a sealed glass tube containing a near-vacuum which allows the free passage of
electric current) were used.
⇒ Expensive to operate as it used to consume more electricity and produce more heat and cover a
large space as it was very big in size.

II. Second generation of computer.

⇒ Vacuum tube was replaced by transistors which were small in size, cheaper, and more reliable
and faster than vacuum tube.)
⇒ Magnetic core was used as primary memory and magnetic disk and tapes were used as secondary
memory.

III. Third generation of computer.

⇒ Integrated Circuit (IC) were introduced, A single IC contains many transistors, resistors, and
capacitors
⇒ High level language was used in such computers such as (FORTRAN-II TO IV, COBOL, PASCAL,
BASIC)

IV. Fourth generation of computer.

⇒ Very Large-Scale Integration (VLSI) technology were used where 1000 of integrated circuits were
built onto a single silicon chip.
⇒ In this generation time-sharing, real-time networking, data sharing, distributed operating system
was used.

V. Fifth generation of computer.

⇒ Very Large-Scale Integration (VLSI) technology became Ultra Large-Scale Integration (ULSI)
technology
⇒ Ahh high level languages such as C++, C#, C, JAVA, .NET, etc. are used in this generation of
computer.

ii. Draw a diagram showing a typical computer system invented by Von Neumann in 1954 and explain the
stored program concept.
 Central processing unit (CPU)

Arthematic and
Logical unit Input output
(ALU) module
Main memory

Control unit
(CU)

Fig. Von Neumann

 Stored Program Concept. (SPC)

• Stored program concept means that a computer could get its instructions by reading them
from the memory and a program could be set or altered by setting the values of a portion of
the memory.A stored program digital computer keeps both program instruction and data in
read-write in random-access memory (RAM).

CPU Data and

Instruction

Fig: Stored-program concept

As shown in the diagram, both the instructions and data are stored in the memory hence CPU
can access them directly and quickly however, not at the same time due to the use of same
system bus which and this flaw is called von Neumann bottleneck. This concept of storing
both data and instructions together made computer systems much faster.
• Main memory storing programs and data (data and instructions),
• All the Arthematic and Logical Unit (ALU) operating on binary data,
• Control unit interpreting instructions from memory and executing,
 • All the Input and output (I/O) equipment operated by control unit, through which data and
instruction can be entered,
• Turing architecture and Von Neumann architecture propose the same SPC concept.

iii. Explain the function of following terms or abbreviations:

a. Computer Architecture. (2 marks)

 Computer Architecture is an executive unit which is a part of CPU which performs the operations
and calculations as per the instructions. Computer architecture refers to the attributes visible to
the programmer and which affect the logical execution of a program. Computer Architecture is a
set of rules and methods that describe the implementation, organization and functionality of
computer systems

• Architecture is those attributes visible to the programmer

• Instruction set, number of bits used for data representation, I/O mechanisms,
addressing techniques.

b. Computer Organization (2 marks)

 Computer organization is concerned with the hardware (the structure) and behaviour of a computer
system seen by the user. The term organization includes the high-level aspects of a computer’s
design, such as the memory system, the memory interconnect, and the design of the internal
processor or CPU (central processing unit—where arithmetic, logic, branching, and data transfer are
implemented.)
• Organization is how features are implemented,
• E.g. Control signals, interfaces, memory technology,

c. Register (2 marks)
 Register is the high-speed memory contained in CPU which are used by the processor to store small
amount of data needed during processing. Functions of register are ;
• Time reduction between the main memory and Athematic and logical units(ALU)
• Helps to assist to store location of the data,
• Also stores the instructions,
• And also temporarily hold operands and result of ALU operations.

d. I/O module (2 marks)

 Input output module are the peripheral devices that works as an mediator between the processor
and I/O devices. Function of I/O module are,

 Data transfer,
 CPU Communication,
 Device communication,
 Error Detection,

e. MBR (2 marks)
 MBR stands for Memory Buffer Resister. MBR is the register of CPU that holds the data or
information that are to be stored to memory or sent to input output device, or used to receive the
data or information from memory or input output device. Functions are;
• Contains data to be written to memory or receive data to be read from memory,
• Holds data and information and sends them to ALU if it’s a data or CU if its information.