The central Processing Unit (CPU) in one way or another may be referred as the heart of the computer. It is the part of the computer that receives instructions from the user and processes them. In computing terms, a CPU is a piece of hardware which plays the role of ensuring that the instructions that the computer receives are implemented. A CPU contains several components. One of the components is the arithmetic logic unit (ALU), which serves the function of simple arithmetic and logical operations. Control unit (CU) is the second component. The CU reads and interprets instructions and transforms the instructions into computer signals. The third component is a cache, which serves the role of a high-speed memory. The last component is the interface. The interface moves the instruction in the computer between different drivers (Anderson et al, 1973).
Since the era of mainframe computers and desktop pc, technology on processors has continually changed to address the new needs in the technology world. With the current mobile computing flooding the market, the innovation in the processor has become a force to develop. Initial processors were slow thus their performance slow. However, evolution has occurred in the CPU innovation to new processors with high speed and performance (Crow, 2004).
There are different types of processors. The two primary manufacturers of computer processors are Intel and Advanced Micro Devices (AMD), which leads the market in terms of quality and speed. Desktop CPUs include Celeron, Core, and Pentium. AMD processors include Sempron, Phenom, and Athlon. The exercise of understanding the different types of processors has given me the knowledge to be able to choose the best processors based on the speed and quality.
An L cache is the fast memory that the processor can contact as fast as possible. This type of memory in cache is on the same category as that used in the processor, but much expensive than that of RAM. Cache speed is considerably faster than the speed of RAM and with it is information that the system can easily access. The size and speed of the ram does not directly have an impact on the performance of a processor. However, depending on the RAM memory, it is possible to run many programs at the same time without the computer hanging.
References
Anderson, D., Gustafson, R., Johnson, L., Sparacio, F., Tomas, W., & Webster, J. (1973). U.S. Patent No. 3,736,566. Washington, DC: U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.
Crow, T. S. (2004). Evolution of the graphical processing unit (Doctoral dissertation, University of Nevada Reno).
