Basics of Computer

We all have heard or used a computer today. A computer is now an integral part of our life. We use this device everywhere in our schools, banks, Airports, Defence or any other place you name it. Computers make our life easier and solve our so many daily tasks so quickly. In this article, we are going to learn about the basic structure of any computer system. Do you know the computer used to exists before the 20th century and went through different generations, If you want to learn more about History and generation of computer, click here.

As per Google, the meaning of Computer is.

The Computer is an electronic device for storing and processing data. In a very basic term, we can think of the computer as a device which give any data as input and after processing gives us a different set of data or information. For example, we use the keyboard as an input device and feed a different kind of keystrokes as data, computer process all those and gives you output.

The very basic structure of any computer system is provided below in the image, we will discuss each one of them later in the article, so keep reading.

A computer unit can be divided into four components.

• Input Unit
• Control Unit
• Arithmetic Logic Unit
• Output Unit

• Input Unit: Any Devices, like keyboard, mouse, microphone, etc, which are used to input data or instruction to control unit are called Input Unit.

• Control Unit: Control Unit the center of any computer system and it interacts with each of the other units. 

• Arithmetic Logic Unit: Computer understands everything in binary format meaning in the form of 1 or 0. The Arithmetic Logic unit is the brain of the computer and does all kind of arithmetic (Addition, Subtraction, Differentiation, etc.) or logical calculation (Greater than, Less than, equality, etc). 

• Output Unit: Any Devices like monitor, Speakers, printers, etc, which are used to provide the output based on the input provided are called Output Unit. For example, you provided input through a microphone and recorded your audio in the computer, when you will play that audio you can hear the output in the form of a sound through the speakers.

• Memory: All input data, instructions, and interim data get stored into memory. The memory can be primary or secondary memory. The primary memory is also called cache memory which resided within the processor (you might have heard about Pentium 4, Intel i-3/i-5/i-7 processor) and the secondary memory is nothing but the RAM (Random Access Memory).

The Control Unit, Arithmetic Unit, and Memory are together called the Central Processing Unit (CPU). Every Computer has some hardware components e.g. Mouse, Keyboard, Motherboard, etc.  The other component of Computer is some program or applications which interacts with all the hardware and complete predefined tasks are called Softwares. 

Every computer is designed on the above-mentioned architect and it is getting updated and upgraded every day. 

We hope you find this article helpful!