Computer System Architecture Notes: Computer System Architecture notes provide the student with the most updated notes on the subject and provide reference books that are up to the curriculum. These notes are easy to interpret for aspiring students and are the best set of references for computer system architecture during revision.
These notes can save students from the hassle of going through different books to understand the basic concepts required for Computer System Architecture. By using these Lecture Notes, students can determine concepts which are more relevant for them and save time.
By using computer system architecture notes, aspiring students can identify a good structure on how to start their preparation process for the subject. This article provides students with the most up to date curriculum, reference books and essential questions for computer system architecture notes.
Students can use this article for their Computer System Architecture notes and use the reference books so that they can get the best scores.
- Computer System Architecture reference books
- Computer System Architecture curriculum
- List of Computer System Architecture important questions
- FAQs on Computer System Architecture notes
- Conclusion
Introduction to Computer System Architecture
The computer system architecture provides us with a detailed understanding of how a computer software system and a computer hardware system interact with each other to form the entire computer system. What a computer system architecture entails is the design of the computer system and how it functions with the various categories that are microarchitecture, instruction set architecture and system design, all these categories are what constitute the basic CPUs architecture, and it is the key in the function of the computer as a whole.
If we were to break down the entire process, the computer system first receives the information, decodes the information, transfers the data and then executes the data. This whole process is completed with the help of input unit, output unit, storage unit, arithmetic logic unit, control unit. A good Computer system architecture which can carry out all the above processes the quickest in a sense it should be able to recognize the information fast and be able to process it quickly.
B.Tech Computer System Architecture Notes and Study Material PDF Free Download
Bachelor in technology can get updated and revised notes provided in the article. These notes offer students the best of knowledge in computer system architecture in the most condensed form without leaving any important information on the subject. The notes provide the most concise information, and it is straightforward for students to interpret the material. Using the notes provided by this article will help students better prepare for the subject by giving them in-depth knowledge and help in scoring better grades. Students can download all these notes easily from the internet for free. The following are a list of notes for Computer System Architecture notes for aspiring B.Tech students-
- Computer System Architecture lecturer notes pdf.
- Computer organization and architecture lecturer notes pdf.
- Computer system Architecture 6th-semester notes
- Computer System Architecture lecturer notes by Buddhitha Hettige
Computer System Architecture Reference Books
To have a better overview of the subject and to do some proper fact-checking it is always recommended to use good reference books. A topic like a Computer system Architecture required students to understand the basics of computer systems and to understand the function of almost every component of the computer system. Students can use these reference books and study sources for a more thorough preparation of computer system architecture.
The following is the list of reference books which come highly recommended from experts in the field from which students can use to prepare –
- Computer Architecture and Design Books from Morgan Kaufmann Publishers
- Synthesis Lecture on Fault Tolerant Computer Architecture by Daniel J. Sorin
- Computer Architecture: From Microprocessors to Supercomputers, Oxford, 2005 – Textbook for an upper-division undergraduate course, with 28 lecture-size chapters, 491 problems, and extensive downloadable PowerPoint presentations (ISBN 0-19-515455-X)
- Virtual Machines – Versatile Platforms for Systems and Processes
- Macintosh Technology in the Common Hardware Reference Platform by Apple Computer Inc.
- PowerPC Microprocessor Common Hardware Reference Platform by Apple Computer Inc., International Business Machines, Inc., and Motorola Inc.
- The Designer’s Guide to VHDL by Peter J. Ashenden
- High Performance Cluster Computing Vol 1 and 2 by Rajkumar Buyya
- Reasoning About Parallel Architectures by William W. Collier
- Parallel Computer Architecture – A Hardware/Software Approach by David Culler and Jaswinder Pal Singh
- Distributed and Parallel Computing by Hesham El-Rewini and Ted Lewis
- The MIPS Programmer’s Handbook by Erin Farquhar and Philip Bunce
- Computer Architecture: Pipelined and Parallel Processor Design by Michael J. Flynn
- Computer Architecture: A Quantitative Approach, Second Edition by John L. Hennessy and David A. Patterson – web component
- Readings in Computer Architecture edited by Mark D. Hill, Norman P. Jouppi, and Gurindar S. Sohi – web component
- The PowerPC Architecture: A Specification for a New Family of RISC Processors by International Business Machines, Inc.
- RISC System/6000: PowerPC System Architecture by International Business Machines, Inc.
- High-Performance Mass Storage and Parallel I/O Hai Jin, Toni Cortes, and Rajkumar Buyya, Editiors
- Computer Arithmetic Algorithms by Israel Koren
- Introduction to Parallel Algorithms and Architectures: Arrays, Trees, and Hypercubes by F. Thomson Leighton
- Scalable Shared-Memory Multiprocessing by Daniel E. Lenoski and Wolf-Dietrich Weber
- Distributed Algorithms by Nancy A. Lynch
- Parallel Processing from Applications to Systems by Dan I. Moldovan
- Advanced Compiler Design and Implementation by Steven Muchnick
- Computer Arithmetic Systems by Amos R. Omondi
- The Microarchitecture of Pipelined and Superscalar C
Computer System Architecture Curriculum
Here the subject provides a vast array of information on computer system architecture, and it is important for students to know which topics to study and which to discard. Students must be able to structure their syllabus so that they can better prepare for future exams, and here this curriculum will provide students with a detailed understanding of the subject. Therefore here, the curriculum has been broken down into different units and topics, thereby allowing students to plan out their preparation much better. Students should be aware of the updated syllabus so that they don’t waste time on topics that don’t matter. The updated computer system architecture syllabus is as follows-
| Unit 1: Abstractions, Technology and Performance Computers | 1.1. Introduction
1.2. Architecture of a computer system. 1.3. Performance in a computer system 1.4. Perspective and evolution of technology |
| Unit 2: Segmented Processors | 2.1. fundamentals of designing a processor 2.1.1. The instruction set
2.1.2. single cycle 2.1.3. Data path and control 2.2. The technique of segmentation (pipeline) 2.2.1. ideal operation 2.2.2. Associated Concepts: Latency and Performance (Throughput) 2.3. Design a processor with pipeline 2.4. Limitations of the pipelined instructions channel 2.4.1. Causes of performance loss due to stop of pipeline 2.4.1.1. Conflicts structural constraints 2.4.1.2. Conflicts over control risks 2.4.1.3. Data dependency conflicts 2.4.2. Techniques to avoid halts 2.4.2.1. Internal forwarding 2.4.2.2. Branch prediction |
| Unit 3: Memory Organization and Structure: Caches and Virtual Memory | 3.1. Memory Hierarchy
3.2. Basic principles of the cache 3.2.1. Multi-level cache 3.2.2. Organizations: fully associative, direct-mapped and set associative 3.2.3. Operating schemes. Write Through with assignment in writing (Fetch on write) and no assignment in writing. Post-write or writeback 3.2.4. Replacement algorithms 3.2.5. cache coherence 3.2.6. Examples of caches 3.3. Virtual Memory 3.3.1. Operation of virtual memory: paging, segmentation, paged segments 3.3.2. Translation of virtual addresses to physical or real addresses 3.3.3. Memory Management Unit (MMU) 3.3.4. Translation Look-aside Buffer (TLB) 3.4. Integration of the memory: the TLB and cache 3.4.1. Cache system with real or virtual cache |
| Unit 4: Storage and other aspects of the I / O | 4.1. Reliability and availability
4.2. Flash disk storage 4.3. Measures of performance in I / O 4.4. Parallelism and I / O |
| Unit 5: Advanced Techniques of Parallelism | 5.1. Instruction level parallelism (ILP)
5.2. superscalar processors 5.2.1. Policies in Instruction Issue 5.2.2. Register renaming 5.2.3. Superscalar Implementation, reorder buffer, unit retirement 5.3. VLIW processors. 5.3.1. Planning by the compiler 5.3.2. Comparison Superscalar vs VLIW processor. 5.4. Multicore, multiprocessors and clusters 5.4.1. The difficulty of parallel programs 5.4.2. Shared memory multiprocessors 5.4.3. Clusters and another message-passing multiprocessor 5.4.4. Introduction to graphics processors |
List of Important Questions for Computer Systems Architecture
- What do you understand by the term Computer Architecture?
- Is Computer Architecture different from a Computer Organization?
- What are the various Interrupts in a Microprocessor system?
- What are the standard Components of a Microprocessor?
- What do you know about MESI?
- Are you aware of Pipelining?
- What do you know about Cache Coherence?
- What is cache miss?
- What do you know about Virtual Memory?
- What are the five stages of the DLX pipeline?
- What is Branch Prediction, and how can it control Hazards?
- Can you calculate the number of sets given with its size and way in a cache?
FAQs on Computer System Architecture Notes
Questions 1.
What is Computer System Architecture?
Answer:
The computer system architecture provides us with a detailed understanding of how a computer software system and a computer hardware system interact with each other to form the entire computer system. What a computer system architecture entails is the design of the computer system and how it functions with the various categories that are microarchitecture, instruction set architecture and system design, all these categories are what constitute the basic CPUs architecture, and it is the key in the function of the computer as a whole.
Question 2.
What are the best books for Computer System Architecture?
Answer:
- Computer Architecture and Design Books from Morgan Kaufmann Publishers
- Synthesis Lecture on Fault Tolerant Computer Architecture by Daniel J. Sorin
- Computer Architecture: From Microprocessors to Supercomputers, Oxford, 2005 – Textbook for an upper-division undergraduate course, with 28 lecture-size chapters, 491 problems, and extensive downloadable PowerPoint presentations (ISBN 0-19-515455-X)
- Virtual Machines – Versatile Platforms for Systems and Processes
Question 3.
What is the importance of computer system architecture?
Answer:
Computer System Architecture is a hardware-centric study which gives students a better understanding of logic design. The subject is essential for software students as well because without understanding the hardware of the computer, you cannot make software developments since the development of software of hardware go hand in hand.
Question 4.
List a few of the important questions in Computer System Architecture
Answer:
- Is Computer Architecture different from a Computer Organization?
- What are the various Interrupts in a Microprocessor system?
- What are the common Components of a Microprocessor?
- What do you know about MESI?
- Are you aware of Pipelining?
Conclusion
This article provides users with the most up to date information of computer System Architecture with the right notes, most resourceful books, curriculum and essential questions. By using all the resources provided in this article, users can easily prepare for any exam on the subject.