EIT Electrical Review, Second Edition
Written for the FE/EIT Electrical Exam, this volume provides a complete review of all exam topics, including end-of-chapter mini exams with complete step-by-step solutions.
TABLE OF CONTENTS EIT Electrical Review, Second Edition
Chapter 9: Digital Computers: Hardware and Software
For these subjects, bookshelves of reference material would be needed. But, of course, this is not possible, so only certain subjects that might possibly be on the examination will be presented. For computer hardware, a continuation of digital logic, registers, memory organization, and an introduction to an ALU will be reviewed; for software, fetch cycles, machine language, and a short general discussion of program concepts will be discussed. Because software packages, such as PSPICE (probably the most popular for electrical circuit analysis) are so specialized, only brief mention will be made of these kinds of programs.
Hardware:
Any discussion of hardware assumes a certain sophistication of digital systems including data transfer, manipulation and storage of data, I/O devices, and keyboards for interfacing; and, within the computer, register addressing, ALU, ROM memory, control, etc. This brief discussion will start with a review of registers and counters and data transfer, and continue on with only the more likely items that may be on the examination.
Digital Registers, Counters, and RAMs:
Digital data transfer from register to register, to ALU, to disk memories, etc., requires their operation at the right instant, either at a certain clock pulse or a signal from a counter. These signals, if from a counter, will trigger on the correct count. Starting with the operation of a typical UP/DOWN counter, assume that a continuous clock pulse is left connected, but with other signals holding it to a preset value until ready for operation. Consider the following sample design (see...
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