1. Maran Illustrated Computers CIS 102
Chapter 3 Processing
Maran Illustrated Computers
CIS 102

2. Content
Memory
CPU
Memory Cache
Bus

3. Memory Also called system memory
RAM is volatile (loses contents when power is lost)

4. Memory Speed This, unfortunately, isn’t quite right!
RAM speeds are measured in terms of the data transfer speed of the motherboard’s frontside bus (FSB).
Current bus speeds are measured in megahertz (MHz), and RAM is measured by a PC designation.
The FSB is 64 bits wide on most motherboards  that’s 8 bytes; The RAM PC designation is obtained by multiplying the FSB
data transfer rate by 8, and then doing a weird rounding:
Examples:
266 MHz FSB  8x266=2128; ergo PC2100
400 MHz FSB  8x400=3200; ergo PC3200
533 MHz FSB  8x533=4264; ergo PC4200 (Note: This does not round per the rule of fives.)
667 MHz FSB  8x667=5336; ergo PC5300
800 MHz FSB  8x800=6400; ergo PC6400
1066 MHz FSB  8x1066=8528; ergo PC8500
This covers most, but not all, motherboards. There are some faster rates out there, and the older PCs had a 133 MHz FSB speed
Conversely, divide the PC number by 8 to get the FSB speed, but you have to know the standard FSB speeds to round correctly.

5. Matched processor and RAM ratings
Processor Model
Front Side Bus
DDR, DDR2 or DDR3 rating
Memory channels
Bandwidth
T5200, T5300, U7n00
533 MT/s
PC (DDR2-533)
Single channel
4.267 GB/s
T5n00, T5n50, T7n00, L7200, L7400
667 MT/s
PC (DDR2-667)
5.333 GB/s
T5n70, Socket P T7n00, L7300, L7500, X7n00
800 MT/s
PC3200 (DDR400) or PC (DDR2-400)
Dual channel
6.400 GB/s
PC (DDR2-800)
E4n00/Pentium E21n0/Celeron 4n0
E6n00, E6n20, X6n00, Q6n00 and QX6n00
1066 MT/s
8.533 GB/s
PC (DDR2-1066)
PC (DDR3-1066)
E6n40, E6n50, QX6n50
1333 MT/s
10.667 GB/s
PC (DDR3-1333)
The new FSB transfer speed designation is MT/s, which means megatransfers (millions of transfers) per second. Not widely used yet, but will snowball. 5

6. Memory Size
Vista will load with 512 MB of RAM, but you probably won’t be able to run any programs.
Windows XP users can get away with 512 MB, but 1 GB is better. 2 GB is even better yet.
Windows Vista users should start with no less than 1 GB, and 2 GB should be the actual starting point.
Most motherboards in off-the-shelf, non-gaming systems, will probably limit the maximum installed RAM to no more than 4 GB.

7. Memory Chips
Almost everything in RAM today is DIMMs, or RIMMs (Rambus in-line memory module.) The Pentium 4 was originally designed to work with Rambus memory, but the cost was 1.5 to 2 times as much for a 5% to 10% increase in speed. Intel had to back water, and create a workaround, so that the P4 could work with SDRAM.
DDR transfers data on both the rise and the fall of the electrical signal, rather than just on its presence on the FSB lines.
DIMMS do not have to be installed in pairs. They are already a pair. That’s the “double” part.
Most motherboards, however, offer dual channel RAM access, which is faster than single channel. To access the dual channel capability, the DIMMs have to be installed in matching pairs.
Single channel RAM will transfer at half the rate of dual channel. It takes a single channel PC6400 DIMM to transfer at the same rate as two dual channel PC3200 DIMMs.
Newer RAM type is DDR3, but don’t see much of it, yet.

8. Why doesn't my Windows® PC recognize the whole 4GB of memory I installed?
The maximum amount of memory that your system can use is actually limited in two ways — not only is there a maximum amount of memory that your computer motherboard can accept, there is also a maximum amount of memory that your operating system (OS) can accept. For instance, when you install 4GB of memory in a 32-bit Windows system (the most common version; 64-bit systems are typically used only by high-end users), your system will see (and utilize) only 3GB or 3.5GB. Is the problem bad memory? Relax, there isn't a problem with the memory. Windows allows for 4GB of memory to be addressed, but this isn't 100 percent the same as having 4GB of physical memory. What happens is that some of the addressable memory (regardless of how much you have physically installed) is reserved for use by page files or by some of the devices that you are using, such as a graphics card, PCI card, integrated network connections, etc., so it's unavailable for use as normal main memory. The amount of memory needed for these devices is calculated by your system at startup; if you haven't maxed out the memory in your system, it's invisible to you, and all your physical memory (the RAM that's installed) is available for use. However if you've maxed out the DRAM in your system, this amount will be deducted from your physical memory, so you can't use 100% of your DRAM.
232 = 4GB 8

9. The maximum memory limitation varies by operating system; for instance, the 4GB memory limitation doesn't exist in 64-bit versions of Windows. Memory maximums for current Microsoft® Windows OSs include: Windows XP Home: 4GB Windows XP Professional: 4GB Windows XP 32-bit: 4GB Windows XP 64-bit: 128GB Windows Vista Home Basic: 4GB Windows Vista Home Basic 64-bit: 8GB Windows Vista Home Premium: 4GB Windows Vista Home Premium 64-bit: 16GB Windows Vista Ultimate: 4GB Windows Vista Ultimate 64-bit: 128GB+ Windows Vista 32-bit: 4GB Windows Vista 64-bit: 128GB+
64 bit Windows yields an effective 37-bit memory counter. 237 = 128GB
The 64-bit editions of Windows Vista are not for everyone, and require a system with a 64-bit processor and 64-bit system drivers. Please confirm that your system, applications, and devices are compatible with a 64-bit edition of Windows Vista before installing. 9

10. The next two slides are from a technical post by a homebrew artist
I've spent a lot of time on this issue over the last 6 months or so.  I have things working for the most part.  Here are some of the facts I've been able to collect during my troubleshooting:
1) Of course, 32-bit operating systems won't recognize more than GB RAM - you have no choice but to upgrade to a 64-bit O/S.
2) Motherboards older than about a year are a toss-up as to whether they'll work with 4 GB RAM or not.  Some will, some won't.  Higher-end boards do better than entry-level or mid-range boards.  It has more to do with how the motherboard has been designed and what the BIOS does than it has to do with Microsoft's programming.  There are similar issues with Linux operating systems.
3) Anything above 3 GB RAM conflicts with the PCI-Express video card memory address space.  That's the way boards have been designed for years to make everything compatible.  If your motherboard/BIOS supports memory remapping, then you have a good chance at making this work.  If it doesn't, don't look for software patches - there's not much you can do.  The PAE switches for Windows are very, very unlikely to work!  Buy a new motherboard (sorry).  If your BIOS doesn't count to 4 GB, then you might as well stop there - again, no software patches will fix the way your motherboard and BIOS have been designed.

11. 4) Most motherboards (except the higher-end ones) don't work well with all 4 memory slots populated.  Most often, you have to bump down the speed of the memory.  For example, if you are using DDR2-800 memory (which is still considered an overclock for a lot of the motherboards out there), you have to bump it down to DDR2-667 or even DDR2-533.  If you want to run at a higher speed with all 4 slots populated, buy a new, expensive motherboard (sorry again).
5) If you're running 4 GB RAM and have an nVidia SLI video card configuration (prior to the 8600/8800 series), you're going to have problems.  There seems to be a conflict (remembering that video card address space conflicts with the 4 GB RAM range).  This does appear to be fix-able via nVidia driver updates.  I finally got this working by using a little-advertised nVidia beta driver version   Guru3D has this driver, but nVidia doesn't advertise it at all.  Eventually, I expect that the upcoming nVidia drivers will fix these problems.
I have had success with the eVGA 680i motherboard with 4 GB RAM (OCZ Platinum 4x1GB DDR2-800).  I can also get the ASUS P5N-E SLI board to work IF I underclock the memory to 667 MHz. 
Generally, nobody wants to admit they are having some serious problems with 4 GB RAM - it seems that nobody was expecting so many people to upgrade to 4 GB RAM so early, but with Vista...it's becoming a requirement for any enthusiasts.  You won't likely see motherboard manufacturers admit that their boards won't handle 4 GB RAM - they'll blame it on MS or on the type of memory you have, but in my experience, it's always the board and its BIOS. 

12. Virtual Memory
Windows has a swap file that it uses for virtual memory, and when you hear your HDD activate while you’re daydreaming, that’s Windows doing some swapping. Can we say “fragmentation” without representation?
Some programs that create very large data files can also make use of virtual memory.

13. Virtual memory is a common part of most operating systems on desktop computers. It has become so common because it provides a big benefit for users at a very low cost.
For example, most computers today have something like 512 megabytes to 2 gigabytes of RAM available for the CPU to use. Unfortunately, that amount of RAM is not enough to run all of the programs that many users expect to run at the same time.
If a user loads the operating system, an program, a Web browser, a word processor, five sessions of the Internet, and a DirectX 9 game into RAM simultaneously, 512 megabytes may not be enough to hold it all. If there were no such thing as virtual memory, then once you filled up the available RAM your computer would have to say, "Sorry, you can not load any more applications. Please close another application to load a new one." With virtual memory, what the computer can do is look at RAM for areas that have not been used recently and copy them onto the hard disk. This frees up space in RAM to load the new application.
© howstuffworks.com 13

14. Because this copying happens automatically, you don't even know it is happening, and it makes your computer feel like is has unlimited RAM space even though it only has 512 megabytes installed. Because hard disk space is so much cheaper than RAM chips, it also has a nice economic benefit.
The read/write speed of a hard drive is much slower than RAM, and the technology of a hard drive is not geared toward accessing small pieces of data at a time. If your system has to rely too heavily on virtual memory, you will notice a significant performance drop. The key is to have enough RAM to handle everything you tend to work on simultaneously -- then, the only time you "feel" the slowness of virtual memory is when there's a slight pause when you're changing tasks. When that's the case, virtual memory is perfect
© howstuffworks.com 14

15. When it is not the case, the operating system has to constantly swap information back and forth between RAM and the hard disk. This is called thrashing, and it can make your computer feel incredibly slow.
The area of the hard disk that stores the RAM image is called a page file. It holds pages of RAM on the hard disk, and the operating system moves data back and forth between the page file and RAM. On a Windows machine, page files have a .SWP extension.
© howstuffworks.com 15

16. © howstuffworks.com 16

17. ROM/EPROM The BIOS programs are in ROM.
The most common type today is EEPROM. (electrically erasable, programmable read-only memory,)
(Gee, isn’t this alphabet soup stuff fun?)

18. CPU
The two main manufacturers of CPUs are Intel and AMD (Advanced Micro Devices).
Microprocessor is often abbreviated μP. (μ is the Greek letter mu.) 18

19. CPU Complexity A micron is one one-millionth of a meter.
A nanometer is one one-billionth of a meter. A meter is app inches, or originally, one one-millionth of the distance around the earth at the equator. 19

20. Dual-Core Design
They have already moved. Intel has gone from the Pentium D, to the Pentium Core Duo, to the Pentium Core 2 Duo.
AMD has gone from the Athlon 64 X2 to the Athlon X2. They dropped the 64 from the name, since almost everything is 64-bit today, even though Windows and most applications still only run in 32-bit mode.
Intel has a ViiV ad slogan. viiv is Roman numeral coded 64.

21. Choose a CPU

22. Intel Core 2 Duo Processor
Processor Competitive Comparison AMD Athlon™ 64 X2 and AMD Athlon™ X2 Dual-Core Processors
AMD Athlon™ 64 X2 and AMD Athlon™ X2 Dual-Core Processor
Intel Core 2 Duo Processor
Infrastructure
socket AM2
Socket LGA 775
Process Technology
90 nanometer, SOI (silicon on insulator) 65 nanometer, SOI (silicon on insulator)
65 nanometer
Number of Transistors
90nm: 164 to 243 million (depending on cache size) 65nm: 221 million
291 million
64-bit Instruction Set Support
Yes, AMD64 Technology
Yes, EM64T
Enhanced Virus Protection*
Yes
Yes, Execute Disable Bit
System Bus Technology
HyperTransport™ technology up to 2000MHz, full duplex
Front Side Bus up to 1066 MHz, Half duplex
Integrated Memory Controller
128-bit + 16-bit ECC unbuffered PC2 6400(DDR2-800), PC2 5300(DDR2-667), PC2 4200(DDR2-533), PC2 3200(DDR2-400)
No, Discrete logic device on motherboard
Total Processor-to-System Bandwidth
HyperTransport technology: up to 8.0 GB/s
Memory bandwidth: up to 12.8 GB/s
Total: up to 20.8 GB/s
Total: up to 17.0 GB/s
3D & Multimedia instructions
3DNow!™ technology, SSE, SSE2, SSE3
SSE, SSE2, SSE3
Chipset support
NVIDIA: Nforce Series chipsets
ATI: Radeon Xpress Series chipsets
VIA: K8 Series chipsets
SiS: 75x Series chipsets or greater
Intel: 975, 965, 963, 946
Total Designed Power (TDP)
45W, 65W, 89W, or 125W
65W or 95W
Don’t even try to memorize this. These are the general technical specs for AMD and Intel CPUs.
Note the number of transistors on these babies!

23. Generation

24. Speed
Heat dissipation became a major problem when speeds exceeded 3.6 GHz. Liquid cooling is available, but raises the cost of a PC substantially. In mid-2006, both AMD and Intel introduced dual core CPUs, dropped the speed back by 40%, dropped the power requirements by 40%, and increased the overall operational speed by 20%, roughly brought quad core CPUs, and the end of 2008, or into 2009, we will probably be looking at 8-way CPUs. The number of CPU offerings from both companies is both staggering and confusing. AMD just had a name change, dropping the “64” from the Athlon 64 X2 designation. Intel keeps adding speed-increment CPUs in the middle of its lineup, and changing the names of its top-of-the-line models.
Right now, the best buys are in the mid-range with speeds between 1.8 and 2.4 GHz.

25. Bit Processing
Most new CPUs are 64-bit. Sometimes they process 32-bit apps slower than an older 32-bit CPU.
Windows and Linux are currently available in 64-bit editions.

26. Intel Celeron
Except for AMD’s Opteron CPU for servers, the letters “ron” at the end of a CPU name denote it as a crippled, less expensive CPU. The amount of the less expensive usually does not justify the poorer processor for an individual n today’s marketplace. Companies buying PCs 10,000 at a time would have a reason to look at less powerful processors for the cost savings. It doesn’t make sense for an individual.
The AMD crippled chip was called the Duron until last year (2006). Now it’s called the Sempron. It’s easy to remember: Celeron reminds me of celery, Duron is very similar to the Russian word, durak, which means idiot, and the word Sempron reminds me of simple!

27. Intel Pentium 4
Just like poor Judd, the Pentium 4 should be dead to new purchasers.

28. Intel Pentium 4 with HT Technology
Hyperthreading has been replaced by newer techniques for handling instructions in the dual and quad core processors. Basically, these design technologies allow more than one instruction to be executed at the same time.

29. Intel Pentium 4 Extreme Edition with HT Technology
This CPU has been replaced in ultra-high end and fast gaming applications by the Intel QX 6800 and its newer cousins.

30. This is the link to the Intel CPU part numbering page for the Core 2 Duo processors
Too much for one PPt page 30

31. AMD CPUs
Ah, yes; the Sempron!
Another crippled chip! Avoid!

32. AMD Athlon™ XP
The new versions are the Athlon X2 designations. Remember, everything is dual core, now, except for the quad core.

33. AMD Athlon™ 64
Again, the “64” is gone, and X2 has been added for the dual-core processors.

34. AMD Athlon™ 64 FX
Like the Intel models, these guys are still around. They’ll be emptying the distribution channel of these as fast as they can. Can probably grab some pretty good prices.

35. AMD’s CPU numbering system is a little shorter, until you get to the Opteron (server) series.
SOI stands for Silicon-on-Insulator 35

36. Memory Cache
Every desktop has cache memory. It’s like lunch. If you make it the night before, when you have lots of time, it’s ready the next day when you want it. Otherwise you have to make it the next day when you don’t have time. The PC is constantly fetching instructions and data from memory, and sending them through the CPU for decoding and execution. Although memory transfers are fast by human standards, they are fairly slow by CPU speed standards.
When a RAM fetch is requested, the cache memories are loaded with other data and instructions. Usually these are the most recent and most often used bytes. The CPU checks the cache memories in number order, and any required bytes that are found can then be loaded faster than directly from RAM.

37. Using Memory Cache
The desktop analogy.

38. L1 Cache
We say it’s located directly on the die. The die is the CPU silicon itself.

39. L2 Cache
If the CPU die has L2 cache, then the cache on the motherboard is L3. If the CPU does not have L2 cache, then the motherboard cache is L2. Not since the first Celeron and Duron chips have the CPU dies not had L2 cache. L2 cache on the Intel core 2 duo CPUs is 2MB or 4MB, depending on the CPU speed. It is possible to get a slower Intel CPU with a larger L2 cache that will actually run faster than a faster CPU with a smaller L2 cache. Weird, huh?

40. L3 Cache

41. RAM
As in the previous slide, whether the motherboard cache is L2 or L3 depends on whether the CPU die has L2 cache. Some older P4 CPUs, and the first Celeron CPUs did not have on-board L2 cache. It’s time to rid ourselves of anything less than dual core when buying a new PC.

42. Bus

43. Bus width, speed and bandwidth
Bus width is the number of electrical lines the bus contains.
Bus speed is the number of times a second the switches for the bus can be turned on and off.
Bandwidth is the bus width divided by 8, then multiplied by the bus speed, and then multiplied by the number of transfers per clock tick. i.e., 32-bit bus, 133 MHz transfer rate, 2 transfers per clock tick = 1064 MHz bandwidth

44. PCI Bus
Created in 1993 to replace IBM’s MCA bus, and the VLB and EISA local buses. 32-bit bus. MCA and VLB died out by EISA pretty much gone by PCI-X extended the bus width to 64 bits. PCI is gradually being replaced by PCI-express.

45. AGP Bus

46. PCI Express
Designed to replace the PCI, the PCI-X, and the AGP graphics card.
Can be scaled up. A smaller connector can fit into a larger slot.

47. Comparing Bus Types