CPU speed
A computer鈥檚 speed is heavily influenced by the Central processing unit - the brain of the computer that processes program instructions. it uses. There are three main factors that affect how quickly a CPU can carry out A single action that can be performed by a computer processor.:
- clock speed
- cores
- cache
Clock speed
CPUs can only carry out one instruction at a time.
It might seem like CPUs can perform many instructions simultaneously, since it is possible for you to do homework, read instant messages and listen to music at the same time. However, the CPU is able to carry out instructions at such speed that it can seem like it is simultaneous.
The speed at which the CPU can carry out instructions is called the clock speed. This is controlled by a clock. With every tick of the clock, the CPU fetches and To run a computer program. one instruction. The clock speed is measured in cycles per second, and one cycle per second is known as 1 hertz. This means that a CPU with a clock speed of 2 gigahertz (GHz) can carry out two thousand million (or two billion) cycles per second.
The higher the clock speed a CPU has, the faster it can process instructions.
Cores
A CPU is traditionally made up of a processor with a single core. Most modern CPUs have two, four or even more cores.
A CPU with two cores, called a dual core processor, is like having two processors in one. A dual core processor can fetch and execute two instructions in the same time it takes a single core processor to fetch and execute just one instruction. A quad core processor has four cores and can carry out even more instructions in the same period of time.
The main downside of using quad core processors is that they are more expensive to design and make, and they also use more power than single or dual core processors. Another disadvantage is that the instructions have to be split up to decide which core will execute them and the results have to be merged together again at the end, which slows the processor down a little.
Cache
A cache (pronounced 鈥榗ash鈥) is a tiny block of The part of a computer that stores data. built right onto the processor. The most commonly used instructions and Units of information. In computing there can be different data types, including integers, characters and Boolean. Data is often acted on by instructions. are stored in the cache so that they are close at hand. The bigger the cache is, the more quickly the commonly used instructions and data can be brought into the processor and used.