Lesson 037
What is a Computer?
Input · Process · Output
1:00How every computer — from a calculator to a supercomputer — is built from a single loop (input, process, output) and six cooperating parts named by von Neumann in 1945.
By the end, you can
- Describe the input-process-output loop and identify it in everyday examples.
- Name the six parts of the von Neumann architecture and state each part's role.
- Distinguish the Control Unit from the ALU and explain what each one does.
- Explain the stored-program concept and why it makes a machine a general-purpose computer.
- Trace the three steps of the fetch-decode-execute cycle in order.
- Contrast RAM and storage on volatility, speed, and size.
- Explain why booting copies the OS from storage into RAM.
- Refute the myth that a bigger storage drive makes a computer faster.
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