ABSTRACT
Previous chapters describe the basic building blocks used to construct computer systems: digital logic and representations used for data types such as characters, integers, and floating point numbers. This chapter begins an investigation of one of three key elements of any computer system: a processor. The chapter introduces the general concept, describes the variety of processors, and discusses the relationship between clock rate and processing rate. The next chapters extend the basic description by explaining instruction sets, addressing modes, and the functions of a general-purpose CPU.
