What is computer system architecture?
In computer engineering, computer architecture is the conceptual design and fundamental operational structure of a computer system. It is a blueprint and functional description of requirements (especially speeds and interconnections) and design implementations for the various parts of a computer — focusing largely on the way by which the central processing unit (CPU) performs internally and accesses addresses in memory. It may also be defined as the science and art of selecting and interconnecting hardware components to create computers that meet functional, performance and cost goals. Computer architecture comprises at least three main subcategories:[1] * Instruction set architecture, or ISA, is the abstract image of a computing system that is seen by a machine language (or assembly language) programmer, including the instruction set, memory address modes, processor registers, and address and data formats. * Microarchitecture, also known as Computer organization is a lower level, more
