Microprocessors
Terms related to microprocessors, including definitions about silicon chips and words and phrases about computer processors.STA - ZIF
- stack pointer - A stack pointer is a small register that stores the address of the last program request in a stack.
- Star processor - IBM's Star processor is a reduced instruction set computer (RISC) processor that is available in several series versions for IBM's AS/400 and RS/6000 systems.
- stepper - A stepper is a machine used to project the image of a circuit in photolithographic semiconductor fabrication.
- stepping - Stepping is a number used by Intel to identify what level of design change a microprocessor was built to.
- stretchable silicon - Stretchable silicon is a flexible form of silicon manufactured in thin, wavelike ribbons that can be expanded and compressed like accordion bellows.
- substrate - A substrate is a solid substance or medium to which another substance is applied and to which that second substance adheres.
- superscalar - Superscalar describes a microprocessor design that makes it possible for more than one instruction at a time to be executed during a single clock cycle.
- system-on-a-chip (SoC) - System-on-a-chip (SoC) technology is the packaging of all the necessary electronic circuits and parts for a "system" (such as a cell phone or digital camera) on a single integrated circuit (IC), generally known as a microchip.
- teraflop - A teraflop is a measure of a computer's speed and can be expressed as: A trillion floating point operations per second 10 to the 12th power floating-point operations per second 2 to the 40th power flops Today's fastest parallel computing operations are capable of teraflop speeds.
- terahertz (THz) - The terahertz, abbreviated THz, is a unit of electromagnetic (EM) wave frequency equal to one trillion hertz (1012 Hz).
- texture sensing - Texture sensing is the ability of a robot end effector to determine whether a surface is smooth or rough.
- thermal grease (thermal paste or thermal compound) - Thermal grease, also called thermal paste or thermal compound, is a substance used to promote better heat conduction between two surfaces and is commonly used between a microprocessor and a heatsink.
- thyristor - A thyristor is a four-layer semiconductor device, consisting of alternating P type and N type materials (PNPN).
- Titanium (TiBook) - Titanium is the name of a popular laptop computer from Apple that is encased in titanium, the strong but light metal that is used in supersonic aircraft engines.
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- transistor-to-transistor logic (TTL) - Transistor-transistor logic (TTL) is a digital logic design in which bipolar transistors act on direct-current pulses.
- true multitasking - True multitasking is the capacity of an operating system to carry out two or more tasks simultaneously rather than switching from one task to another.
- USART (Universal Synchronous/Asynchronous Receiver/Transmitter) - A USART (Universal Synchronous/Asynchronous Receiver/Transmitter) is a microchip that facilitates communication through a computer's serial port using the RS-232C protocol.
- Very Large Scale Integration (VLSI) - VLSI (very large-scale integration) is the current level of computer microchip miniaturization and refers to microchips containing in the hundreds of thousands of transistor s.
- VLIW (very long instruction word) - Very long instruction word (VLIW) describes a computer processing architecture in which a language compiler or pre-processor breaks program instruction down into basic operations that can be performed by the processor in parallel (that is, at the same time).
- volatile - In general, volatile (from the Latin "volatilis" meaning "to fly")is an adjective used to describe something unstable or changeable.
- voltage reference - A voltage reference is an electronic component or circuit that produces a constant DC (direct-current) output voltage regardless of variations in external conditions such as temperature, barometric pressure, humidity, current demand, or the passage of time.
- von Neumann bottleneck - The von Neumann bottleneck is a limitation on throughput caused by the standard personal computer architecture.
- wait state - A wait state is a situation in which a computer program or processor is waiting for the completion of some event before resuming activity.
- WinChip (WinChip C6) - WinChip (also known as the WinChip C6) is a microprocessor designed for use in business computers that run Microsoft operating systems Made by IDT, the microprocessor reportedly provides comparable performance to Intel's more expensive Pentium microprocessors as well as to the more competitively-priced K6 and the Cyrix 6X86MX.
- Wirth's Law - Wirth's Law states that computer software increases in complexity faster than does the ability of available hardware to run it.
- x86 - x86 is a generic name for the series of Intel microprocessor families that began with the 80286 microprocessor.
- x86-64 - x86-64 is a 64-bit processing technology developed by AMD that debuted with the Opteron and Athlon 64 processor.
- Xeon - Xeon (pronounced ZEE-ahn) is a 400 MHz Pentium microprocessor from Intel for use in "mid-range" enterprise servers and workstations.
- ZIF socket (Zero Insertion Force socket) - A ZIF (Zero Insertion Force) socket is the physical way that Intel's 486 and Pentium microprocessors up to Pentium II connect on the computer motherboard to the data bus.