Electrical Engineering Stack Exchange
Electrical Engineering Stack Exchange

Questions tagged [computers]

Questions regarding architectures or design of specific parts, not consumer-related questions.

For consumer-related questions, which are off-topic here, try Super User.

368 questions
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12 answers

How can we be sure that computers will never accidentally switch a 0 by a 1?

I've read a bit about the construction of a digital computer in Shocken/Nisan's: The Elements of Computing Systems. But this book says nothing about certain electrical aspects in computers, for example: It's often said that 0's and 1's are…
Red Banana
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10 answers

What is a Charge?

I'm a high school student. I love computers and electronics. Few weeks ago, I thought to build my own electronic gadget but, unfortunately I had not much knowledge in electronics. So, I decided to learn. After Googling here and there, I came across…
seek_learn_joy
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7 answers

Can we not simply connect a battery to a RAM to prevent data loss during power cuts?

So, I was just wondering about how volatile memory storage loses data when the power to them is cut off. But can we not solve that problem by using a battery in conjunction with a RAM and a ROM and when there's a power cut i.e. when the computer…
Vishal Dalwadi
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32
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2 answers

How do computers calculate sin values?

How does a computer calculate a sin value? Logically, when I think about it the only apparent way is to put many sin values into memory, and when a sin value needs to be "calculated" it would just pull data from a specific memory address.(ex. sin(x)…
zack1544
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29
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5 answers

How does division occur in our computers?

How does division occur inside digital computers? What is the algorithm for it? I have searched hard in google but haven't got satisfactory results. Please provide a very clear algorithm/flowchart for division algorithm with a sample illustration.
program-o-steve
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26
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3 answers

How do hotswapping computer parts work?

Computers support hotswapping so that a user can replace a harddrive while the system is running. Is that mostly software just powering off the harddrive or is it some special hardware involved? If there were not special hardware then I suppose that…
Niklas Rosencrantz
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25
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1 answer

What is this transformer-like component, and why is it not really connected?

Recently, a power surge took out a few components in my PC's ATX power supply. While repairing (I hope), one component in the power drew my attention. I'm an electronics engineer, but I'm confused about it's purpose: At first sight, it looks like a…
jcoppens
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24
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4 answers

Why do CPU's typically connect to only one bus?

I found a motherboard architecture here: This looks to be the typical layout of motherboards. EDIT: Well, apparently it's not so typical anymore. Why does the CPU connect to only 1 bus? That front-side bus looks like a major bottleneck. Wouldn't it…
DrZ214
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Explain what is a transistor in plain English!

Can someone care to explain - in plain English - what a transistor is and how it works. I know computers are full of these but don't know much about them. P.S. I know about this site from another one in the family of StackExchange (I have no…
curiousJoe
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1 answer

How does the switch on the back of older computer power supplies work to vary between 110 and 220 volt input?

There is a little switch on the back of older computer power supplies to select between 110 and 220 volt AC input. I imagine this switch enables/disables a 220 to 110 volt transformer. Or perhaps a different channel within the same transformer unit…
sebastian323
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6 answers

Does water actually damage or only temporarily disable electronics until drying out?

Does water leave any damage after drying out? If it does, where and how exactly does it? How can it be repaired?
neverMind9
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What are different types of computer architectures?

I am going through the book "Elements of computing systems". This book teaches how to build a whole computer from scratch. While I was just browsing the chapters on computer architecture, I noticed that it all focused on the Von Neumann…
Rick_2047
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Breadboard computer

Is it possible to make a simple computer entirely with breadboards and basic electronic components? Is it feasible to, for example construct a scientific calculator in this way?
C.T.
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6 answers

Reusing laptop monitors

I have a 17" laptop monitor with a 1920x1200 (WUXGA I beleive it's called? or just UXGA?) resolution which I simply love. Now, assuming the laptop dies before the monitor does, would anyone know if it would be possible to salvage the monitor? Are…
falstro
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Electrical reason for the minimum altitude (-50 feet) in the computer specs?

Are if there any electrical reasons not to operate or store my Dell OptiPlex computers below the altitude of -50 feet, as written in the specifications? Screenshot of the original Dell OptiPlex specifications I saw:
eXtranium
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