Central Processing Unit (CPU) is one of the 3 major parts of a computer. However, most people don’t really know why we have to have it in computer nor the evaluation of it. People should have know a little about it. Therefore, let’s go back to mid-20 Century to see how the first computer looks like.
ENIAC, the first electronic general-purpose computer, came to the world in 1942. However, at that time, there wasn’t a CPU in it. And people had to use several rooms to set up the entire ENIAC. Therefore, most people didn’t think that computers could change the way they live. Fortunately, we don’t need to use that complicated computer today. If you want me to do some simple calculation with ENIAC, I would prefer doing it by myself to setting a huge ENIAC first.
Glen Beck (background) and Betty Snyder (foreground) program ENIAC in BRL building 328. (U.S. Army photo)
After the ENIAC, people started to separate the whole computer into different parts, such as storage part and calculation part. CPU first came to world with Von Neumann architecture. In this architecture, CPU meanly define as calculation part of computer. It does not store data or any program in it. What it does is only calculating plus some logic circuit. In this case, the CPU only need to do 1+1 = 2 or some true or false calculation but, it no longer need to store 2 in it. This is really a milestone in the evaluation of CPU. it separate CPU, as a calculation part, from the heavy ENIAC.
Above Picture shows the actual Von Neumann architecture including CPU and memory part.
Around 1970, microprocessor began to show that a small computer might be possible. People were able to put an entire CPU on one printed circuit board, and that circuit board was only one-tenth of old CPU. Minicomputers became common. At this time, people don’t need several rooms to set up a entire computer, but they only need to one desk to use a simple computer. A famous microprocessor – the Intel 8008 was introduced by Intel in 1972, and it laid the foundation for modern CPU.
i8008 clone U808(D) developed since 1974 and produced since 1978 in theGDR by Funkwerk Erfurt (FWE) / Mikroelektronik Erfurt (MME), part ofKombinat Mikroelektronik Erfurt (KME).
Video done by LinusTechTips
Time has changed. Nowadays, single microprocessor (small CPU) is no longer able to fit people’s demands. Therefore, Multi-core CPU(CPU with multiple core in it) has become dominant. The more cores a CPU has, the more powerful it could be. When people hold the modern CPU in their hands, they can hardly believe that there are six or more cores in that small chip. Meanwhile, in order to make full use of CPU, people changed the original way CPU works. In the past, the computer was running only one program; but now CPU allow running multiple programs together. In the future, people will have smaller but more powerful CPU.