MICROPROCESSORS

Microprocessors are used now-a-days, in each and every field. These small chunks of silicon are the pillars of today's elecronic prowess. They have made loads of work as easy as the click of a button and as automatic as the day and night.
Microprocessors are made up from basic logical gates connected in various combinations which result in registers, control unit and ALU. The registers are used to store data. The control unit controls the various activities of the processors. ALU stand for Arithmetic and Logical Unit. It is the main processing part of the processor. It solves arithmetic problems and generates numerical answers. It also solves logical problems to give results. All the different registers are connected to the control unit and the ALU by the "bus", which is a bunch of wires carrying data.
Buses are of two types - Address bus and data bus. The address bus carries the address of the memory locations, where data is to be transferred or retrieved, while the data bus carries the actual data.
This whole assemby is realised in silicon (or germanium) and is housed in a hermaetically plastic package. Metal pins are provided on the edges to make conections wih the external components. Processors come in various types of packages; and are employed as per the requirement.
They can be connected externally to memory devices, ports, other ICs or simply to other processors. They all work in perfect coordination to run a particular system or work on a particular data.
Numerous companies today produce microprocessors; some of them are Intel, Motorola, Texas Instruments, Atmel,etc.