Winn L. Rosch Hardware Bible, Sixth Edition

Logic Design

Reduced to its fundamental principles, the workings of a modern silicon-based microprocessor are not difficult to understand. They are simply the electronic equivalent of a knee-jerk. Every time you hit the microprocessor with an electronic hammer blow (the proper digital input), it reacts by doing a specific something. Like a knee-jerk reflex, the microprocessor's reaction is always the same. When hammered by the same input and conditions, it kicks out the same function.

The complexity of the microprocessor and what it does arises from the wealth of inputs it can react to and the interaction between successive inputs. Although the microprocessor's function is precisely defined by its input, the output from that function varies with ...