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[-] RubberElectrons@lemmy.world 5 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Gonna guess this is related to what he's talking about: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shift_register

They actually move bits of data in and out of the CPU/ram once per 'tick' of the system-wide clock, which is usually ticking in the GHz range.

Software will handle decisions on what bits/bytes to move where, the registers are where data is electronically modified, the shifters actually move the bytes in and out.

[-] baines@lemmy.cafe 3 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

I think it’s even simpler than that

it’s ram

here is some ee 100 stuff not looked at the whole thing

www.cs.emory.edu/~cheung/Courses/255/Syllabus/4-intro/SLIDES/s10a.html

there’s probably a youtube video with a guy from India that’ll do it better

ewww ran into ai slop on youtube instead

this is decent

https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/1gvh5c6/eli5_is_there_really_a_tiny_switch_for_every_bit/

[-] RubberElectrons@lemmy.world 3 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Without more details, it's hard to know.

But I'd guess his dad would've simply said "ram" or "memory", something everyone is at least mildly familiar with, vs the more specific phrasing, "similar to a data switch but on a way smaller scale".

[-] baines@lemmy.cafe 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

It's on the chips. It's similar to a data switch, but on a waaaaaaay smaller scale.

We've argued about this a lot. He doesn't like to call them that. The term "electronic switch" is so old.

this makes it pretty clear

he’s explaining the function to someone that he thinks is hardware illiterate

also if he’s really specialized it may literally be the ‘switch’ part

[-] RubberElectrons@lemmy.world 2 points 1 year ago
[-] baines@lemmy.cafe 1 points 1 year ago

There can be only one!

~Here we are…

this post was submitted on 18 Jul 2025
576 points (100.0% liked)

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