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Professor Emeritus, Department of Computer Science, Union College, Schenectady, New York. Coeditor of Encyclopedia of Computer Science, 4th ed. (2000).Britannica Editors
Encyclopaedia Britannica's editors oversee subject areas in which they have extensive knowledge, whether from years of experience gained by working on that content or via study for an advanced degree....HistoryhierarchyCPUcache memoryvirtual memoryRAMhard diskcachesfeasibleDavid Hemmendinger
computer memory, encyclopedia, encyclopeadia, britannica, article
- Computer memory - Cache, RAM, ROM: Although the main/auxiliary memory distinction is broadly useful, memory organization in a computer forms a hierarchy of levels, arranged from very small, fast, and expensive registers in the CPU to small, fast cache memory; larger DRAM; very large hard disks; and slow and inexpensive nonvolatile backup storage. Memory usage by modern computer operating systems spans these levels with virtual memory, a system that provides programs with large address spaces (addressable memory), which may exceed the actual RAM in the computer. Virtual memory gives each program a portion of main memory and stores the rest of its code and data on