Computer Organization

CS 224 is where the abstraction of "the computer" gets torn open: you learn how a few billion transistors actually execute a program by tracing the path from MIPS assembly down through datapaths, control logic, pipelines, caches, and virtual memory. Expect to write MIPS by hand, build single-cycle and pipelined processors in lab, and reason carefully about hazards, forwarding, and memory hierarchy performance on an open-book midterm and final. It sits on top of CS 223's digital logic and feeds directly into operating systems, compilers, and embedded work, basically every later course where knowing what the hardware is really doing stops being optional.