Examples of General And Special Purpose Computers?

General purpose computers differ from special purpose computers in that they are designed to follow instructions. Special purpose computers are created and assigned specific tasks.

The best way to gain an understanding of general purpose computers is to look at the ENIAC computer which was the first ever general purpose computer. It was built in 1946 for the US army to complete a variety of tasks. As it could do so, it was nicknamed a 'Giant Brain'. It was able to be reprogrammed to perform a range of computing problems.

General purpose computers are designed so that they do not require any specific human instruction in order to complete problems and tasks. They are programmed in their design to do so themselves. These computers are common in day to day life and are often used to perform tasks including data processing and numerical problems. Personal computers that are used at home or at work are general purpose computers.

Special purpose computers are those designed to do a specific job. These again are used throughout daily life and examples include:

• Home appliances
• Toys and games
• Cash machines
• Vehicle computers

These computers are not designed to be versatile in their tasks and require human input to do them. Their purpose is in built when the computer is being designed and cannot be reprogrammed. They can be designed to perform for example only numerical or data processing tasks among others.

General purpose computers are designed for everyday use at homes for family use, or inside our offices. All computers from micro to mainframe are general purpose. Even computers in toys, games and single-function devices follow instructions in their built-in program. It can be used for typing documents, listening to music, watching movies, browsing the web or for playing video games. Special purpose computers are those found at a convenience store or supermarket counters. These computers have the same components such as the CPU, Monitor and input devices such as a keyboard and a mouse. The only difference is that the keyboard is designed to input numeric characters and a pre-set product and price combinations. The keys on such keyboards are designed to respond only to the program that the computer is designed to run. The computer will not run any other program other than the POS system.

examples of general purpose