✅ Quiz 01 — What Is a Computer, Really?
Answer each question in your head (or on paper), then open the fold to check. No grades, no timer. If you miss one, that’s the quiz doing its job — glance back at the lesson and try again tomorrow.
1. The lesson says a computer has three “superpowers”. What are they?
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It is extremely **fast** (billions of instructions per second), extremely **obedient** (never skips a step, never gets bored), and extremely **literal** (does exactly what the instructions say — including the mistakes, because it never guesses what you meant).2. Why do computers use on/off switches (binary) instead of, say, switches with ten positions?
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Reliability. Electricity is messy — voltages wobble. But "on or off?" stays a crisp, unmistakable question even when conditions aren't perfect. Two clean states are far more dependable than ten fuzzy ones.3. What is a bit? And how many bits are in a byte?
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A **bit** is one single 0-or-1 — the smallest piece of information a computer can hold, like one light switch. Eight bits make one **byte** (roughly enough to store one letter of text).4. A computer can only store numbers. So how does it store the word “HI”?
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By agreement, every letter has a number (in the standard code, H is 72 and I is 73). The computer stores those numbers in binary. "Everything is numbers": letters, photos (color values per dot), and sound (pressure measurements) all become numbers first.5. Match each computer part to its kitchen role: CPU, RAM, storage, motherboard, GPU.
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- **CPU** → the chef (carries out every instruction, one after another, very fast) - **RAM** → the kitchen counter (fast to reach, limited space, wiped clean when power goes off) - **Storage** → the pantry / filing cabinet (slow to reach, huge, keeps everything even without power) - **Motherboard** → the building's wiring and plumbing (connects everything, does no cooking itself) - **GPU** → a thousand junior chefs (many simple calculations, all at the same time)6. Your friend’s laptop died mid-sentence and their unsaved document vanished — but all their old photos are fine. Explain both facts with one idea from the lesson.
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The document was in **RAM** (the counter), which loses everything when power is cut. The photos were in **storage** (the pantry), which keeps its contents without power. Saving a file means copying it from the counter to the pantry.7. Why does “turn it off and on again” fix so many problems?
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Hours of running leave RAM cluttered with leftover temporary state — stuck programs, piled-up small errors. Powering off wipes RAM completely (it can't hold anything without power), so the machine restarts with a clean counter. Files in storage are untouched. It fixes temporary messes, not permanent problems.8. True or false: a smartphone is a real computer.
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True. It has a CPU, RAM, storage, a GPU, and input/output devices — the full kitchen. It is also far more powerful than the computers that navigated astronauts to the Moon. "Computer" in this course always includes your phone.9. A laptop ad says: “16 GB RAM, 512 GB SSD.” Which number is the counter, which is the pantry — and why is the pantry number so much bigger?
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16 GB RAM is the counter; 512 GB SSD is the pantry. The pantry is bigger because fast memory is expensive to make, while slower permanent storage is cheap — so machines pair a small fast workspace with a large slow warehouse.10. What is Moore’s law, in one sentence?
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The observation (by Gordon Moore, 1965) that engineers fit roughly twice as many switches on a chip every couple of years — a doubling that compounded for decades and explains why a pocket phone now outpowers a room-sized 1970s computer, though the pace has been slowing as switches approach the size of atoms.11. Why is a GPU better than a CPU for video games (and for AI)?
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Games and AI both need *millions of small, similar calculations at the same time* — like updating every pixel on screen 60 times a second. A CPU is one masterful chef working through tasks in order; a GPU is a thousand junior chefs each doing one simple task simultaneously. For huge piles of simple parallel work, the thousand juniors win.12. 🗣️ Explain it to a friend. Imagine a friend asks: “OK, so what actually IS a computer? What’s inside my phone?” Give your answer out loud, in under two minutes, using at least one analogy from this module. No fold to open this time — if you can say it so your friend nods along, you’ve passed.
Stuck? Here's one way to start
"Your phone is a machine that follows instructions — billions per second, totally literally, never guessing. Inside, everything is stored as patterns of tiny on/off switches. Think of it as a kitchen: there's a chef (the processor) doing the work, a counter (memory) holding what it's working on right now — which gets wiped when the power's off, that's why restarting fixes things — and a pantry (storage) where your photos and apps live permanently…"Done? On to Module 02: What Is Software?, or browse the extra resources first.