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Clock frequency

We know this from the ads: "A Pentium 166 MHZ." The 166 MHZ is the clock frequency. Actually, there is a small crystal on the system board. which continually ticks to the CPU at a steady number of clock ticks per second. At each clock tick something happens in the CPU. Thus, the more ticks per second the more data are processed per second.


The first CPU's worked at a frequency of 4,77 MHZ. Subsequently then, clock frequencies rates rose to 16, 25, 50, 66, 90, 133 and 200 MHZ to the best today, which probably operate at 266 MHZ. Clock frequencies are still being increased. In a few years we will have CPU's operating at 400 and 500 MHZ.

To reach these very high clock frequencies, one has to employ a technique called clock doubling
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