What is the temporary storage within the CPU that holds data temporarily during processing before it is transferred to memory?

What is the temporary storage within the CPU that holds data temporarily during processing before it is transferred to memory?

• A. Data bus
• B. Accumulator
• C. Program Counter
• D. Register

Answer: (B)

Inside the CPU, data is stored temporarily in very fast storage called registers. One special register, the accumulator, is used as a workspace for arithmetic and logic operations. It holds the operands and the intermediate and final results of computations while they’re being processed, just before those results are written back to memory. That makes it the most fitting temporary storage for this scenario. The data bus is the channel that moves data between the CPU and memory, not storage. The program counter keeps track of the address of the next instruction to fetch, not data being processed. A register is a broad category of internal storage, but the accumulator is the specific register traditionally used for temporary storage of calculation results, which is why it’s chosen here.

Inside the CPU, data is stored temporarily in very fast storage called registers. One special register, the accumulator, is used as a workspace for arithmetic and logic operations. It holds the operands and the intermediate and final results of computations while they’re being processed, just before those results are written back to memory. That makes it the most fitting temporary storage for this scenario.

The data bus is the channel that moves data between the CPU and memory, not storage. The program counter keeps track of the address of the next instruction to fetch, not data being processed. A register is a broad category of internal storage, but the accumulator is the specific register traditionally used for temporary storage of calculation results, which is why it’s chosen here.