There are different kinds of storage chip- those that can't hold data when the computer is switched off (volatile) and those that can. We use the latter to store data we always need (e.g. the software for starting a computer after switch on- operating system software). Of course this kind of data must not change- we mustn't be able to write data to such chips as we would over-write existing data. So these chips are read-only memory (ROM) (memory is another word for storage). But we can write to volatile chips, so they provide read and write memory, RAM (Random access memory). RAM holds the data and programs that you are working on at one time.
Main store...
- Holds the processor's data (you don't have much to do with it)
- is part of the CPU
- is always on one or more chips
- is accessed much faster than backing store (because access to data on chips is faster)
- tends to be a few hundred megabytes (on desktop computers)
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