The x86 Architecture
The internals of most modern computer architectures (including x86) follow the Von Neumann architecture, illustrated in Figure 4-2. It has three hardware components:
The central processing unit (CPU) executes code.
The main memory of the system (RAM) stores all data and code.
An input/output system (I/O) interfaces with devices such as hard drives, keyboards, and monitors.
Figure 4-2. Von Neumann architecture
As you can see in Figure 4-2, the CPU contains several components: The control unit gets instructions to execute from RAM using a register (the instruction pointer), which stores the address of the instruction to execute. Registers ...
Get Practical Malware Analysis now with the O’Reilly learning platform.
O’Reilly members experience books, live events, courses curated by job role, and more from O’Reilly and nearly 200 top publishers.
