Of CPUs and instructions

[pspwxp fan]

Hi Daniweb,
Sorry if this sounds incredibly noobish, but i was just pondering seriously upon it. If the processer can handle only one instruction at a time, how does the computer seem to be doing like a hundred things at a time? It is performing the OS functions, it is running the application, it is displaying the GUI, and all the stuff between these. I suppose the obvious answer will be that it juggles between these processes extremely fast, but then, how fast can you go?

[Ancient Dragon]

It's all handled by the operating system. The os contains a task scheduler whose job is to give cpu time to the various processes that are running. Here is an article that will interest you.

[pspwxp fan]

Thank You :)
Wowww you're still around haha. I remember being really fascinated by you and your stats in the C++ board ages ago :P
Edit: Hey btw im reading your link, it has a lot of stuff coming in my exam tomorrow. Thanks a lot :)

[cmps]

Ancient Dragon is totally true, and parallel processing makes the throughput even faster (Computers with multiple processors). But everything depends on the OS and the program running (Programmers can distribut tasks of there programs on different processors to make execution faster). A single processor cannot execute multiple instructions in exactly the same time, but if you want to know more about how to benefit the maximum of a single processor check the Pipelining
Good Luck in your exam :)