If you are wondering – What Coding Scheme is used by most Microcomputers, let’s proceed to learn how it works.
In this article today, you are going to learn about Coding Schemes in Microcomputers.
Here is a brief list of content in this write-up.
Table of Content
- What is meant by a Coding Scheme ?
- Which Coding Scheme Microcomputers use ?
- Different types of Coding Schemes
Let’s proceed to dive deep into the details without further delay.
What is a Coding Scheme ?
A Coding Scheme in Computers forms a standard for representing Data. In simple words, a Coding Scheme defines rules to represent data with special phrases, Text, or characters.
A Coding Scheme helps a computer better interpret instructions. If a Coding Scheme is not in place, instructions could mis-interpret, resulting in creating unintentional outputs.
When it comes to performance specific to various Coding Schemes, ASCII performs well for modern computers. There are also Coding Schemes specific to special computers, such as Mainframes.
Among all Coding Schemes, Unicode is higher level Coding Scheme among all. However, when it comes to personal PCs, ASCII is commonly used in today’s PCs.
Different Coding Schemes works with various capacities to represent and process data. In simple words, the more a Coding Scheme can afford a higher number of representation Bits or Memory, the better it can process information.
What Coding Scheme is used by most Microcomputers ?
There are different Coding Schemes in Computers to represent data. But, among Coding Schemes, ASCII is widely used in most Computers.
So, in simple words, ASCII Coding Scheme is used by most Microcomputers. ASCII was invented by ANSI in 1968 and is commonly used in Personal Computers.
Note: ANSI stands for American National Standard Institute and ASCII stands for American Standard Code for Information Interchange.
A Coding Scheme is extremely important for computers. Without a Coding Scheme, representing information in computer’s memory or processing is impossible.
Today’s personal computers use Binary Digits (0 and 1) to process and store data. When it comes to Coding Schemes, computers use different schemes to convert data into Binary form.
Different types of Coding Schemes
When it comes to using Coding Schemes to convert, process, or store data in a Computer’s memory, PCs use different schemes to perform the Encoding process.
The Encoding process refers to converting data from simple form to Binary state. Once the encoding process is performed, computers are able to process the data or perform storing actions on the Data.
Here are some popular Coding Schemes with brief descriptions.
BCD (Binary Code Decimal) is commonly used in old computers. It consists of representing each decimal digit in 4 Binary digits.
EBCDIC (Extended Binary Coded Decimal Interchange Code) is/was mostly used by Mainframe computers. Mainframe computers are big and EBCDIC helps mainframe represent data in 256 characters.
ASCII (American Standard Code for Information Interchange) is widely used Coding Scheme in modern computers. ASCII helps personal computers encode data using 128 characters. In simple words, ASCII is the Coding Scheme used by most Personal Computers.
Unicode is modern than ASCII and can represent data in 65536 characters. Unicode helps computers easily represent characters in any language in the World.
Conclusion
So, can you tell – which Coding Scheme is used by most Microcomputers ?
ASCII is commonly used Coding Scheme in Microcomputers. It is developed by ANSI, which is an American based system or institution, stands for American National Standard Institute.
In modern PCs, Unicode is also used like ASCII. In my opinion, Unicode can take advantage over ASCII when it comes to performance and speed. You can also visit This resource to know more about Coding Schemes in Computers.