ELI5: Explain Like I'm 5

Sum-addressed decoder

Have you ever played with a treasure map where you have to follow the clues to find the treasure? Imagine your computer is like a treasure map and needs to know where to find certain things. A sum-addressed decoder is like a cheat code on the treasure map that helps your computer find what it's looking for faster.

When your computer needs to find something, it sends a signal to the sum-addressed decoder that tells it what it's looking for. The sum-addressed decoder takes this signal and checks whether it matches any of the pre-programmed codes that it knows. If it finds a match, it sends a signal to the corresponding location in the computer's memory where the information is stored.

Think of the sum-addressed decoder as a gatekeeper that only lets in the information that matches its codes. Just like a treasure map, the sum-addressed decoder helps your computer find what it needs faster and more efficiently.