Amazing! This Course will be always in my top list. Before starting this course, I was thinking like how can i build a computer on my own Computer. But the course instructor Shimon Schocken and Noam Nisan make it so simple and easy to understand. And in the end of this course Wollahh!! i created my First Computer Called HACK Computer.

Great course! The instructors make it sound really easy, and when you see the implementation working It really motivates you. The community is really great too, lots of people to help and assist you. No need for any background in Computer Science or Programming to attend and finish this course.

Computer system internals, hardware and software architectures, concept of abstraction, divide and conquer method, the fun of building hardware, and the fun of writing programs, all combined into this course, in an organised way, I can't think of a better course and a better teaching!

Coming from a high level programming backgroun with a degree in games programming, this course was amazing to fill in the gaps in my knowledge, and solidify low level computer science fundamentals.

Impressive work had been done by tutors. For me computers were always a black box and now i see logic behind it and to certain extent i can create one from the set of logic gates.

This is one of the best courses available on the internet. Projects are just at the end of comfort zone. Thank you professor.

Really Amazing Course! This course gives a proper insight of how things work on the most fundamental level!

It's been a really nice course. I'm a EE undergrad and I did know most of it but it was a fun experience.

It's the best course that I've ever seen. And I'm hoping to participte in the second part of the course!

Best Course Ever! Watch its Ted Talk for all you need to know about it. They deliver on their promise.

It was really good. It gave me a very good understanding how a computer is built from scratch.

any CS people should take this course. the way it delivers is just amazing.

Thank you a lot for taking the making the blackbox clear !

这是一门很棒的课程，满足了我对计算机底层架构的好奇心，非常感谢两位老师！！！

Excellent course!

Good starting point but very slim on the 'why's and the hardware is quite unlike anything you'd find in real life. In addition, I feel they leave too much unsaid and rely on visual comprehension far too much. I had to use the book to figure out the last two weeks. Overall, I did learn the more practical sides of hardware that other textbooks failed to convey. If they would add a Status register and break 'branching' into a separate instruction then I'd be happy with the CPU.

The program takes you step by step into the development of a functional model of a computer. It delivers everything it promises and is very well integrated. I put 4 stars because 4 and half is not possible, and I feel that you need to be a little bit familiar with logic and computers in order to do progress at the rate the course requires, because although every chapter is formidably explained, it can take much more time for anyone to fully understand the concepts.

Took more work and effort than expected (except for the last project which was surprisingly easy going), and although there were (many) moments of frustration, there was always a sense of accomplishment at the end. Everything ties together in a very satisfying way. But I would prefer if the course provided more support than just the forum for questions and queries, because I found it hard to find help when I most needed it.

The course is good. I just do not give five stars because we have to pay to atempt pass.

explanations could have been better

I submitted homework for week 1. I get an email telling me I did not submit. Then week two the course makes references to material not covered in week 1. it looks like a week is missing between week 1 and week 2?

The program is buggy, you will spend more time trying to troubleshoot the language than doing the questions.

The link www.nand2tetris.org is down always . I can't download data from website.

Great course to go over the basics of how a computer works up to the assembler. This is a great introduction to computer organization (hardware) as it goes through various logic gates and builds up to sequential circuits to be able to implement an ALU, memory which then can be used to build a CPU. The course goes over their own variation of HDL and assembly which is a great introduction to those who are not familiar with it. The assembly may look different from what some may be used to but it's designed to be simple for those without computer science background to be able to learn. In fact the entire course is designed to be simple for anyone with enough dedication to be able to build a computer. Therefore, there are some simplifications and "axioms" that are established (i.e. you don't learn about how transistors work in depth, nor are you expected to implement various flip flops and chips that may be a bit too complex).

I particularly like this course as it helps refresh my memory of what I learned when I was in undergraduate. This is a project centered course which contrasts to my undergrad where it was more theoretical (though we did have lab components which was in some sense more in-depth on implementing certain chips). I never tried building a computer theoretically from what I learnt in University and the computer architecture we studied was either too complex or way too time consuming for the average student to implement virtually. This computer architecture was designed just right.

Building on their superb and seemingly timeless book (published 2005), Shocken and Nisan deliver a tightly organised and engagingly presented sequence of lectures to guide us on the journey from logic gates to assembler via computer architecture (and you can go further in their second course, all the way up through high-level languages to operating systems). Their painstaking examination of the detailed material, on camera, and their reflections on it in the Perspectives sections, add depth and colour to the already brilliant expositions in the book. This is the way computing should be taught and learned, in a succession of demanding practical exercises connected to underlying theory. You can see the value of abstraction when you can put it to use. Rather than resort to mumbo-jumbo or geekiness, they keep the central sense of wonder about the power of the computer at the centre of attention.

I found HDL hard to learn and write, but am glad to have had the opportunity to try. It was hard for me to fathom how sequential circuits worked, and I found it hard, as someone used to procedural programming, to get my head round the declarative nature of HDL: it's not one damned thing after another you have to think about, but every damned thing at once!