> NAND refers to NAND gates right -- does this course start from Hardware?
NAND does refer to NAND gates. no the course doesn't start from hardware. a (java based) simulator is used to simulate the most fundamental building block.
the hardware is simulated, but you do actually start from NAND gates to build primitive logic gates, then forward to a half adder, full adder, ALU, CPU and ram memory
NAND does refer to NAND gates. no the course doesn't start from hardware. a (java based) simulator is used to simulate the most fundamental building block.
and then things go from there.
take a look at the following: http://www.nand2tetris.org/ for more information.