Advanced Computer Architecture

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Advanced Computer Architecture

• George Wells

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Course Overview

• Background
• Historical
• SPARC Architecture
• Modern Trends in Computer Architecture
• Quantitative assessment (price/performance)
• Pipelining
• Superscalar and VLIW Architectures
• Memory Hierarchies
• Vector Processing
• Input/Output
• Future Trends

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Historical Background

• First Generation (1950 1959)
• Vacuum Tube Technology
• Second Generation (1960 1968)
• Transistor Technology
• 1964 IBM coined the term Computer Architecture
• Third Generation (1969 1977)
• Integrated Circuits
• Fourth Generation (1978 ?)
• Large and Very/Ultra Large Scale Integration

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RISC

• Reduced Instruction Set Computing
• Proposed by Patterson and Ditzel in 1980

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The SPARC Architecture

• SPARC
• Scalable Processor ARChitecture
• Programming Model
• Instruction Set

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SPARC Programming Model
Twenty-four window registers
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SPARC Programming Model (cont.)
Eight global registers, and control registers
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SPARC Instruction Set

1. Load/Store operations
2. Arithmetic, logical and shift operations
3. Control transfer
4. Control register access
5. Floating point (or other coprocessor) operations

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Assembling and Linking

• Use the GNU C compiler (gcc)

gcc -g prog.s -o prog
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Macros

• Use m4
• Generic UNIX text macro processor

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Debugging

• Use the GNU debugger (gdb)

gdb prog
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A First Example

• Temperature conversion

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SPARC Program
/ This program converts a temperature in
Celcius to Fahrenheit. George Wells - 30 May
2003 / offs 32 / Variables c and f
are stored in l0 and l1 / .global
main main mov 24, l0 !
Initialize c 24 mov 9, o0 ! 9
into o0 for multiplication mov l0,
o1 ! c into o1 for multiplication
call .mul ! Result in o0 nop
! Delay slot mov 5, o1
! 5 into o1 for division call .div
! Result in o0 nop
! Delay slot
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Example (cont.)
... add o0, offs, l1 ! f
result offs mov 1, g1 !
Trap dispatch ta 0 !
Trap to system
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