Instruction Set Architecture

• Part of the interface between hardware and software that is visible to the programmer

• Instruction Set

  • RISC, CISC , VLIW-EPIC but also other issues such as how branches are handled, multimedia/graphics extensions etc.

• Addressing modes (including how the PC is used)

• Registers

  • Integer, floating-point, but also flat vs.windows, and special-purpose registers, e.g. for multiply/divide or for condition codes or for predication

Previous slide

Next slide

Back to first slide

View graphic version