UNIT-1

OVERVIEW & INSTRUCTIONS

2 Marks
1. Define Computer Architecture.
 Computer architecture is a set of rules and methods that describe the functionality,
organization, and implementation of computer systems.
 Computer architecture involves instruction set architecture design, micro architecture
design, logic design, and implementation.
2. What are the components of a computer?
 Input
 Output
 Memory
 Control
 Datapath
3. What is Execution time / Response time?
 Execution time: the time spent by processor between the start and completion of
a task—also referred as Response time.
4. What is meant by CPI?
 Clock Cycles per Instruction (CPI) is the average number of clock cycles each
instruction takes to execute, is often abbreviated as CPI.
CPU time = Instruction count x CPI x Clock cycle time
5. State and explain the performance equation?
 CPU performance equations is to calculate CPU time as follows
CPU time = IC x CPI x Clock cycle time
or
CPU time = (Instruction count x CPI) / Clock Rate
6. Differentiate between throughput and response time.
 Execution time: the time spent by processor between the start and completion of a
task—also referred as Response time.
 Throughput or bandwidth—the total amount of work done in a given time.
7. What is Addressing Modes? What are the different types of addressing Modes?
 Addressing modes are the ways to identify the location of an operand which is specified
in an instruction is called.
 The addressing modes in computer architecture actually define how an operand is chosen
to execute an instruction.
8. What is Immediate addressing Mode?
 In the immediate addressing mode, the instruction contains two fields. One for the
Opcode and another field contains the operand itself.
 The instruction itself containing the operand. This mode is used to manipulate constant
values.
 Example : ADD #05 ADD constant 05 to the content of accumulator
9. What are the merits and demerits of single address instructions?
 Merit: There is no need of encoding the address of the accumulator register/
 Demerit: Expensive and small amount of data can be stored.
10. Distinguish between auto increment and auto decrement addressing mode
 In auto increment mode After accessing the operand, the content of the register is
automatically incremented by step size ‘d’.
 In auto decrement mode First, the content of the register is decremented by step size
‘d’. After decrementing, the operand is read.
11. Compare RISC with CISC architecture.

CISC (Complex Instruction Set Computer) RISC (Reduced Instruction Set Computer)
A large number of instructions are present in the Very fewer instructions are present. The numbers
architecture. of instructions are generally less than 100.
CISC supports array. RISC does not support array.
Some instructions will take long execution times. No instruction with a long execution time due to
very simple instruction set.
Variable-length encodings of the instructions Fixed-length encodings of the instructions are
used.

12.What is an Opcode? How many bits are needed to specify 32 distinct operations?

 An Opcode is short for 'Operation Code'.\

 An Opcode is a single instruction that can be executed by the CPU.
 In assembly language mnemonic form an Opcode is a command such as MOV or ADD or
JMP.
 For example MOV AL, 34h
 The Opcode is the MOV instruction. The other parts are called the 'operands'.

13.What is SPEC? Specify the formula for SPEC rating.

 Standard Performance Evaluation Corporation (SPEC) is a non-profit corporation
formed to establish, maintain and endorse standardized benchmarks and tools to evaluate
performance and energy efficiency for the newest generation of computing systems.

14. What is relative addressing mode? When is it used?

 In relative addressing mode . The effective address of an operand is obtained by adding
the content of the program counter with the address part of the instruction.
  EA = PC+ Instruction Register
 Relative addressing mode is used only for branch instructions.

14. Define program-controlled I/O.

 Programmed I/O (PIO) refers to data transfers initiated by a CPU under driver software control
to access registers or memory on a device.
 The CPU issues a command then waits for I/O operations to be complete.
 As the CPU is faster than the I/O module, the problem with programmed I/O is that the CPU
has to wait a long time for the I/O module of concern to be ready for either reception or
transmission of data.
 The CPU, while waiting, must repeatedly check the status of the I/O module, and this process
is known as Polling.
 As a result, the level of the performance of the entire system is severely degraded.

16. Define interrupt-service routine (ISR).

 Interrupt is a signal which may be disturb or alter the sequence of execution of the
processor.
 Interrupt service routine (ISR) is actually a program or device driver, When an
interrupt is acknowledged by the the processor, the routine or program which is running
currently gets pause or interrupted, and ISR program gets executed.
 When the ISR is complete, the process is resumed.
18. State Amdahl law.
 Amdahl law states that Speedup due to an enhancement is defined as:

ExecutionTime old Performance new

Speedup = ---------------- = ---------------------
ExecutionTime new Performance old

PART-B
What is Computer Architecture?
 Computer architecture is a set of rules and methods that describe the functionality,
organization, and implementation of computer systems.
 It is defined as the functional operation of the individual hardware unit in a computer
system and the flow of information among the control of those units.
 Computer hardware is the electronic circuit.
 Computer architecture is a Specification of detailing how a set of software and
hardware technology standards interact to form a computer system or platform.
 Computer architecture involves instruction set architecture design, micro architecture
design, logic design, and implementation.
 Computer architecture = Set of Instructions + Computer organization

1. Components of a computer system

 The five classic components of a computer are input, output, memory, data path, and
control, with the last two sometimes combined and called the processor.
1. Input
2. Output
3. Memory
4. Control
5. Datapath
1. Input
 Input is data coming into the processor from external input devices such as keyboards,
mice, disks, and networks.
 In modern processors, this data is placed in memory before entering the processor. Input
handling is largely under the control of operating system software.
2. Output
 Output is data going from the processor to external output devices such as displays,
printers, disks, and networks.
 In modern processors, this data is placed in memory before leaving the processor. Output
handling is largely under the control of operating system software.
3. Memory
 Memory holds instructions and most of the data for currently executing programs.
 The rest of the data is held in programmable registers, which can only hold a limited
amount of data.
4. Control
 Control generates control signals that direct the operation of memory and the data path.
The control signals do the following.
 Tell memory to send or receive data.
 Tell the ALU what operation to perform.
 Route data between different parts of the data path.

5. Datapath
 The data path manipulates the data coming through the processor. It also provides a
small amount of temporary data storage.
 The data path consists of the following components.
 Programmable Registers - Small units of data storage that are directly visible to
assembly language programmers. They can be used like simple variables in a
high-level program.
 Program Counter (PC) - holds the address for fetching instructions.
 Multiplexers have control inputs coming from control. They are used for routing
data through the data path.
 Processing Elements - compute new data values from old data values. In simple
processors the major processing elements are grouped into an Arithmetic-Logic
Unit (ALU).
  Special-Purpose Registers - hold data that is needed for processor operation but
is not directly visible to assembly language programmers.

Processor Operation
 The processor executes a sequence of instructions that are located in memory.
 Execution of each instruction involves at least the first three of the following activities.
 The last four activities are required for some, but not all, instructions.
 The activities are approximately in time order.
 However, some of the activities can be overlapped in time.
 Instruction fetch
 Program counter (PC) update
 Instruction decode
 Source operand fetch
 Arithmetic-logic unit (ALU) operation
 Memory access
 Register write
In these activities
 The program counter (PC) hold the address of the next instruction.
 For a simple processor, the arithmetic-logic unit (ALU) performs all arithmetic and
logical operations.

 The organization of the data path can be determined from these activities.
 Where an activity requires selecting among different options depending on the
instruction, there will be a multiplexer that selects the appropriate option as directed by a
control signal.

2. Technology
 As per Moore’s Law, feature size shrinks by 30% every 2-3 years, resulting in an
increase in Transistor, Capacity, Performance, and reduce manufacturing cost.
 The following figure shows the technologies that have been used over time period, with
an estimate of the relative performance/unit cost for each technology.
 A transistor is simply on/off switch controlled by electricity.
 The Integrated circuit (IC) combined dozens to hundreds of transistors into a single chip.
 Memory-DRAM capacity increases twice per 2years and 64x size improvement in last
decade.
 Processor-Speed 2x per 1.5 years and 100x performance in last decade.
 Disk-Capacity -2x per year and 250x sixe in last decade.

Year Technology used in Relative Performance/Cost

computer
1951 Vacuum Tube 1
1965 Transistors 35
1975 Integrated Circuit 900
1995 VLSI Circuit 2,400,000
2005 ULSI Circuit 6,200,000,000
3. Performance
 Running a program on two different desktop computers, you’d say that the faster one is
the desktop computer that gets the job done first.
 If you were running a datacenter that had several servers running jobs submitted by many
users, you’d say that the faster computer was the one that completed the most jobs
during a day.

 As an individual computer user, you are interested in reducing response time and
Datacenter managers are often interested in increasing throughput or bandwidth
 Response time: the time between the start and completion of a task—also referred as
execution time.
 Throughput—the total amount of work done in a given time.
 Measuring Performance:
 The computer that performs the same amount of work in the least time is the fastest.
Program execution time is measured in seconds per program.
 CPU execution time or simply CPU time, which recognizes this distinction, is the
time the CPU spends computing for this task and does not include time spent waiting
for I/O or running other programs.
 CPU time can be further divided into the CPU time spent in the program, called user
CPU time, and the CPU time spent in the operating system performing tasks on behalf of
the program, called system CPU time.
 The term system performance to refer to elapsed time on an unloaded system and
CPU performance to refer to user CPU time.

 CPU Performance and Its Factors:

 CPU execution time for a program = CPU clock cycles for a program x Clock cycle
time
 Alternatively, because clock rate and clock cycle time are inverses,
 CPU execution time for a program = CPU clock cycles for a program
Clock rate
 This formula makes it clear that the hardware designer can improve performance by
reducing the number of clock cycles required for a program or the length of the clock
cycle.

 Instruction Performance:
 The performance equations above did not include any reference to the number of
instructions needed for the program.
 The execution time must depend on the number of instructions in a program. Here
execution time is that it equals the number of instructions executed multiplied by the
average time per instruction.
 Clock cycles required for a program can be written as

 CPU clock cycles = Instructions for a program x Average clock cycles per instruction
 The term clock cycles per instruction, which is the average number of clock cycles each
instruction takes to execute, is often abbreviated as CPI.
 CPI provides one way of comparing two different implementations of the same instruction set
architecture, since the number of instructions executed for a program will be the same.
 The Classic CPU Performance Equation:
 The basic performance equation in terms of instruction count (the number of instructions
executed by the program), CPI, and clock cycle time:
 CPU time = Instruction count X CPI X Clock cycle time or, since the clock rate is the inverse
of clock cycle time:
 CPU time = Instruction count X CPI
 Clock rate
 These formulas are particularly useful because they separate the three key factors that affect
performance.
Components of performance Units of Measure
CPU execution time for a program Seconds for the program
Instruction count Instructions executed for the
program
Clock cycles per instruction (CPI) Average number of clock cycles
per
Clock cycle time Seconds per clock cycle

 We can measure the CPU execution time by running the program, and the clock cycle time is
usually published as part of the documentation for a computer.
 The instruction count and CPI can be more difficult to obtain. Of course, if we know the
clock rate and CPU execution time, we need only one of the instruction count or the CPI to
determine the other.

4. Power wall
 The SPEC(Standard Performance Evaluation Corporation) states that performance of the
hottest chip grew by 52% per year from 1986 to 2002, and then grew only 20% in the
next three years (about 6% per year). This problem is now called “the Power Wall”.
 More transistors mean more power, thus more heat generated .The design goal for the
late 1990’s and early 2000’s was to drive the clock rate up. This was done by adding
more transistors to a smaller chip.
 Unfortunately, this increased the power dissipation (consumption) of the CPU chip
beyond the capacity of inexpensive cooling techniques.
 Dense chips that were literally “hot”; they radiated considerable thermal power and were
difficult to cool.
There are two solutions to the problem of the Power Wall.
1. The technique taken by IBM servers was to include sophisticated and costly(water
cooling system) cooling technologies.
2. The technique taken by commodity processor providers, such as Intel and AMD. They
have moved to a multicore design, in which the chips are cooled by simple fans and all–metal
heat radiators.
CPU chips with multiple processors per chip are called “multicore”.
The dynamic energydependsonthecapacitiveloadingofeachtransistorandthevoltageapplied:
  Frequency switched is a function of the clock rate. The capacitive load per transistor is a
function of both the number of transistors connected to an output (called the fanout) and
the technology, which determines the capacitance of both wires and transistors.
5. Uniprocessors to multiprocessors;
 The power wall has forced a dramatic change in the design of microprocessor.
 Increasing the clock speed of uniprocessor has reached saturation and cannot be
increased beyond a certain limit because of power consumption and heat dissipation
issues.
 As the physical size of chip decreased, while the no of transistors/chip increased, clock
speed increased, which boosted the heat dissipation across the chip to a dangerous level.
 Cooling and heat sink requirement issues were there.
 There were limitations in the use of silicon surface area and in reducing the sixe of
individual gates further.
 To gain performance within a single core, many techniques like pipelining, super
pipelined, super scalar architectures are used.
6. Instructions
 The instruction format of an instruction is usually depicted in a rectangular box
symbolizing the bits of the instruction as they appear in memory words or in a control
register.
 An instruction format defines the layout of the bits of an instruction, in terms of its
constituent parts.
 The bits of an instruction are divided into groups called fields.
 The most common fields found in instruction formats are:
 An operation code field that specifies the operation to be performed.
 An address field that designates a memory address or a processor register.
 A mode field that specifies the way the operand or the effective address is determined.
  Other the operation code field of an instruction is a group of bits that define various
processor operations, such as add, subtract, complement and shift.
 Address fields contain either a memory address field or a register address. Mode fields
offer a variety of ways in which an operand is chosen.
 There are mainly four types of instruction formats:
 Three address instructions
 Two address instructions
 One address instructions
 Zero address instructions

 Three address instructions

 Computers with three address instructions formats can use each address field to specify either a
processor register or a memory operand.
 The program in assembly language that evaluates X= (A+B)*(C+D) is shown below, together
with comments that explain the register transfer operation of each instruction.
Add R1, A, B R1M [A] + M [B]
Add R2, C, D R2M [C] + M [D]
MUL X, R1,R2 M [X]R1 + R2
 It is assumed that the computer has two processor registers, R1 and R2.
 The symbol M[A] denotes the operand at memory address symbolized by A.
 Advantages of the three address format are that results in short programs when evaluating
arithmetic expressions.
 The disadvantage is that the binary coded instructions require too many bits to specify three
addresses
 Two address instructions
 Two address instructions are the most common in commercial computers.
 Here again each address field can specify either a processor register or a memory word. The
program to evaluate X= (A+B)*(C+D) is as follows:

 The MOV instruction moves or transfers the operands to and from memory and processor
registers.
 The first symbol listed in an instruction is assumed to be both a source and the destination where
the result of the operation is transferred.
 One address instructions
 One address instructions use an implied accumulator (AC) register for all data manipulation.
 For multiplication and division there is a need for a second register.
 However, here we will neglect the second register and assume that the AC contains the result of
all operations.
 The program to evaluate X= (A+B)*(C+D) is
  All operations are done between the AC register and a memory operand.
 T is the address of a temporary memory location required for storing the intermediate result.
 Commercially available computers also use this type of instruction format.
 Zero address instructions
 A stack organized computer does not use an address field for the instructions ADD and MUL.
 The PUSH and POP instructions, however, need an address field to specify the operand that
communicates with the stack.
 The following program shows how X=(A+B)*(C+D) will be written for a stack organized
computer.(TOS stands for top of stack.)

 To evaluate arithmetic expressions in a stack computer, it is necessary to convert the expression

into reverse polish notation.
 The name “zero address” is given to this type of computer because of the absence of an address
field in computational instructions.

 In MIPS, this design compromise produces instructions that are 32 bits long. The governing
principle follows:
 MIPS instructions have three different formats:
1. R format - Arithmetic instructions
2. I format - Branch, transfer, and immediate instructions
3. J format - Jump instructions
7. Representing instructions
8. Logical operations
9. Control operations
10. Addressing and addressing modes
 Addressing modes is the ways that is used to identify the location of an operand in instruction.
 Each instruction needs to specify data on which the operation is to be performed.
 But the operand (data) may be in accumulator, general purpose register or at some specified
memory location.
 So the way that is used to identify the location of an operand which is specified in an instruction
is called Addressing modes.
 The addressing modes in computer architecture actually define how an operand is chosen to
execute an instruction. Assume operand size = 2 bytes.
 11. Stacks and queues

S.No Stack Queue

1 Objects are inserted and removed at the Objects are inserted and removed from different
same end. ends.
2 In stacks only one pointer is used. It In queues, two different pointers are used for
points to the top of the stack. front and rear ends.
3 Stacks follow Last In First Out (LIFO) Queues following First In First Out (FIFO)
order. order.
4 Stack operations are called push and Queue operations are called enqueue and
pop. dequeue.
5 Collection of dinner plates at a wedding People standing in a file to board a bus is an
reception is an example of stack. example of queue.