Data Addressing Modes

• MOV AX,BX; This instruction transfers the word contents of the source-
register(BX) into the destination register(AX).
• The source never changes, but the destination always changes.
• This instruction always copies the source-data into the destination.
• This instruction never actually picks up the data and moves it.
• Memory-to-memory transfers are not allowed by any instruction except for the
MOVS instruction.
• The source & destination are called operands (ex: contents of AX, BX, LOC)
• An opcode(operation code) tells microprocessor which operation to perform
(Ex : ADD, MOV, SUB).
8086 Data Addressing Modes
Addressing Modes
Register Addressing
• This transfers a copy of a byte(or word) from the source-register or
contents of a memory-location to the destination-register or memory-
location.
• Example: MOV CX, DX; This instruction copies word-sized contents
of register DX into register CX.
Immediate Addressing
• This transfers an immediate byte/word of source-data into the
destination-register or memory-location.
• For example, MOV AL, 22H ;This instruction copies a byte-sized 22H
into register AL.
Direct Addressing
• This moves a byte(or word) between a memory-location and a register.
• For example, MOV CX, LIST ;This instruction copies the word-sized
contents of memory-location LIST into register CX.
• Memory-to-memory transfers are not allowed by any instruction except
for the MOVS instruction.
Register Indirect Addressing
• This transfers a byte between a register and a memory-location
addressed by base-register.
• The index & base registers are BP, BX, DI and SI.
• For example, MOV [BP], DL ;This instruction copies the byte-sized
contents of register DL into the memory location addressed by BP.
Base Plus Index Addressing
• This transfers a byte between a register and the memory-location
addressed by a base-register (BP or BX) plus an index-register (DI or SI).
• For example, MOV [BX+DI], CL ;this instruction copies the byte-sized
contents of register CL into the memory location addressed by BX plus
DI.
Register Relative Addressing
• This moves byte between a register and memory-location addressed by
an index-or base-register plus a displacement.
• For example, MOV AX, [BX+4] ;This instruction loads AX from
memory-location addressed by BX+4.
Base-Relative-Plus Index Addressing
• This transfers a byte between a register and the memory-location
addressed by a base- and an index-register plus a displacement.
• For example, MOV AX,[BX+DI+4] ;This instruction loads AX
from memory-location addressed by BX+DI+4.
Scaled Index Addressing
• The second register of a pair of registers is modified by the scale
factor of 2*, 4* to generate the operand memory address.
• For example, MOV EDX, [EAX+4*EBX] ;This instruction loads
EDX from memory-location addressed by EAX plus four times EBX.
• Scaling allows access to word(2*), doubleword(4*) memory array-
data.
RIP Relative Addressing
• This mode allows access to any location in the memory by adding a
32-bit displacement to the 64-bit contents of the 64-bit instruction
pointer.
Register Addressing
• The microprocessor contains the following 8-bit registers used with
register addressing: AH, AL, BH, BL, CH, CL, DH and DL.
• Also present the following 16-bit registers: AX, BX, CX, DX, SP, BP,
SI and DI.
• Some MOV instructions and the PUSH/POP instructions also use the
16-bit segment registers: CS, ES, DS, SS, FS and GS.
• Any instruction should use registers that are of same size {(AL,CL),
(AX,CX)}. Never mix an 8-bit register with a 16-bit register because this
is not allowed by the microprocessor and results in an error. A few
instructions such as SHL DX, CL are exceptions to this rule.
• None of the MOV instructions affect the flag bits. The flag bits are
normally modified by arithmetic or logic instructions (ADD, SUB, INC)
• A segment-to-segment register MOV instruction is not allowed.
• The contents of the destination-register (or memory-location) change
for all instructions except the CMP and TEST instructions.
Examples of register-addressed instructions
The effect of executing the MOV BX,CX instruction at the
point just before the BX register changes.
Note : That only the rightmost 16bits of register EBX
change
Examples :
MOV AX, BX ; copy contents of BX into AX
MOV CL, DH ; copy contents of DH into CL
MOV AX, CS ; copy CS into DS (2 steps)
MOV DS, AX ;
MOV CS, AX ; copy AX into CS (causes problem)
Immediate Addressing
• The term ‘immediate’ implies that the data immediately follow the
opcode in the memory.
• Immediate-data are constant-data, whereas data transferred from a
register( or memory-location) are variable-data.
• This addressing operates upon a byte or word of data.
• MOV immediate instruction transfers a copy of immediate-data
into a register or a memory-location.
• The symbolic assembler shows immediate-data in many ways.
The letter H appends hexadecimal data.
The letter B appends binary data.
Examples of immediate addressing using the MOV
instruction
 Operation of the MOV EAX,13456H instruction.
 This instruction copies immediate data(13456) into EAX
Each statement in an assembly language program consists of 4 parts:
1) Label is used to store a symbolic-name for the memory-location that it
represents. A label may be of any length from 1 to 35 characters.
2) Opcode-field is used to hold the instruction or opcode
3) Operand-field contains information used by the opcode
4) Comment-field contains a comment about an instruction or a group of
instructions. A comment always begins with a semicolon (;)
Direct Data Addressing
• There are 2 basic forms of direct data addressing:
1) Direct addressing applies to a MOV between a memory-location
and the AL or AX (accumulator)
2) Displacement addressing applies to almost any instruction in the
instruction set
• In either case, the effective-address(EA) is formed by adding the
displacement to the default data-segment address.
(ex: if DS=1000 and BP=200, then
EA=DS*10+BP=1000*10+200=10200H)
Direct Addressing
• Direct addressing with a MOV instruction transfers data between a memory-
location, located within the data segment and the AL or AX register.
• A MOV instruction is usually a 3-byte long instruction.
• The MOV AL,DATA ;This instruction loads AL from the memory-location
DATA(1234H)
• Memory location ‘DATA’ is a symbolic memory location, while the 1234H is
the actual hexadecimal location.
• MOV AL, [1234H] ;This instruction transfers a copy of the byte-sized
contents of memory-location 11234H into AL.
The effective address is formed by adding 1234H(offset address) and
10000H(data segment address of 1000H ties 10H) in a system operating in the
real mode.
The operation of the MOV AL,[1234H] instruction when DS=1000H

Direct addressed instructions using AX and AL

Register Indirect Addressing
• This transfers a byte between a register and a memory-
location addressed by base-register.
• The Index- and Base-Registers are BP, BX, DI and SI.
• The [] symbols denote indirect addressing.
• If BP addresses memory, the stack-segment is used by
default.
If BX, DI or SI addresses memory, the data-segment is
used by default.
The operation of the MOV AX,[BX] instruction when BX=1000H and DS=0100H.
Examples of register indirect addressing
• In some cases, indirect addressing requires specifying the size of
the data. The size is specified by the special assembler directive
BYTE PTR, WORD PTR. These directives indicate the size of the
memory data addressed by the memory pointer(PTR).
• For example, the MOV AL,[DI] instruction is clearly a byte-sized
move instruction, but the MOV [DI],10H instruction is ambiguous.
Does the MOV [DI],10H instruction address a byte, word sized
memory location?
The assembler can’t determine the size of the 10H. The instruction
MOV BYTE PTR[DI],10H clearly designates the location addressed
by DI as a byte-sized memory location.
Base Plus Index Addressing
• This addressing is similar to indirect addressing because it
indirectly addresses memory-data.
• This uses one base-register(BP or BX) & one index-register(DI or
SI) to indirectly address-memory.
• The base-register often holds the beginning location of a memory-
array, whereas Index-register holds the relative position of an
element in the array.
Examples of base-plus-index addressing
An example showing how the base-plus-index addressing mode functions for
the MOV DX,[BX+DI instruction]. Memory address 02010H is accessed
because DS=0100H, BX=100H and DI=0010H
An example of the base-plus-index addressing mode. Here an element(DI) of
an ARRAY(BX) is addressed.
Register Relative Addressing
• This moves byte/word between a register and the
memory-location addressed by an index- or base- register
plus a displacement (BP, BX, DI or SI).
Examples of register relative addressing
The operation of the MOV AX,[BX+1000H] instruction when BX=0100H and
DS=0200H
Register relative addressing used to address an element of ARRAY. The
displacement addresses the start of ARRAY and DI accesses an element
Base Relative Plus Index Addressing
• This transfers a byte between a register and the
memory-location addressed by a base-and an index-
register plus a displacement.
• This often addresses a t2-dimensional array of
memory-data.
Example base relative-plus-index instructions
An example of base relative-plus-index addressing using a MOV AX,
[BX+SI+100H] instruction. Note DS=1000H.
Program Memory-Addressing Modes
• This mode(used with the JMP and CALL instructions) consists
of 3 distinct forms: direct, relative and indirect.
Direct Program Memory Addressing
• Many early microprocessors used this type of addressing for all
jumps and calls.
• This is also used in high-level languages such as the BASIC
language (GOTO instructions).
• The instructions store the address with the opcode.
• An inter-segment jump is a jump to any memory location within
the entire memory system.
• The direct jump is often called a far jump because it can jump
to any memory location for the next instruction.
• In the real-mode, a far jump accesses any location within the
first 1Mbyte of memory by changing both CS and IP.
The 5-byte machine language version of a JMP[10000H] instruction
A JMP[2] instruction . This instruction skips over the 2-bytes of memory that
follows the JMP instruction
Relative Program Memory Addressing
• The term relative means "relative to the instruction pointer(IP)".
• A 1-byte displacement is used in short jumps and
a 2-byte displacement is used with near jumps and calls.
• An intra-segment jump is a jump anywhere within the current
code segment.
Examples of indirect program memory addressing
Indirect Program Memory Addressing
• If a 16-bit register holds the address of a JMP instruction, the
jump is near. For example, if the BX register contains 1000H
and a JMP BX instruction executes, the microprocessor jumps to
offset address 1000H in the current code segment.
• If a relative register holds the address, the jump is also
considered to be an indirect jump. For example, JMP[BX] refers
to the memory location within the data segment at the offset
address contained in BX. At this offset address is a 16-bit
number that is used as the offset address in the intra-segment
jump. This type of jumps is called an indirect-indirect or double-
indirect jump.
Stack Memory Addressing Modes
• The stack holds data temporarily and stores the return-addresses
used by procedures.
• The stack-memory is an LIFO memory.
• Data are placed onto the stack with a PUSH instruction and
removed with a POP instruction.
• CALL instruction also uses the stack to hold the return-address
for procedures.
(RET instruction is used to remove the return address from the
stack).
• The stack-memory is maintained by 2 registers: i) stack-
pointer(SP) & 2) stack segment(SS).
• Whenever a data-word is pushed onto the stack,
The high-order 8 bits are placed in the location addressed by SP-1
The low-order 8 bits are placed in the location addressed by SP-2.
The SP is then decremented by 2.
The SP register always points to an area-of-memory located
within the stack-segment.
• In real mode, the SP register adds to SS*10H to form the stack
memory-address
• Whenever data are popped from the stack,
The low-order 8 bits are removed from the location addressed by
SP.
The high-order 8 bits are removed from the location addressed
by SP+1.
The SP register is then incremented by 2.
• In 8086, PUSH & POP store or retrieve words of data but never
bytes
• The PUSHA and POPA instructions either push or pop all the
registers except segment-registers onto the stack.
a)PUSH BX places the contents of BX into the stack
b)POP CX removes data from the stack and places
them into CX.