An Investigation Into the Design Costs of a Single Chip Multigauge Machine

Abstract

Multigauge computers can operate either with their full datapath width or with the datapath split into separate narrower width machines. Such a concept has been previously shown to provide parallelism when the data values are small. This paper reports on the costs of gauge-shiftable computers. Specifically a single chip microprocessor, the 32-bit Quarter Horse machine, is redesigned to be gauge shiftable under software control to two 16-bit microprocessors. A complete accounting of the effects of gauge shifting on computer architecture is thus realized. Care is taken to identify the effects on the design of SIMD and MIMD executions. The general costs of gauge shifting for other implementation strategies are also identified.

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Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
Jun 01, 1986
Accession Number
ADA197777

Entities

People

  • Chyan Yang
  • Lawrence H Snyder

Organizations

  • University of Washington

Tags

Communities of Interest

  • Energy and Power Technologies

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Addressing
  • Case Studies
  • Computations
  • Computer Architecture
  • Computer Science
  • Computers
  • Computing System Architectures
  • Data Processing
  • Information Systems
  • Instruction Set Architecture
  • Instructions
  • Microcode
  • Microprocessors
  • Personality
  • Splitting
  • Switches
  • Two Dimensional

Readers

  • Integrated Circuit Design and Technology.
  • Mathematics or Statistics
  • Parallel and Distributed Computing.