CSC303: Computer Organization and

Architecture

 TOPICS COVERED
 Course schedule
 Course objectives
 Course resources and textbooks
 Grading system
 Introduction

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 General information

Course :Computer Organization and Architecture

Instructors : Nyanga Bernard Y.; Tabo Delphine F.
Lecture time : Tuesday 7:00-9:00 &Friday 13:00-15:00
.
Online Resources:
https://www.bu.edu.eg/staff/abdelwahabalsammak3-
courses/10596/files;
http://www.eecs.harvard.edu/~dbrooks/cs146-spring2004/

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 Course Objective

 Describe the general organization and architecture of

computers.
 Identify computers’ major components and study their
functions.
 Introduce hardware design of modern computer
architectures.
 Learn assembly language programming.

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 Textbooks

Introduction to Computer Architecture and Organisation 2nd

Ed by Harold Lorin
Computer Organisation and Architecture by Morris Mano

REFERENCES (Web) www.freebookcentre.net

www.freetechbooks.com

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 Grading System

•Continuous Assessment (30%: two tests and/or projects/assignments)

and
• End-of Semester Examination (70%)
Course Objectives:
•The main objective of this course is to introduce the students to the
operations of a digital computer, Hardware components and their
basic
building block.
•Students will be introduced to the electronic components of the
different hardware components of a computer system and how they
are
programmed to function.

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Content Coverage
 What is a computer?

 a computer is a sophisticated electronic calculating machine

that:
 Accepts input information,
 Processes the information according to a list of internally
stored instructions and
 Produces the resulting output information.
 Functions performed by a computer are:
 Accepting information to be processed as input.
 Storing a list of instructions to process the information.
 Processing the information according to the list of
instructions.
 Providing the results of the processing as output.
 What are the functional units of a computer?

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 What is Computer Organization and
Architecture?
 It is the study of internal working, structuring and
implementation of A computer system.
 Architecture in Computer system Refers To the Externally
Visual attributes Of the system.
 Organization Of computer System results In realization Of
architectural Specifications of A computer system .

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 Overview

 Computer organization
 physical aspects of computer systems.
 E.g., circuit design, control signals, memory types.
 How does a computer work?
 Computer architecture
 Logical aspects of system as seen by the programmer.
 E.g., instruction sets, instruction formats, data types,
addressing modes.
 How do I design a computer?

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 Application Areas

 General-Purpose Laptop/Desktop
 Productivity, interactive graphics, video, audio
 Optimize price-performance
 Examples: Intel Pentium 4, AMD Athlon XP
 Embedded Computers
 PDAs, cell-phones, sensors => Price, Energy efficiency
 Examples: Intel XScale, StrongARM (SA-110)
 Game Machines, Network uPs => Price-Performance
 Examples: Sony Emotion Engine, IBM 750FX

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 Application Areas

 Commercial Servers
 Database, transaction processing, search engines
 Performance, Availability, Scalability
 Server downtime could cost a brokerage company more
than $6M/hour
 Examples: Sun Fire 15K, IBM p690, Google Cluster
 Scientific Applications
 Protein Folding, Weather Modeling, CompBio, Defense
 Floating-point arithmetic, Huge Memories
 Examples: IBM DeepBlue,
 BlueGene, Cray T3E, etc.

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 von Neumann Architecture /Harvard Architecture

 von Neumann Architecture

 Instructions and data mixed
 Used in modern computers
 Harvard Architecture
 Instructions and data separate
 Used in low-level cache memory design

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 Functional units of a computer
Input unit accepts Arithmetic and logic unit(ALU):
information: •Performs the desired
•Human operators, operations on the input
•Electromechanical devices (keyboard) information as determined
•Other computers by instructions in the memory

Memory Arithmetic
Input Instr1 & Logic
Instr2
Instr3
Data1
Output Data2 Control

I/O Stores Processor

information: Control unit coordinates
Output unit sends various actions
results of processing: •Instructions,
•Data •Input,
•To a monitor display, •Output
•To a printer •Processing

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 Information in a computer -- Instructions

 Instructions specify commands to:

 Transfer information within a computer (e.g., from memory to
ALU)
 Transfer of information between the computer and I/O devices
(e.g., from keyboard to computer, or computer to printer)
 Perform arithmetic and logic operations (e.g., Add two numbers,
Perform a logical AND).
 A sequence of instructions to perform a task is called a
program, which is stored in the memory.
 Processor fetches instructions that make up a program from
the memory and performs the operations stated in those
instructions.
 What do the instructions operate upon?

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 Information in a computer -- Data

 Data are the “operands” upon which instructions operate.

 Data could be:
 Numbers,
 Encoded characters.
 Data, in a broad sense means any digital information.
 Computers use data that is encoded as a string of binary
digits called bits.

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 Input unit
Binary information must be presented to a computer in a specific format. This
task is performed by the input unit:
- Interfaces with input devices.
- Accepts binary information from the input devices.
- Presents this binary information in a format expected by the computer.
- Transfers this information to the memory or processor.
Real world Computer

Memory

Keyboard
Audio input
Input Unit
……

Processor

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 Memory unit
 Memory unit stores instructions and data.
 Recall, data is represented as a series of bits.
 To store data, memory unit thus stores bits.
 Processor reads instructions and reads/writes data from/to
the memory during the execution of a program.
 In theory, instructions and data could be fetched one bit at a
time.
 In practice, a group of bits is fetched at a time.
 Group of bits stored or retrieved at a time is termed as “word”
 Number of bits in a word is termed as the “word length” of a
computer.
 In order to read/write to and from memory, a processor
should know where to look:
 “Address” is associated with each word location.

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 Memory unit (contd..)
 Processor reads/writes to/from memory based on the
memory address:
 Access any word location in a short and fixed amount of time
based on the address.
 Random Access Memory (RAM) provides fixed access time
independent of the location of the word.
 Access time is known as “Memory Access Time”.
 Memory and processor have to “communicate” with each
other in order to read/write information.
 In order to reduce “communication time”, a small amount of
RAM (known as Cache) is tightly coupled with the processor.
 Modern computers have three to four levels of RAM units with
different speeds and sizes:
 Fastest, smallest known as Cache
 Slowest, largest known as Main memory.

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 Memory unit (contd..)

 Primary storage of the computer consists of RAM units.

 Fastest, smallest unit is Cache.
 Slowest, largest unit is Main Memory.
 Primary storage is insufficient to store large amounts of
data and programs.
 Primary storage can be added, but it is expensive.
 Store large amounts of data on secondary storage devices:
 Magnetic disks and tapes,
 Optical disks (CD-ROMS).
 Access to the data stored in secondary storage in slower, but
take advantage of the fact that some information may be
accessed infrequently.
 Cost of a memory unit depends on its access time, lesser
access time implies higher cost.

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 Arithmetic and logic unit (ALU)

 Operations are executed in the Arithmetic and Logic Unit

(ALU).
 Arithmetic operations such as addition, subtraction.
 Logic operations such as comparison of numbers.
 In order to execute an instruction, operands need to be
brought into the ALU from the memory.
 Operands are stored in general purpose registers available in
the ALU.
 Access times of general purpose registers are faster than the
cache.
 Results of the operations are stored back in the memory or
retained in the processor for immediate use.

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 Output unit
•Computers represent information in a specific binary form. Output units:
- Interface with output devices.
- Accept processed results provided by the computer in specific binary form.
- Convert the information in binary form to a form understood by an
output device.

Computer Real world

Memory Printer
Graphics display
Speakers
……
Output Unit

Processor

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 Control unit

 Operation of a computer can be summarized as:

 Accepts information from the input units (Input unit).
 Stores the information (Memory).
 Processes the information (ALU).
 Provides processed results through the output units (Output
unit).
 Operations of Input unit, Memory, ALU and Output unit are
coordinated by Control unit.
 Instructions control “what” operations take place (e.g. data
transfer, processing).
 Control unit generates timing signals which determines
“when” a particular operation takes place.

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 How are the functional units connected?
•For a computer to achieve its operation, the functional units need to
communicate with each other.
•In order to communicate, they need to be connected.

Input Output Memory Processor

Bus

•Functional units may be connected by a group of parallel wires.

•The group of parallel wires is called a bus.
•Each wire in a bus can transfer one bit of information.
•The number of parallel wires in a bus is equal to the word length of
a computer

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Organization of cache and main memory

Main Cache
memory memory Processor

Bus

Why is the access time of the cache memory lesser than the
access time of the main memory?

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Computer Components: Top-Level View
Basic Operational Concepts
A Partial Program Execution Example
A Partial Program Execution Example
 Interrupt

 Normal execution of programs may be interrupted if some

device requires urgent servicing
 To deal with the situation immediately, the normal execution of the
current program must be interrupted

 Procedure of interrupt operation

 The device raises an interrupt signal
 The processor provides the requested service by executing an
appropriate interrupt-service routine
 The state of the processor is first saved before servicing the
interrupt
• Normally, the contents of the PC, the general registers, and some
control information are stored in memory
 When the interrupt-service routine is completed, the state of the
processor is restored so that the interrupted program may
continue
 Classes of Interrupts
 Program
 Generated by some condition that occurs as a result of an
instruction execution such as arithmetic overflow, division
by zero, attempt to execute an illegal machine instruction,
or reference outside a user’s allowed memory space
 Timer
 Generated by a timer within the processor. This allows the
operating system to perform certain functions on a regular
basis
 I/O
 Generated by an I/O controller, to signal normal completion
of an operation or to signal a variety of error conditions
 Hardware failure
 Generated by a failure such as power failure or memory
parity error
 Bus Structures

 A group of lines that serves a connecting path for several

devices is called a bus
 In addition to the lines that carry the data, the bus must
have lines for address and control purposes
 The simplest way to interconnect functional units is to use a
single bus, as shown below
 Drawbacks of the Single Bus Structure
 The devices connected to a bus vary widely in their speed of
operation
 Some devices are relatively slow, such as printer and
keyboard
 Some devices are considerably fast, such as optical disks
 Memory and processor units operate are the fastest parts of
a computer
 Efficient transfer mechanism thus is needed to cope with this
problem
 A common approach is to include buffer registers with the
devices to hold the information during transfers
 An another approach is to use two-bus structure and an
additional transfer mechanism
• A high-performance bus, a low-performance, and a bridge
for transferring the data between the two buses. ARMA
Bus belongs to this structure
 Software
 In order for a user to enter and run an application
program, the computer must already contain some system
software in its memory

 System software is a collection of programs that are

executed as needed to perform functions such as
 Receiving and interpreting user commands
 Running standard application programs such as word
processors, etc, or games
 Managing the storage and retrieval of files in
secondary storage devices
 Controlling I/O units to receive input information and
produce output results
 Software

 Translating programs from source form prepared by

the user into object form consisting of machine
instructions

 Linking and running user-written application programs

with existing standard library routines, such as
numerical computation packages

 System software is thus responsible for the

coordination of all activities in a computing system
 Operating System
 Operating system (OS)
 This is a large program, or actually a collection of routines,
that is used to control the sharing of and interaction among
various computer units as they perform application programs
 The OS routines perform the tasks required to assign computer
resource to individual application programs
 These tasks include assigning memory and magnetic disk
space to program and data files, moving data between
memory and disk units, and handling I/O operations
 In the following, a system with one processor, one disk, and one
printer is given to explain the basics of OS
 Assume that part of the program’s task involves reading a
data file from the disk into the memory, performing some
computation on the data, and printing the results
User Program and OS Routine Sharing
Multiprogramming or Multitasking
 Performance
 The speed with which a computer executes programs
is affected by the design of its hardware and its
machine language instructions

 Because programs are usually written in a high-level

language, performance is also affected by the
compiler that translates programs into machine
languages

 For best performance, the following factors must be

considered
 Compiler
 Instruction set
 Hardware design
 Performance
 Processor circuits are controlled by a timing signal
called a clock
 The clock defines regular time intervals, called clock cycles
 To execute a machine instruction, the processor
divides the action to be performed into a sequence of
basic steps, such that each step can be completed in
one clock cycle
 Let the length P of one clock cycle, its inverse is the
clock rate, R=1/P
 Basic performance equation
 T=(NxS)/R, where T is the processor time required to
execute a program, N is the number of instruction executions,
and S is the average number of basic steps needed to execute
one machine instruction
 Performance Improvement
 Pipelining and superscalar operation
 Pipelining: by overlapping the execution of successive
instructions
 Superscalar: different instructions are concurrently
executed with multiple instruction pipelines. This means that
multiple functional units are needed
 Clock rate improvement
 Improving the integrated-circuit technology makes
logic circuits faster, which reduces the time needed
to complete a basic step
 Performance Improvement

 Reducing amount of processing done in one basic

step also makes it possible to reduce the clock
period, P.
 However, if the actions that have to be performed
by an instruction remain the same, the number of
basic steps needed may increase
 Reduce the number of basic steps to execute
 Reduced instruction set computers (RISC) and complex
instruction set computers (CISC)
 Instruction Set Architecture

 “Instruction Set Architecture is the structure of a

computerthat a machine language programmer (or a
compiler) mustunderstand to write a correct (timing
independent) programfor that machine.” IBM, Introducing
the IBM 360 (1964)
 The ISA defines:
 Operations that the processor can execute
 Data Transfer mechanisms + how to access data
 Control Mechanisms (branch, jump, etc)
 “Contract” between programmer/compiler + HW

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Classifying ISAs

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 Stack

 Architectures with implicit “stack”

 Acts as source(s) and/or destination, TOS is implicit
 Push and Pop operations have 1 explicit operand
 Example: C = A + B
 Push A // S[++TOS] = Mem[A]
 Push B // S[++TOS] = Mem[B]
 Add // Tem1 = S[TOS--], Tem2 = S[TOS--] ,
S[++TOS] = Tem1 + Tem2
 Pop C // Mem[C] = S[TOS--]
 x86 FP uses stack (complicates pipelining)

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 Accumulator

 Architectures with one implicit register

 Acts as source and/or destination
 One other source explicit
 Example: C = A + B
 Load A // (Acc)umulator <= A
 Add B // Acc <= Acc + B
 Store C // C <= Acc
 Accumulator implicit, bottleneck?
 x86 uses accumulator concepts for integer

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 Register

 Most common approach

 Fast, temporary storage (small)
 Explicit operands (register IDs)
 Example: C = A + B
 Register-memory load/store
 Load R1, A Load R1, A
 Add R3, R1, B Load R2, B
 Store R3, C Add R3, R1, R2
 Store R3, C
 All RISC ISAs are load/store
 IBM 360, Intel x86, Moto 68K are register-memory

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 Common Addressing Modes

 Base/Displacement Load R4, 100(R1)

 Register Indirect Load R4, (R1)
 Indexed Load R4, (R1+R2)
 Direct Load R4, (1001)
 Memory Indirect Load R4, @(R3)
 Autoincrement Load R4, (R2)+
 Scaled Load R4, 100(R2)[R3]

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 What leads to a good/bad ISA?

 Ease of Implementation (Job of Architect/Designer)

 Does the ISA lead itself to efficient implementations?
 Ease of Programming (Job of Programmer/Compiler)
 Can the compiler use the ISA effectively?
 Future Compatibility
 ISAs may last 30+yrs
 Special Features, Address range, etc. need to be thought
out

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 Implementation Concerns

 Simple Decoding (fixed length)

 Compactness (variable length)
 Simple Instructions (no load/update)
 Things that get microcoded these days
 Deterministic Latencies are key!
 Instructions with multiple exceptions are difficult
 More/Less registers?
 Slower register files, decoding, better compilers
 Condition codes/Flags (scheduling!)

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 ISA Compatibility

“In Computer Architecture, no good idea ever goes unpunished.”

Marty Hopkins, IBM Fellow
 Never abandon existing code base
 Extremely difficult to introduce a new ISA
 Alpha failed, IA64 is struggling, best solution may not
win
 x86 most popular, is the least liked!
 Hard to think ahead, but…
 ISA tweak may buy 5-10% today
 10 years later it may buy nothing, but must be
implemented
• Register windows, delay branches

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 CISC vs. RISC

 Debate raged from early 80s through 90s

 Now it is fairly irrelevant
 Despite this Intel (x86 => Itanium) and DEC/Compaq (VAX =>
Alpha) have tried to switch
 Research in the late 70s/early 80s led to RISC
 IBM 801 -- John Cocke – mid 70s
 Berkeley RISC-1 (Patterson)
 Stanford MIPS (Hennessy)

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 RISC vs. CISC Arguments

 • RISC
 Simple Implementation
• Load/store, fixed-format 32-bit instructions,
efficient pipelines
 Lower CPI
 Compilers do a lot of the hard work
• MIPS = Microprocessor without Interlocked Pipelined
Stages
 CISC
 Simple Compilers (assists hand-coding, many addressing
modes, many instructions)
 Code Density

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 After the dust settled

 Turns out it doesn’t matter much

 Can decode CISC instructions into internal “micro-ISA”
 This takes a couple of extra cycles (PLA implementation)
and a few hundred thousand transistors
 In 20 stage pipelines, 55M tx processors this is minimal
 Pentium 4 caches these micro-Ops
 Actually may have some advantages
 External ISA for compatibility, internal ISA can be
tweaked each generation (Transmeta)

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