Instruction Sets:

Characteristics and Functions

B.VISHNU VARDHAN
 What is an Instruction
Set?
• The complete collection of
instructions that are understood by a
CPU
• Machine Code
• Binary
• Usually represented by assembly
codes

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 Elements of an Instruction

• Operation code (Op code)

• Source Operand reference
• Result Operand reference
• Next Instruction Reference

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 Where have all the
Operands Gone?

• Main memory (or virtual memory or

cache)
• CPU register
• I/O device

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Instruction Cycle State Diagram

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 Instruction Representation
• In machine code each instruction has
a unique bit pattern
• For human consumption a symbolic
representation is used
– e.g. ADD, SUB, LOAD
• Operands can also be represented in
this way
– ADD A,B

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 Simple Instruction
Format

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 Instruction Types

• Data processing
• Data storage (main memory)
• Data movement (I/O)
• Program flow control

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 Instruction Types
• Arithmetic and logic instructions
– Computational capability
• Memory Instruction
– Moving data between memory and registers
• I/O instructions
– Data (memory) and results (user)
• Test and Branch instruction
– Test the status decision making

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Number of Addresses (a)

• 3 addresses
– Operand 1, Operand 2, Result
– a = b + c;
– May be a forth - next instruction
(usually implicit)
– Not common
– Needs very long words to hold
everything

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 Three Address instruction

• SUB Y,A,B YA-B

• MPY T,D,E TD*E
• ADD T,T,C TT+C
• DIV Y,Y,T YY/T

• PROGRAM TO EXECUTE
• Y=(A-B)/(C+D*E)
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Number of Addresses (b)

• 2 addresses
– One address doubles as operand and
result
–a=a+b
– Reduces length of instruction
– Requires some extra work
• Temporary storage to hold some results

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 TWO ADDRESS
• MOVE Y,A YA
• SUB Y,B YB
• MOVE T,D T D
• MPY T,E T T*E
• ADD T,C T T+C
• DIV Y,T Y Y/T

• PROGRAM TO EXECUTE
• Y=(A-B)/(C+D*E)

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Number of Addresses (c)

• 1 address
– Implicit second address
– Usually a register (accumulator)
– Common on early machines

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 1 ADDRESS FORMAT
• Load D ACD
• MPY E AC AC*E
• ADD C ACAC+C
• STOR Y YAC
• LOAD A ACA
• SUB B ACAC-B
• DIV Y ACAC/Y
• STOR Y YAC
• PROGRAM TO EXECUTE
• Y=(A-B)/(C+D*E)

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Number of Addresses (d)

• 0 (zero) addresses
– All addresses implicit
– Uses a stack
– e.g. push a
– push b
– add
– pop c
c=a+b
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 How Many Addresses
• More addresses
– More complex instructions
– More registers
• Inter-register operations are quicker
– Fewer instructions per program
• Fewer addresses
– Less complex instructions
– More instructions per program
– Faster fetch/execution of instructions

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 Design Decisions (1)
• Operation repertoire
– How many ops?
– What can they do?
– How complex are they?
• Data types
• Instruction formats
– Length of op code field
– Number of addresses

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 Design Decisions (2)

• Registers
– Number of CPU registers available
– Which operations can be performed on
which registers?
• Addressing modes

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 Types of Operand
• Addresses
• Numbers
– Integer/floating point
• Characters
– ASCII etc.
• Logical Data
– Bits or flags
• (Aside: Is there any difference between numbers
and characters?
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 Pentium Data Types
• 8 bit Byte
• 16 bit word
• 32 bit double word
• 64 bit quad word
• Addressing is by 8 bit unit
• A 32 bit double word is read at
addresses divisible by 4
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Pentium Numeric Data
Formats

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 PowerPC Data Types
• 8 (byte), 16 (halfword), 32 (word) and 64
(doubleword) length data types
• Some instructions need operand aligned on 32 bit
boundary
• Can be big- or little-endian
• Fixed point processor recognises:
– Unsigned byte, unsigned halfword, signed
halfword, unsigned word, signed word, unsigned
doubleword, byte string (<128 bytes)
• Floating point
– IEEE 754
– Single or double precision

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 Types of Operation

• Data Transfer
• Arithmetic
• Logical
• Conversion
• I/O
• System Control
• Transfer of Control
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 Data Transfer
• Specify
– Source
– Destination
– Amount of data
• May be different instructions for
different movements
– e.g. IBM 370
• Or one instruction and different
addresses
– e.g. VAX
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 Arithmetic
• Add, Subtract, Multiply, Divide
• Signed Integer
• Floating point ?
• May include
– Increment (a++)
– Decrement (a--)
– Negate (-a)

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 Shift and Rotate
Operations

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 Logical
• Bitwise operations
• AND, OR, NOT

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 Conversion

• E.g. Binary to Decimal

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 Input/Output
• May be specific instructions
• May be done using data movement
instructions (memory mapped)
• May be done by a separate controller
(DMA)

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 Systems Control
• Privileged instructions
• CPU needs to be in specific state
Kernel mode
• For operating systems use

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 Transfer of Control
• Branch
– e.g. branch to x if result is zero
• Skip
– e.g. increment and skip if zero
– ISZ Register1
– Branch xxxx
– ADD A
• Subroutine call
– interrupt call
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 Branch Instruction

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Nested Procedure Calls

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 Use of Stack

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 Stack Frame Growth
Using Sample Procedures
P and Q

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 Byte Order
(A portion of chips?)
• What order do we read numbers that
occupy more than one byte
• e.g. (numbers in hex to make it easy
to read)
• 12345678 can be stored in 4x8bit
locations as follows

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 Byte Order (example)
• Address Value (1) Value(2)
• 184 12 78
• 185 34 56
• 186 56 34
• 186 78 12

• i.e. read top down or bottom up?

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 Byte Order Names
• The problem is called Endian
• The system on the left has the least
significant byte in the lowest
address
• This is called big-endian
• The system on the right has the
least significant byte in the highest
address
• This is called little-endian
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Alternative View of Memory Map

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Computer Organization
and Architecture

Addressing Modes and

Formats
 Addressing Modes
• Immediate
• Direct
• Indirect
• Register
• Register Indirect
• Displacement (Indexed)
• Stack
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 Immediate Addressing
• Operand is part of instruction
• Operand = address field
• e.g. ADD 5
– Add 5 to contents of accumulator
– 5 is operand
• No memory reference to fetch data
• Fast
• Limited range
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 Immediate Addressing
Diagram
Instruction
Opcode Operand

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 Direct Addressing
• Address field contains address of operand
• Effective address (EA) = address field (A)
• e.g. ADD A
– Add contents of cell A to accumulator
– Look in memory at address A for
operand
• Single memory reference to access data
• No additional calculations to work out
effective address
• Limited address space
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Direct Addressing Diagram

Instruction
Opcode Address A
Memory

Operand

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 Indirect Addressing (1)
• Memory cell pointed to by address
field contains the address of (pointer
to) the operand
• EA = (A)
– Look in A, find address (A) and look
there for operand
• e.g. ADD (A)
– Add contents of cell pointed to by
contents of A to accumulator

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 Indirect Addressing (2)
• Large address space
• 2n where n = word length
• May be nested, multilevel, cascaded
– e.g. EA = (((A)))

• Multiple memory accesses to find

operand
• Hence slower

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 Indirect Addressing Diagram
Instruction
Opcode Address A
Memory

Pointer to operand

Operand

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 Register Addressing (1)

• Operand is held in register named in

address filed
• EA = R
• Limited number of registers
• Very small address field needed
– Shorter instructions
– Faster instruction fetch

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 Register Addressing (2)
• No memory access
• Very fast execution
• Very limited address space
• Multiple registers helps performance
– Requires good assembly programming or
compiler writing
– N.B. C programming
• register int a;
• c.f. Direct addressing
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 Register Addressing Diagram

Instruction
Opcode Register Address R
Registers

Operand

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Register Indirect Addressing

• indirect addressing
• EA = (R)
• Operand is in memory cell pointed to
by contents of register R
• Large address space (2n)
• One fewer memory access than
indirect addressing

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Register Indirect Addressing
Diagram
Instruction
Opcode Register Address R
Memory

Registers

Pointer to Operand Operand

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Displacement Addressing

• EA = A + (R)
• Address field hold two values
– A = base value
– R = register that holds displacement
– or vice versa

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Displacement Addressing Diagram

Instruction
Opcode Register R Address A
Memory

Registers

Pointer to Operand + Operand

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 Relative Addressing
• A version of displacement addressing
• R = Program counter, PC
• EA = A + (PC)
• get operand from A cells from
current location pointed to by PC
• locality of reference & cache usage

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 Base-Register
Addressing
• A holds displacement
• R holds pointer to base address
• R may be explicit or implicit

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 Indexed Addressing
• A = base
• R = displacement
• EA = A + R
• Good for accessing arrays
– EA = A + R
– R++

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 Stack Addressing
• Operand is (implicitly) on top of
stack
• e.g.
– ADD
– Pop top two items from stack
and add

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 Pentium Addressing Modes
• Virtual or effective address is offset into segment
– Starting address plus offset gives linear address
– This goes through page translation if paging enabled
• 12 addressing modes available
– Immediate
– Register operand
– Displacement
– Base
– Base with displacement
– Scaled index with displacement
– Base with index and displacement
– Base scaled index with displacement
– Relative
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 Instruction Formats

• Layout of bits in an instruction

• Includes opcode
• Includes (implicit or explicit)
operand(s)
• Usually more than one instruction
format in an instruction set

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 Instruction Length
• Affected by and affects:
– Memory size
– Memory organization
– Bus structure
– CPU complexity
– CPU speed
• Trade off between powerful
instruction repertoire and saving
space
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 Allocation of Bits

• Number of addressing modes

• Number of operands
• Register versus memory
• Number of register sets
• Address range
• Address granularity

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Pentium Instruction Format

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