Book Image

Modern Computer Architecture and Organization

By : Jim Ledin
Book Image

Modern Computer Architecture and Organization

By: Jim Ledin

Overview of this book

Are you a software developer, systems designer, or computer architecture student looking for a methodical introduction to digital device architectures but overwhelmed by their complexity? This book will help you to learn how modern computer systems work, from the lowest level of transistor switching to the macro view of collaborating multiprocessor servers. You'll gain unique insights into the internal behavior of processors that execute the code developed in high-level languages and enable you to design more efficient and scalable software systems. The book will teach you the fundamentals of computer systems including transistors, logic gates, sequential logic, and instruction operations. You will learn details of modern processor architectures and instruction sets including x86, x64, ARM, and RISC-V. You will see how to implement a RISC-V processor in a low-cost FPGA board and how to write a quantum computing program and run it on an actual quantum computer. By the end of this book, you will have a thorough understanding of modern processor and computer architectures and the future directions these architectures are likely to take.
Table of Contents (20 chapters)
1
Section 1: Fundamentals of Computer Architecture
8
Section 2: Processor Architectures and Instruction Sets
14
Section 3: Applications of Computer Architecture

Input/output operations

The goal of the I/O portion of a processor architecture is to efficiently transfer data between external peripheral devices and system memory. Input operations transfer data from the external world into memory and output operations send data from memory to an outside destination.

The format of the data on the external side of the I/O interface varies widely. Here are some examples of the external representations of computer I/O data:

  • Signals on a video cable connected to a monitor
  • Voltage fluctuations on the wires in an Ethernet cable
  • Magnetic patterns on the surface of a disk
  • Sound waves produced by computer speakers

Regardless of the form the data takes when it is outside the computer, the connection of any I/O device with the processor must comply with the processor's I/O architecture, and the I/O device must be compatible with any other I/O devices that happen to be present in the computer system.

The processor uses...