Re: Beyond binary compatibility

Message-ID	<4DF39845.1090402@SPAM.comp-arch.net> (permalink)
Date	2011-06-11 09:31 -0700
From	"Andy \"Krazy\" Glew" <andy@SPAM.comp-arch.net>
Organization	comp-arch.net
Newsgroups	comp.arch
Subject	Re: Beyond binary compatibility
References	<cac3b264-37f3-4f29-881d-7a37c8f90d2f@glegroupsg2000goo.googlegroups.com> <bddf6354-9495-4752-9344-34f3651e92c3@q30g2000vbs.googlegroups.com> <fa0f4d0e-af19-4a3d-9bc3-f76aae6c9666@d1g2000yqm.googlegroups.com> <e9bc9a89-8c2d-4fad-b338-e1f376a0a88a@ct4g2000vbb.googlegroups.com> <1f86ba2d-52b5-4999-a5b2-0ccbc1b5ed60@k13g2000vbv.googlegroups.com>

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On 6/7/2011 3:02 PM, Paul A. Clayton wrote:
> On Jun 7, 11:22 am, MitchAlsup<MitchAl...@aol.com>  wrote:
>> On Jun 7, 2:05 am, "Paul A. Clayton"<paaronclay...@gmail.com>  wrote:
>>
>>> With respect to microcode, how much of the microcode is
>>> merely instruction ROM and how much uses specialized state
>>> machines (in the front-end)?
>>
>> Back in the early days of Opteron with 3K microcode 'words' about 1/2
>> was used for power on initialization and power on checks and never
>> used again. The Virtual machine Opterons have 4K microcode words and
>> about 1/3 of it ends up "used once".
>
> So there are no front-end state machines for generating
> microcode?  (It seemed like something like FXSAVE might use
> a state machine to iterate through the register names.)

No. There are no front end state machines.  Possibly just a microcode 
loop counter, but  that is supporting generic microcode.

I advocate state machine support for REP MOVS, etc., but that requires 
information from execution - the loop count - so it is not purely a 
front end state machine.

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Re: Beyond binary compatibility "Paul A. Clayton" <paaronclayton@gmail.com> - 2011-05-19 12:54 -0700
  Re: Beyond binary compatibility timcaffrey@aol.com (Tim McCaffrey) - 2011-05-19 21:06 +0000
  Re: Beyond binary compatibility "Ken Hagan" <k.hagan@thermoteknix.com> - 2011-05-20 14:12 +0100
    Re: Beyond binary compatibility "Paul A. Clayton" <paaronclayton@gmail.com> - 2011-06-06 23:32 -0700
      Re: Beyond binary compatibility MitchAlsup <MitchAlsup@aol.com> - 2011-06-07 08:31 -0700
        Re: Beyond binary compatibility "Paul A. Clayton" <paaronclayton@gmail.com> - 2011-06-07 14:58 -0700
      Re: Beyond binary compatibility "Ken Hagan" <k.hagan@thermoteknix.com> - 2011-06-08 10:05 +0100
        Re: Beyond binary compatibility torbenm@diku.dk (Torben Ægidius Mogensen) - 2011-06-10 16:00 +0200
  Re: Beyond binary compatibility torbenm@diku.dk (Torben Ægidius Mogensen) - 2011-05-23 10:31 +0200
  Re: Beyond binary compatibility Morten Reistad <first@last.name> - 2011-05-29 10:06 +0200
    Re: Beyond binary compatibility George Neuner <gneuner2@comcast.net> - 2011-05-31 12:41 -0400
  Re: Beyond binary compatibility MitchAlsup <MitchAlsup@aol.com> - 2011-05-29 13:20 -0700
    Re: Beyond binary compatibility "Paul A. Clayton" <paaronclayton@gmail.com> - 2011-06-07 00:05 -0700
      Re: Beyond binary compatibility MitchAlsup <MitchAlsup@aol.com> - 2011-06-07 08:22 -0700
        Re: Beyond binary compatibility "Paul A. Clayton" <paaronclayton@gmail.com> - 2011-06-07 15:02 -0700
          Re: Beyond binary compatibility MitchAlsup <MitchAlsup@aol.com> - 2011-06-08 08:41 -0700
          Re: Beyond binary compatibility "Andy \"Krazy\" Glew" <andy@SPAM.comp-arch.net> - 2011-06-11 09:31 -0700

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