The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Mar. 09, 1999
Filed:
Mar. 25, 1996
Timothy Alan Elliott, Austin, TX (US);
Robert Thaddeus Golla, Plano, TX (US);
Christopher Hans Olson, Austin, TX (US);
Terence Matthew Potter, Austin, TX (US);
International Business Machines Corporation, Armonk, NY (US);
Abstract
A method and system for an infinite precision split multiply and add operation which has increased speed. The method and system for providing a split multiply and add of a plurality of operands include a multiplier and an adder means. The multiplier multiplies a first portion of the plurality of operands, thereby providing a product. The adder, which combines the remaining operands and the product, comprise at least one pair of data paths. Each pair of data paths comprises a first data path and a second data path. The first data path comprises a first aligner, a first adder, and a first normalizer capable of shifting a mantissa by a substantially fewer number digits than the aligner. The second data path comprises a second aligner, a second adder, and a second normalizer capable of shifting a mantissa by a substantially larger number of digits than the aligner. Accordingly, the present invention includes split multiply and add data paths which, individually, are faster than a fused multiply and add. In addition, the split multiply and add data paths can preserve the appearance of infinite precision. Consequently, overall system performance is increased.