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:
Jul. 27, 1999
Filed:
Mar. 19, 1997
Thomas W Lynch, Austin, TX (US);
Advanced Micro Devices, Inc., Sunnyvale, CA (US);
Abstract
A pipeline conveys a control word and a steering word with each instruction. The control word specifies the control signals for the instruction at each pipeline stage. The steering word specifies the routing of the instruction through the pipeline stages. Many pipeline modifications may be made by modifying the control words and steering words corresponding to the instructions. According to one embodiment, the execution pipeline within the microprocessor employs the control word/steering word method of pipeline control. Certain instructions do not perform any multiplication operations, and so may bypass the multiply pipeline stage or stages. Similarly, other instructions do not perform addition operations and may bypass the adder pipeline stage or stages. Still further, data movement and control update type instructions may bypass the pipeline all together and move directly to the result queue in the FPU. Additional instructions may be implemented in many cases by adding a control word and steering word for the instructions into the control word/steering word generation. Additional instructions may be implemented in this manner if the hardware within the pipeline can be used to implement the instruction.