Modern Computer Architecture and Organization Second Edition, by Jim Ledin. Published by Packt Publishing.
The fundamental aspects of processor and memory architectures discussed in previous chapters enable the design of a complete and functional computer system. However, the performance of such a system would be poor compared to most modern processors without the addition of features to increase the speed of instruction execution.
Several performance-enhancing techniques are employed routinely in processor and system designs to achieve peak execution speed in real-world computer systems. These techniques do not alter what the processor does in terms of program execution and data processing; they just help get it done faster.
After completing this chapter, you will understand the value of multilevel cache memory in computer architectures and the benefits and challenges associated with instruction pipelining. You'll also understand the performance improvement resulting from simultaneous multithreading and the purpose and applications of single instruction, multiple data processing.
The following topics will be covered in this chapter:
- Cache memory
- Instruction pipelining
- Simultaneous multithreading
- SIMD processing