Chapter 2

Machine Instructions
and Addressing Modes
 Machine instruction
characteristics
• Instruction Sets: The complete collection of
machine or computer instructions that are
executed (understood) by a CPU.
– Determines the operation of the CPU.
– Usually represented by assembly codes
 Elements Of a Machine Instruction
• Information of each instruction required by the CPU
for execution, and are specified by binary code:
 Operation Code (Op-code): specifies the operation to
be performed. Ex. ADD, IN, MOV
 Source Operand Reference: one or more source
operands. i.e. inputs for the operation.
 Result Operand Reference: the result of the
operation.
 Next Instruction Reference: tells the CPU where to
fetch the next instruction after the execution of this
instruction is complete.
• The source and result operands can be in one
of the three areas.
– Main or virtual memory: address must be
supplied.
– CPU register: the instruction must contain
the number of the desired register.
– I/O device: the I/O module and device must
be specified.
 Instruction Representation
• Represented by a sequence of bits, and is
divided in to fields corresponding to the
elements.
• Example of a simple instruction format
• During instruction execution,
– instruction is read in to an Instruction
Register (IR).
– CPU extracts the data from various fields of
the instruction.
• Since it is difficult to deal with binary
representation of instructions, it is a common
practice to use a symbolic representation.
Instruction type Op-code Symbolic description
representation
Arithmetic 00000101 ADD M(X) Add M(X) AC; put the result in
AC
00000110 SUB M(X) Subtract M(X) from AC; put the
result in AC

• Op-Codes are represented by abbreviations

(mnemonics), and Operands are represented
symbolically.
• The operation is performed on the contents of
a location, not on its address.
Ex. ADD R, Y
 Instruction Types
• Machine Instructions:
 Defines many of the functions performed by the
processor (has an effect on the implementation of
processor)
 Programmer’s means of controlling the processor.
 Must allow the user to formulate any data processing
task.
 Must be sufficient to express any of the instructions
from high level languages.
• Can be categorized as follows:
Data Processing: arithmetic and logic
instructions.
Data Storage: memory instructions
Data Movement: I/O instructions
Program Flow Control: test and branch
instructions
• Arithmetic Instruction: provide computational
capabilities for processing numerical data.
• Logic (Boolean) Instructions: operate on the bits
of a word. They provide capabilities for
processing any other type of data.
They are performed on data in CPU registers.
• Memory Instructions: used for moving data
between memory and the registers.
• I/O Instructions: are needed to transfer
programs and data in to memory and the results
of computation back out to the user.
• Test Instructions: used to test the value of a
data word or the status of a computation.
• Branch Instructions: used to branch to a
different set of instructions depending on the
decision made.
 Number Of Addresses
• Helps to describe processor architecture.
• Is the maximum number of addresses needed in
an instruction.
• Example consider the Arithmetic & logic
instruction:
– Maximum of two addresses to reference
operands.
– A third address to reference the result.
– Finally fourth address to reference the next
instruction
• Most CPUs are of the one-, two-, or three-
address variety, with the address of the next
instruction being implicit (obtained from the
PC)
• Types of operands: data types on which
machine instructions operate. Categories are
– Addresses
– Numbers
– Characters
– Logic data
• Addresses: unsigned integers
some calculations are done on the operand reference
in an instruction to determine actual address.
• Numbers:
– Integers or fixed point
– Floating point
– Decimal
• Characters: a common form of data.
• ASCII code is the most commonly used character
code. Each character in this code is represented by a
unique 7-bit pattern. Another code is EBCDIC
• Logical Data: when data are treated as a single n-bit
unit of data consisting of n 1 bit items of data.
 Types of operations
Op-Codes vary widely from machine to machine.
The same general purpose types of operations
found on all machines are:
• Data transfer: most fundamental type, and
specifies: the location of source and destination
operands, length of data to be transferred, mode
of addressing.
Ex. MOV EXCHANGE
STORE PUSH
LOAD POP
• Arithmetic:
– basic arithmetic operations are ADD, MUL, SUB
– Single operand instructions are Absolute,
Negate, Increment
– Data transfer operations may be involved
• Logical:
– Operations for manipulating individual bits (bit
wise operations) of a word
– Based upon Boolean operations
– Ex. AND, OR, shift, rotate
• Conversion:
Operations that change the format or operate on
the format of data. Ex. Translate, convert
• example is converting from decimal to binary
• Input Output:
A means of exchanging data (like control, status, and
data signals) between the external environment and
the computer.
May be:
• Specific instructions
• May be done using data movement instructions
(memory mapped)
• May be done by a separate controller (DMA)
– Ex. IN, OUT
• System Control:
– Reserved for the use of the operating system.
– May read or alter control register
– May read or modify a storage protection key
• Transfer Of Control:
– Change the sequence of instruction execution
– Most importance :
If a group of instructions is executed repeatedly
Ex. Loop
During decision making Ex. Jump conditional,
branch
To break down a large programs.
 Addressing Mode
• A technique used to determine the address of the
operands.
different op-codes use different addressing modes
one or more bits in the instruction format can be
used as a mode field.
• The most common are:
Immediate Register Indirect
Direct Displacement (Indexed)
Indirect Stack
Register
 Immediate Addressing
• Operand is part of instruction
• Operand = address field
• Ex. ADD 5
– Add 5 to contents of accumulator
– 5 is operand
• No memory reference to fetch data; Fast
• Limited range: the size of number is restricted to the
size of address field
Instruction

Opcode Operand
 Direct Addressing
• Address field contains address of operand
• Effective address (EA) = address field (A)
• Ex. ADD A
– Add contents of cell A to accumulator
– Look in memory at address A for operand
• Single memory reference to access data
• No additional calculations to work out effective
address
• Limited address space
 Direct Addressing Diagram
Instruction

Opcode Address A
Memory

Operand
 Indirect Addressing
• Memory cell pointed to by address field contains
the address of (pointer to) the operand
• EA = (A)
• Ex. ADD (A) ;Add contents of cell pointed to by
contents of A to accumulator
• Large address space; 2n where n = word length
• Multiple memory accesses to find operand
• Hence slower
 Indirect Addressing Diagram
Instruction

Opcode Address A
Memory

Pointer to operand

Operand
 Register Addressing
• Operand is held in register named in address
filed; EA = R
• Limited number of registers
• Very small address field needed
– Shorter instructions
– Faster instruction fetch
• No memory access
• Very fast execution
• Very limited address space
 Register Addressing Diagram
Instruction

Opcode Register Address R

Registers

Operand
 Register Indirect Addressing
• Similar to indirect addressing
• Operand is in memory cell pointed to by
contents of register R; EA = (R)
• Large address space (2n)
• One fewer memory access than indirect
addressing
Register Indirect Addressing Diagram

Instruction

Opcode Register Address R

Memory

Registers

Pointer to Operand Operand

 Displacement Addressing
• Combines the direct addressing and register
indirect addressing
• EA = A + (R)
• Address field hold two values
– A = base value
– R = register that holds displacement
– or vice versa
• Includes: Relative, Base-register, and Indexing
Displacement Addressing Diagram
Instruction

Opcode Register R Address A

Memory

Registers

Pointer to Operand + Operand

 Relative Addressing
• A version of displacement addressing also
called PC-relative addressing
• R = Program counter, PC
• EA = A + (PC)
• i.e. get operand from a cell displaced by A
from current location pointed to by PC.
• It saves address bits in the instruction.
 Base-Register Addressing
• R holds pointer to base address (main memory
reference)
• A holds displacement (usually an unsigned
integer representation) from that address.
• R may be explicit or implicit
• Ex. segment registers in 80x86
 Indexed Addressing
• The address field references a main memory
address, and the referenced register contains a
positive displacement from that address.
• It is just the opposite for base-register addressing.
• A = base; R = displacement; EA = A + R
• Good for accessing arrays by incrementing or
decrementing the index register after each
reference to it (auto-indexing.)
– EA = A + R;
– R++
• If indexing is performed after the indirection, it
is termed postindexing:
EA = (A) + (R)
• With preindexing, the indexing is performed
before the indirection:
EA = (A+(R))

• (Draw the diagrams)

 Stack Addressing
• Stack is a linear array of reserved block
locations.
• It is sometimes referred to as a pushdown list
or last-in-first-out queue.
• Operand is (implicitly) on top of stack
• E.x. Pop, Push
• In fact it is Register Indirect Addressing Mode
since the Stack Pointer is maintained in a
register.
 INSTRUCTION FORMATS
• Defines the layout of the bits of an instruction, in
terms of its constituent fields.
• Must include an op_code and, implicitly or explicitly,
zero or more operands.
• Each explicit operand is referenced using one of the
addressing modes described for each operand.
• Instruction Format Length
• Affects, and is affected by, memory size, memory
organization, bus structure, processor complexity, and
processor speed.
• Determines the richness and flexibility of the machine
as seen by the assembly-language programmer.
• Trade-off here is between the desire for a powerful
instruction range or longer instruction length (more:
opcodes, operands, addressing modes, and greater
address range) and a need to save space.
• But longer instruction length may be wasteful. A 64-
bit instruction occupies twice the space of a 32-bit
instruction but is probably less than twice as useful.
• Other considerations Beyond this basic trade-off:
 Either the instruction length should be equal to the
memory-transfer length (in a bus system, data-bus
length) or one should be a multiple of the other.
The memory transfer rate has not kept up with
increases in processor speed. Accordingly,
memory can become a bottleneck if the
processor can execute instructions faster than it
can fetch them.
One solution to this problem is to use cache
memory; another is to use shorter instructions.
Additional important feature is that the
instruction length should be a multiple of the
character length (usually 8 bits) and of the length
of fixed-point numbers.
• The word length of memory is, in some sense, the
“natural” unit of organization.
• The size of a word usually determines the size of
fixed-point numbers (usually the two are equal).
• Word size is also typically equal to, or at least
integrally related to, the memory transfer size.
• Because a common form of data is character
data, we would like a word to store an integral
number of characters.
• Otherwise, there are wasted bits in each word
when storing multiple characters, or a character
will have to straddle a word boundary.
• Allocation of Bits
• An issue of how to allocate the bits in the instruction
format.
• There is clearly a trade-off between the number of
opcodes and the power of the addressing capability.
• One refinement to this trade-off is the use of
variable-length opcodes.
• In this approach, there is a minimum opcode length
but, for some opcodes, additional operations may be
specified by using additional bits in the instruction.
• For a fixed-length instruction, this leaves fewer bits
for addressing. Thus, is used for those instructions
that require fewer operands and/or less powerful
addressing.
• The following interrelated factors go into
determining the use of the addressing bits.
 Number of addressing modes:
 Number of operands:
 Register versus memory:
 Number of register sets:
 Address range:
 Address granularity: