BELLS UNIVERSITY OF

TECHNOLOGY
…Only the best is good for Bells.
OTA, NIGERIA

CEN 401
COMPUTER ORGANIZATION AND
ARCHITECTURE

LECTURE NOTE 3

www.bellsuniversity.edu.n
 Outlines
 Instruction Set Architecture (ISA)
 Instruction Sets
 Microarchitecture

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Nigeria
 Instruction Set Architecture (ISA)
An Instruction Set Architecture (ISA) is defined as the design of a computer from the Programmer’s
Perspective. This means that an ISA describes the design of a Computer in terms of the basic
operations it must support. The ISA is not concerned with the implementation-specific details of a
computer. It is only concerned with the set or collection of basic operations the computer must
support. These instructions define the processor’s operations, such as arithmetic, logical operations,
and data movement.
Objectives of ISA:
 The ISA defines the types of instructions to be supported by the processor.
 The ISA defines the maximum length of each type of instruction.
 The ISA defines the Instruction Format of each type of instruction. The3 Instruction
Format determines how the entire instruction is encoded within a certain amount of bits.
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 Instruction Sets
An instruction is a set of codes that the computer processor can understand. The code is usually in
1s and 0s, or machine language. It contains instructions or tasks that control the movement of bits
and bytes within the processor.
Examples of some instruction sets are:
ADD − Add two numbers together.
JUMP − Jump to the designated RAM address.
LOAD − Load information from RAM to the CPU.
Types of Instruction sets are:
 Reduced Instruction Set Computer (RISC)
 Complex Instruction Set Computer (CISC) 4

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Nigeria
 Instruction Sets
Reduced Instruction Set Architecture (RISC)
A number of computer designers recommended that computers use fewer instructions with simple
constructs so that they can be executed much faster within the CPU without having to use memory
as often. This type of computer is called a Reduced Instruction Set Computer. The concept of RISC
involves an attempt to reduce execution time by simplifying the instruction set of computers.
Characteristics of RISC
 Relatively few instructions.
 Relatively few addressing modes.
 Memory access limited to load and store instructions.
 All operations done within the register of the CPU.
 Single-cycle instruction execution.
 Fixed length, easily decoded instruction format. 5

 Hardwired rather than micro programmed control.

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Nigeria
 Instruction Sets
Complex Instruction Set Computer (CISC)
CISC is a computer where a single instruction can perform numerous low-level operations like a
load from memory and a store from memory, etc. The CISC attempts to minimize the number of
instructions per program but at the cost of an increase in the number of cycles per instruction. The
design of an instruction set for a computer must take into consideration not only machine language
constructs but also the requirements imposed on the use of high level programming languages.
The goal of CISC is to attempt to provide a single machine instruction for each statement that is
written in a high level language.
Characteristics of CISC
 A large number of instructions typically from 100 to 250 instructions.
 Some instructions that perform specialized tasks and are used infrequently.
 A large variety of addressing modes- typically from 5 to 20 different modes.
 Variable length instruction formats. 6

 Instructions that manipulate operands in memory.

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Nigeria
 Instruction Sets
Comparison between RISC and CISC
RISC CISC
Acronym It stands for Reduced Instruction Set Computer It stands for Complex Instruction Set Computer

Definition The RISC processors have a smaller set of The CISC processors have a larger set of
instructions with few addressing modes instructions with many addressing modes
Memory Unit It has no memory unit and uses a separate It has a memory unit that implements complex
hardware to implement instructions instructions
Design It is a complex compiler design It is an easy compiler design
Calculations The calculations are faster and precise The calculations are slow and precise
Decoding Decoding of instructions is simple Decoding of instructions is complex
Pipelining Pipelining functions correctly Pipelining does not function correctly
Program It has a hard-wired unit of programming It has a micro-programming unit
Applications It is used in high end applications such as video It is used in low end applications such as
processing, telecommunications and image security systems, home automations, 7etc.
processing

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Nigeria
 Microarchitecture
Microarchitecture is the design and structure of a computer's central processing unit (CPU) and
other hardware components. It is also known as computer organization. Microarchitecture is
important because it determines a computer's performance, power efficiency, and capabilities. It
includes:
 Internal organization
 Data paths
 Memory hierarchy
 Control units
 Arithmetic Logic unit
 Registers
 Memory Management unit
 Cache memory
 Interconnects
8
Microarchitecture focuses on how a processor executes instructions, handles data, and performs
operations. It encompasses various techniques, such as single-cycle, multicycle, and pipelined
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processors.
Nigeria
 Microarchitecture
Differences between Instruction Set Architecture and Microarchitecture
Instruction Set Architecture Microarchitecture
The ISA is responsible for defining the set of The Microarchitecture is more concerned with the lower
instructions to be supported by the processor. level implementation of how the instructions are going to
be executed and deals with concepts like Instruction
Pipelining, Branch Prediction, Out of Order Execution.

The Branch of Computer Architecture is more The Branch of Computer Organization is concerned with
inclined towards the Analysis and Design of the implementation of a particular ISA and deals with
Instruction Set Architecture. For Example, Intel various hardware implementation techniques, i.e. the
developed the x86 architecture, ARM developed Microarchitecture level. For Example, ARM licenses other
the ARM architecture, & AMD developed companies like Qualcomm, and Apple for using ARM
the amd64 architecture. The RISC-V ISA developed ISA, but each of these companies have their
by UC Berkeley is an example of an Open Source implementations of this ISA thereby making them
ISA. different in performance and power efficiency.
The Krait cores developed by Qualcomm have a different
microarchitecture and the Apple A-series processors have
a different microarchitecture. 9

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Nigeria