EDA Weekend Reader – Computer Architecture
This book, by Robert J. Baron and Lee Higbie, is a great reference book introducing the reader to “an overview of a computer’s key structural building blocks, such as the CPU, I/O, memory, with references to particular architectures such as the IBM PC. The copy was published in 1992, and I purchased this book in 1992 to assist with my studies as a computer systems undergraduate at Warwick University – the cover still has the Warwick University Bookshop price stamp! This book contains lots of problem exercises to go away and tackle!
Contents Review of Computer Architecture by Robert J. Baron and Lee Higbie
The book starts with a bit of history (pre 1992) of computers and their architecture. The classes of architecture are explained: Von Neumann machines and Non-von Neumann machines and how they differ with regard to arthimetic computation and memory access.
The reader is then introduced to the instruction-set architecture. Floating point numbers, data structures, data precision and data types are each discussed with useful diagrams. Registers and instruction types and addressing techniques are then discussed in detail.
The book goes onto the topics of buses, CPUs, I/Os, and memory system architecture. The reader is introduced to the technique of memory caching, the various types of memory caching, and virtual memory.
A real architecture is then applied in the shape of the IBM PC. This may seem dated now with the multi-core processor devices that are used today, but is a great way to see how the various parts of the computer architecture discussed earlier in the book are applied to a real-life subject. Again, lots of useful diagrams here aid the understanding of what is being described.
The remainder of the book discusses in detail the process of pipelining, RISC architectures, and parallel processor techniques. Right at the end of the book in the appendix is a useful reference to various logic parts you will find in computer architectures – multiplexors, demultiplexors, shifters, adders, clock generators, registers, counters, stacks, multipliers.
24 years on, this is still a valued book on my bookshelf, and it is referred to frequently.