HIGH PERFORMANCE COMPUTER ARCHITECTURES - A Historical Perspective
© Roland N Ibbett & Nigel P Topham 1996
Computer architecture has been defined in a number of ways by
different authors. Amdahl, Blaauw and Brooks [1], for example, the
designers of the IBM/360 architecture, used the term to "describe the
attributes of a system as seen by the programmer, i.e. the conceptual
structure and functional behaviour, as distinct from the organisation
of the data flow and controls, the logical design and the physical
implementation." Stone [2], on the other hand, states that "the study
of computer architecture is the study of the organisation and
interconnection of components of computer systems." The material
presented here is better described by this wider definition, but is
particularly concerned with ways in which the hardware of a computer
can be organised so as to maximise performance, as measured by, for
example, average instruction execution time. Thus the architects of
high performance systems seek techniques whereby judicious use of
increased cost and complexity in the hardware will give a significant
increase in overall system performance. The material is presented from
a historical perspective, i.e. most of the examples describe
relevant parts of the computer in which the mechanism was first
introduced. Manifestations of most of these techniques can be found
in modern processors and computer systems.
-
G.M. Amdahl et al., "Architecture of
the IBM System/360" IBM Journal of R & D, Vol 8, pp 87-101,
1964
- H.S. Stone, "Introduction to Computer Architecture",
Science Research Associates, Chicago, 1975
About this website
The text in this Computer Architecture website is based largely on the
textbook "Architecture of High Performance Computers" by Roland
N. Ibbett and Nigel P. Topham, originally published in two volumes by
Macmillan Educational Ltd. The website is structured similarly to the
book, with each section roughly corresponding to a chapter in the
printed books. Many of the descriptions of specific hardware systems
are written in the present tense, even though the systems themselves
no longer exist.
A number of HASE simulation models relevant to the text can be found
at Computer Architecture Simulation Models. Links to
specific models are included in the text.