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Date:      Wed, 18 Oct 2006 20:16:23 +0200
From:      "Attilio Rao" <attilio@freebsd.org>
To:        "ranjith kumar" <ranjith_kumar_b4u@yahoo.com>
Cc:        freebsd-ia32@freebsd.org
Subject:   Re: hard-ware prefetching
Message-ID:  <3bbf2fe10610181116w64407a43j83e1acfa16c6c9d5@mail.gmail.com>
In-Reply-To: <20061016151137.56240.qmail@web58405.mail.re3.yahoo.com>
References:  <20061016151137.56240.qmail@web58405.mail.re3.yahoo.com>

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2006/10/16, ranjith kumar <ranjith_kumar_b4u@yahoo.com>:
> Hi everyone,
>             I am new to this mailing list.
>
>
> I have just started reading about architectural
> features of "pentium-4".
>
> I have following questions:
>
> 1) I have read "IA-32 software developers manuals".
>   No information has been given about hardware
> prefetching.
>   Can anyone suggest some material which explains
> more details about "hardware prefetching" (pentium4 if
> possible).

You have to look at this:
http://www.intel.com/design/Pentium4/documentation.htm#manuals

and possibly give a look at the "Pentium 4 optimizations manual".

BTW, even if I'm not aware of what informations do you need about
prefetching, P4 offers prefetch[n]-nta instructions that you can find
in the "IA32 Architecture Manual, vol 2". Prefetching can be emulated
in someway... but it needs a better explanatory here.

> 2) This is a non-technical question.
>  Does Intel company reveals all details about its
> processors(say pentium-4) like what is the exact
> dynamic branching algorithm used to predict
> conditional branches...etc?

You can find some descriptions in every good book about computer
architectures...

Attilio


-- 
Peace can only be achieved by understanding - A. Einstein



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