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This lesson covers the different types of processors you need to know for OCR H446: CISC vs RISC, multi-core processors, parallel processing, co-processors and GPUs. You must be able to compare these types and explain when each is suitable.
A CISC processor has a large, varied instruction set where individual instructions can perform complex multi-step operations.
| Feature | Detail |
|---|---|
| Instruction set | Large — hundreds of different instructions |
| Instruction length | Variable — instructions can be different numbers of bytes |
| Instruction complexity | Single instructions can perform complex tasks (e.g. multiply and store in one instruction) |
| Clock cycles per instruction | Variable — complex instructions may take many clock cycles |
| Addressing modes | Many different addressing modes available |
| Registers | Fewer general-purpose registers |
| Hardware | Complex — uses microcode (micro-programs) to implement complex instructions |
| Compiler complexity | Simpler — the compiler has many powerful instructions to choose from |
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