Classification of Instruction Sets
A complex instruction set computer (CISC) has many specialized instructions, which may only be rarely used in practical programs. A reduced instruction set computer (RISC) simplifies the processor by only implementing instructions that are frequently used in programs; unusual operations are implemented as subroutines, where the extra processor execution time is offset by their rare use. Theoretically important types are the minimal instruction set computer and the one instruction set computer but these are not implemented in commercial processors. Another variation is the very long instruction word (VLIW) where the processor receives many instructions encoded and retrieved in one instruction word.
Read more about this topic: Instruction Set
Famous quotes containing the words instruction and/or sets:
“Casting an eye on the education of children, from whence I can make a judgment of my own, I observe they are instructed in religious matters before they can reason about them, and consequently that all such instruction is nothing else but filling the tender mind of a child with prejudices.”
—George Berkeley (16851753)
“Certain anthropologists hold that man, having discovered tools, ceased to evolve biologically. Animals, never having discovered them, continue to fashion drills out of their beaks, oars out of their hind feet, wings out of their forefeet, suits of armor out of their hides, levers out of their horns, saws out of their teeth. Whether this be true or not, all authorities agree that man is the tool-using animal. It sets him off from the rest of the animal kingdom as drastically as does speech.”
—Stuart Chase (18881985)