A Simulation Study of the Vertical-Migration Microprocessor Architecture

Vertical-migration microprocessor architecture was introduced in [1], and results of its analytical study were presented in the same paper. This paper presents results of its simulation study which is based on selected production benchmarks. Vertical-migration architecture enables the constructs typical of HLL's to be mapped into the constructs typical of microcode. This mapping is provided only for selected types of HLL statements and for HLL statements with a relatively small number of operands and parameters, i.e., for-the most frequent HLL constructs. Using an extended subset of Fortran 77, one that matches the typical demands of the targeted application, i.e., dedicated microprocessing, it has been shown how the proposed architecture supports the mapping of HLL constructs into microinstructions. That was done through the description of a flexible register-transfer level simulator which was implemented to support this study. It was used to run benchmarks, typical of various applications, on various configurations of the architecture. Simulation study has shown that this approach is particularly suitable for the time-critical dedicated signal processing and robotics/control applications, as well as for the GaAs implementation.