4 ms·

How does this architecture perform in terms of FLOPs per Watt, compared with traditional register based architectures?

by ktpsns 7y ago

lebuffon 7y ago
It doesn't have a floating point processor so it would not do FLOPS very efficiently compared to modern machines. In that era the power to performance ratio was not as critical since the clock speed of this device was typically sub 12MHz. (yes that is 12,000,000 Hz) Power losses are quite a bit less than at 1.2GHz
opencl 7y ago
FLOPs is probably not a very sensible measure for measuring hardware from 1985, nothing had FPUs back then. Novix claimed that it achieved 10 MIPS at 7.5Mhz drawing about 0.35W. Kind of hard to verify how accurate their claims were with the chips being impossible to find though. Also from 1985, a 20Mhz MC68HC000 drew 0.38W[2] for 3.5 MIPS (going by 0.175 MIPS/Mhz[3]). So if you believe Novix's claims it had really good power efficiency for the time. [1] https://en.wikichip.org/w/images/a/a6/nc4016.pdf https://en.wikichip.org/w/images/a/a6/nc4016.pdf [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motorola_68000 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motorola_68000 [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instructions_per_second https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instructions_per_second
- abecedarius 7y ago
  As I remember it they claimed much faster interrupt handling too -- I don't remember the details. Something like only having to save a couple of hardware registers.
  - mud_dauber 7y ago
    Exactly. Task switching was (if memory serves - no pun intended) no more than 3-4 references.
- kjs3 7y ago
  FLOPs is probably not a very sensible measure for measuring hardware from 1985, nothing had FPUs back then. Umm...the Intel 8087 was '80 or '81, and it was AFAIK the most popular PC upgrade after memory. The 68881 was '84. My NS32081s have '84 datecodes but came out earlier. The Am9511/C8231 were mid to late 70s and all over the 8-bitters. Weitek had 3rd party solutions for 68k, x86 and lots of others in this timeframe, and MMI was pitching the 74S516 for the 68k early 80s. Almost everything had an FPU option in 1985.

How does this architecture perform in terms of FLOPs per Watt, compared with traditional register based architectures?

by ktpsns 7y ago

How does this architecture perform in terms of FLOPs per Watt, compared with traditional register based architectures?

It doesn't have a floating point processor so it would not do FLOPS very efficiently compared to modern machines. In that era the power to performance ratio was not as critical since the clock speed of this device was typically sub 12MHz. (yes that is 12,000,000 Hz) Power losses are quite a bit less than at 1.2GHz

opencl 7y ago

FLOPs is probably not a very sensible measure for measuring hardware from 1985, nothing had FPUs back then. Novix claimed that it achieved 10 MIPS at 7.5Mhz drawing about 0.35W. Kind of hard to verify how accurate their claims were with the chips being impossible to find though. Also from 1985, a 20Mhz MC68HC000 drew 0.38W[2] for 3.5 MIPS (going by 0.175 MIPS/Mhz[3]). So if you believe Novix's claims it had really good power efficiency for the time. [1] https://en.wikichip.org/w/images/a/a6/nc4016.pdf https://en.wikichip.org/w/images/a/a6/nc4016.pdf [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motorola_68000 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motorola_68000 [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instructions_per_second https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instructions_per_second

abecedarius 7y ago
As I remember it they claimed much faster interrupt handling too -- I don't remember the details. Something like only having to save a couple of hardware registers.
- mud_dauber 7y ago
  Exactly. Task switching was (if memory serves - no pun intended) no more than 3-4 references.
kjs3 7y ago
FLOPs is probably not a very sensible measure for measuring hardware from 1985, nothing had FPUs back then. Umm...the Intel 8087 was '80 or '81, and it was AFAIK the most popular PC upgrade after memory. The 68881 was '84. My NS32081s have '84 datecodes but came out earlier. The Am9511/C8231 were mid to late 70s and all over the 8-bitters. Weitek had 3rd party solutions for 68k, x86 and lots of others in this timeframe, and MMI was pitching the 74S516 for the 68k early 80s. Almost everything had an FPU option in 1985.