On Fri, Sep 28, 2012 at 10:39:50PM -0400, Peter Gavin wrote:
> Speaking of which, this is something that annoys me about the OR1K ISA
> and I think should be changed for OR2K (if it hasn't already).  It's
> pretty much impossible to implement the current ISA with a stock
> 32-bit multiplier, so you have to use a 64-bit multiplier if you don't
> want to hand code a multiplier.
> 
> And the MAC truncates to 32-bits *before* the add, is that right?  But
> it keeps the whole 64-bits of the accumulation?  Is there a good
> reason for that?
> 

I think there was some discussion about that sometime ago,
Yann Vernier participated in that, perhaps he could chime in?
(I believe he was of the same opinion as you)

> I don't understand the justifications for this in the ISA, but it
> certainly seems odd and difficult to implement, if you ask me.  It
> seems to me the best thing would just to have a single, 64-bit MAC
> that takes 32-bit operands and can be used for both the MAC and for
> regular multiply.
> 

Yes, I agree, and you wouldn't loose much if the ISA would allow pushing out 
the 
full 64-bit result to a register pair....

Stefan
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