18-447: Introduction to Computer Architecture, Spring 2009

Notices

· The required text book is Computer Organization and Design: The Hardware/Software Interface, Fourth Edition by Patterson and Hennessy, Morgan Kaufmann/Elsvier. (Third edition is okay, but it is your responsibility to match up the reading and HW assignments from the book.)

· It does not matter which Lab section you register for.

Quick Links

Go to Blackboard for announcements and handouts

(Course Schedule and Download Lecture Notes) Not ready yet. Check out Spring08 first.

Archive of Lecture Notes from the most recently completed semester

A Short Intro to Synopsys Design Compiler

A Short Intro to ModelSim Verilog Simulator

Course Description

Computer architecture is the science and art of selecting and interconnecting hardware components to create a computer that meets functional, performance and cost goals. This course introduces the basic principles and hardware structures of a modern programmable computer. We will learn, for example, how to design the control and datapath for a pipelined RISC processor and how to design fast memory and storage systems. The principles presented in lecture are reinforced in the laboratory through design and simulation of a register transfer (RT) implementation of a RISC processor pipeline in Verilog.

Prerequisites: 18-240 and 15-213.

Staff

	Name	Office	Tele	Email
Instructor	James C. Hoe	HH-A304	8-4259	jhoe+447 AT ece_cmu_edu
TAs
Admin

Meetings

· Lecture: MW, 2:30 - 4:20, DH-A310

· Lab Section A: T, 6:30 – 8:20, HH 1107

· Lab Section B: R, 6:30 – 8:20, HH 1107

*Note* it does not matter which Lab section you register for.

Textbooks

· Computer Organization and Design: The Hardware/Software Interface, Fourth Edition by Patterson and Hennessy, Morgan Kaufmann/Elsvier. (Required)

· Also useful, textbooks from 18-240 and 15-213

Office Hours

· James Hoe, MW 4:30-5:30pm, HH-A304

Additional office hours available by appointment

Fun Links

· Blackboard

· CS 15-213 Introduction to Computer Systems

· ECE 18-240 Fundamentals of Computer Engineering

· ECE 18-447 Introduction to Computer Architecture (Spring 2006 archive)

· ECE 18-741 Advanced Computer Architecture

· ECE 18-742 Parallel Computer Architecture

· Computer Architecture Lab at Carnegie Mellon (CALCM)

· CPU Information Center

· WWW Computer Architecture

· History of Computing (Computer History Museum)

· Microprocessor Lineage (Computer History Museum)

· OpenCores (repository of GPL hardware IPs)

· Leon3 SPARC core (VHDL)

· OpenSPARC (open-sourced SPARC T1 and T2 Verilog RTL and more)