Ebook: Computer Architecture

This book lays out the concepts necessary to understand how a computer works.
For reasons of clarity, the authors have deliberately chosen examples that apply to machines from all eras, without having to water down the contents of the book. This choice helps to show how techniques, concepts and performances have evolved since the first computers.
The book is divided into five parts. The first four, which are of increasing difficulty, are the core of the book: “Elements of a Basic Architecture”, “Programming Model and Operation”, “Memory Hierarchy”, “Parallelism and Performance Enhancement”. The final part provides hints and solutions to the exercises in the book as well as appendices. The reader may approach each part independently based on their prior knowledge and goals.

Content:
Chapter 1 Introduction (pages 3–16): Gerard Blanchet and Bertrand Dupouy
Chapter 2 The Basic Modules (pages 17–34): Gerard Blanchet and Bertrand Dupouy
Chapter 3 The Representation of Information (pages 35–54): Gerard Blanchet and Bertrand Dupouy
Chapter 4 Instructions (pages 57–74): Gerard Blanchet and Bertrand Dupouy
Chapter 5 The Processor (pages 75–102): Gerard Blanchet and Bertrand Dupouy
Chapter 6 Inputs and Outputs (pages 103–136): Gerard Blanchet and Bertrand Dupouy
Chapter 7 Memory (pages 139–156): Gerard Blanchet and Bertrand Dupouy
Chapter 8 Caches (pages 157–174): Gerard Blanchet and Bertrand Dupouy
Chapter 9 Virtual Memory (pages 175–204): Gerard Blanchet and Bertrand Dupouy
Chapter 10 Pipeline Architectures (pages 207–234): Gerard Blanchet and Bertrand Dupouy
Chapter 11 Example of an Architecture (pages 235–260): Gerard Blanchet and Bertrand Dupouy
Chapter 12 Caches in a Multiprocessor Environment (pages 261–286): Gerard Blanchet and Bertrand Dupouy
Chapter 13 Superscalar Architectures (pages 287–324): Gerard Blanchet and Bertrand Dupouy