A family of RISC ISAs.

ARM vs LC3

  • Both are Load/Store architectures
  • Both have Fixed-Format instruction encodings
    • All instructions are the same size
  • Register-Register address
    • Most instructions take two source registers and store their results in a destination register
  • Addresses
  • Processor Modes
    • LC3
      • User
      • System
    • ARM
      • User
        • Normal
      • System
        • Priviledged OS tasks
      • FIQ
        • High priority interrupt request
      • IRQ
        • General purpose interrupts
      • Supervisor
        • Protected mode for OS
      • Abort
        • Memory Access Violations
      • Undefined
        • Undefined Instructions
  • ALU and Registers
    • ARM
      • 16 registers
      • PC is itself a register R15
      • All registers are 32 bits wide
      • Storing to PC can have unpredictable results on older ISAs 1-5
      • R11 Frame Pointer
        • Like R5 in LC3
      • R13 Stack Pointer
        • Like R6 in LC3
      • R14 Link Register
        • Like R7 in LC3
  • Condition Code
    • LC3
      • N
        • Negative result from ALU
      • Z
        • Zero result from ALU
      • P
        • Postivie Result from ALU
    • ARM
      • N
        • Negative result from ALU
      • Z
        • Zero result from ALU
      • C
        • Carry out bit from ALU
      • V