Inside the Machine: An Illustrated Introduction to Microprocessors and Computer Architecture

by Jon Stokes

Book Overview

Computers perform countless tasks ranging from the business critical to the recreational, but regardless of how differently they may look and behave, they're all amazingly similar in basic function. Once you understand how the microprocessor--or central processing unit (CPU)--works, you'll have a firm grasp of the fundamental concepts at the heart of all modern computing.

Inside the Machine, from the co-founder of the highly respected...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1593276680
• ISBN13: 9781593276683
• Release Date: December 2006
• Publisher: No Starch Press
• Length: 320 Pages
• Weight: 1.75 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.9" x 7.0" x 9.2"

Customer Reviews

Very good introduction and overview

I liked the simplicity in the book. It is very easy to read and understand things written on it. I classify the book as introductory level in computer architecture giving an overview on the today's microprocessors. I would recommend it for those who want to learn something about microprocessors on their own, outside the class or want to read some brief details about the most current microprocessors (i.e. Core 2 Duo) or architectural comparison between different microarchitectures (i.e. IBM and Intel cores). I don't think that the book is good as a text book for computer architecture. Instead I would recommend the Hennessy and Patterson "Computer Architecture - Quantitative Approach" I personelly enjoyed reading this book.

great and numerous colour graphics that aid understanding

There are already numerous books on microprocessors. But of all those I have read, this comes across as one of the most elegant in the explanations of concepts. In part, it was greatly aided by the many colour diagrams scattered throughout the text. Colour was used to enhance the pedagogic utility of the diagrams. This vividness helps a reader grasp the underlying concepts. To be sure, many people working in the field already know the book's ideas, and learnt these from earlier texts, which typically had fewer diagrams, and those in black and white. Which meant that, in part, you were smart enough to grasp those ideas. But maybe you had to work a little harder to reach that understanding, due to a paucity of diagrams, and poorly drawn ones at that. Whereas in this book, such ideas like pipelining are eloquently accompanied by good graphics.

What happens once you power on your PC...

It's possible to say you know how your computer works. But do you really know how your microprocessor does what it does? Without forcing you to take a crash course in engineering, Jon Stokes does a great job in uncovering the mysteries in the book Inside the Machine: An Illustrated Introduction to Microprocessors and Computer Architecture. It's an excellent read if you want to know what happens after you press the power button... Contents: Basic Computing Concepts; The Mechanics of Program Execution; Pipelined Execution; Superscalar Execution; The Intel Pentium and Pentium Pro; PowerPC Processors - 600 Series, 700 Series, and 7400; Intel's Pentium 4 vs. Motorola's G4E - Approaches and Design Philosophies; Intel's Pentium 4 vs. Motorola's G4E - The Back End; 64-Bit Computing and x86-64; The G5 - IBM's PowerPC 970; Understanding Caching and Performance; Intel's Pentium M, Core Duo, and Core 2 Duo; Bibliography and Suggested Reading; Index Normally, books like this are endless pages of painfully detailed descriptions of technology that only a true engineering geek could understand and love. For the rest of us mere mortals, we have to make do with simplistic descriptions of the chip that runs our computers. All the details are taken on faith. Stokes successfully bridges the gap between textbook details and real-life analogies to make the work of the CPU understandable. He starts off with the basics of how a CPU works and how instructions are executed. From there, he introduces the concept of pipelined instructions, and shows how that creates a much faster chip. But there are drawbacks, and when you're done reading you readily understand those limitations. Once the general groundwork is in place, the discussion moves to specific microprocessors in the market and how they are designed. Yes, those chips are highly complex, but Stokes lays a solid foundation that makes it possible to actually grasp what's going on without a Masters in chip design. By the time you're done with the book, you are well-equipped to understand why a 2.8 GHz processor may be infinitely faster than a 3.2 GHz processor, depending on how the design was implemented. The graphic illustrations are colorful and clear, and coupled with a conversational teaching tone, this book is... dare I say... "fun" to read. Definitely a recommended read for anyone who wants to delve into microprocessor design without taking a four year degree program prior to doing so.

If you are an educator or a student, you'll wish all textbooks were written this clearly

I received this book with a lot of apprehension; after all, I dropped the introductory CS course in college because it was a little too overwhelming for my business-major brain. My fears were unfounded, and as someone who works in training, I can also appreciate the care with which the concepts of microprocessors and computer programming are explained and developed in a logical fashion. Although I've read Jon's articles over the years, the added and expanded material in the book helped me to connect the ideas that I previously didn't have a firm grasp on. The text and examples begin on an introductory level, but still manage to go into considerable depth without losing their readability. But what really impressed me as an instructional designer was the fact that it could not only function as a textbook in a college-level course, but also as a standalone reference. In evaluating course materials, one needs to consider its reference capacity and one's ability to learn via self-study from it. The reference value of this book for students will remain extremely helpful after they have used it in a course, and their ability to teach themselves from it will be critically important during the class. Because of the nature of textbooks, which focus primarily on teaching, the clarification and explanation of intermediary steps can be quite tedious and decrease the book's reference value. However, Jon does an excellent job and is one of the few who deftly balances these two needs; I was, and remain, impressed with "Inside the Machine," both as a learner and an instructor.

Fills a gap in current books on microprocessors

This book is an introduction to computers that fills the gap between classic and challenging books like Hennesy and Patterson's, and the large number of "How Your Computer Works" books that are too basic for engineers. The first four chapters lay the conceptual groundwork for later chapters' studies of real-world microprocessors. These chapters use a simplified example processor, the DLW, to illustrate basic and intermediate concepts like the instructions/data distinction, assembly language programming, superscalar execution, pipelining, the programming model, and machine language. This section is essential reading for those who are new to the world of microprocessors. The middle section of the book consists of detailed studies of two popular desktop processor lines: the Pentium line from Intel and the PowerPC from IBM and Motorola. These chapters walk the reader through the chronological development of each processor line, describing the evolution of the microarchitectures and instruction set architectures under discussion. Along the way, more advanced concepts such as speculative execution, vector processing, and instruction set translation are introduced and explored via a discussion of one or more real microprocessors. Throughout the middle part of the book the approach is to explain each new processor's features in terms of how they differ from analogous features found in predecessors or competitors. The comparative part of the book culminates in chapters 7 and 8 which consists of detailed comparisons of two starkly different and important processors: Intel's Pentium 4 and Motorola's MPC7450, popularly known as the G4e. After a brief introduction to 64-bit computing and the 64-bit extensions to the popular x86 instruction set architecture in chapter 9, the microarchitecture of the first mass-market 64-bit processor, the IBM PowerPC 970, is treated in chapter 10. The study of the 970, the majority of which is also directly applicable to IBM's POWER4 mainframe processor, concludes the book's coverage of PowerPC processors. Chapter 11 covers the organization and functioning of the memory hierarchy found in almost all modern computers. The final chapter contains a detailed examination of the latest generation of processors from Intel: the Pentium M, Core Duo and Core 2 Duo. This chapter contains the most detailed discussion of these processors available online or in print, and it contains some new information not previously released and specially granted by Intel for printing in this book. I found this book a great read - it is both accessible and enlightening, even for someone with many years experience of working with microprocessors. I really liked how the author used 4-color diagrams to illustrate whatever point he was trying to make. I also appreciate that unlike Patterson's classic book, you don't need to review your combinatorics and discrete math before and after opening the book. The following is the table of contents: Chapter 1