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From: thomson@udel.EDU (Richard Thomson)
Newsgroups: comp.arch
Subject: Re: *Why* do modern machines mostly have 8-bit bytes?
Message-ID: <394@louie.udel.EDU>
Date: Mon, 27-Jul-87 16:39:56 EDT
Article-I.D.: louie.394
Posted: Mon Jul 27 16:39:56 1987
Date-Received: Tue, 28-Jul-87 06:41:08 EDT
Reply-To: thomson@udel.EDU (Richard Thomson)
Organization: University of Delaware
Lines: 14
Summary: Bit addressable processor of the '80s

An interesting sidenote is that there has been recently introduced a
microprocessor that supports variable bit length fields and bit addressing
(at least internally).  This is the new TMS34010 graphics processor from TI.

The internal memory bus is bit-oriented (to provide flexibility in addressing
variable sized pixels) and the 'bit address' is passed to an external memory
interface unit that fetches the appropriate 16-bit external word and performs
all the necessary shifting and masking before supplying the CPU with the data.

This allows the TI chip to handle variable sized pixels and fields (the fields
need not contain graphics display data, but could be anything... i.e. spectral
data, boolean fields, 6-bit characters, etc.).

[Please forgive me if I am mis-remembering the 34010 docs]  Rich Thomson