Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!seismo!gatech!udel!thomson 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