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Instruction set !

A project log for Kobold - retro TTL computer

A 16 bit computer with 20 address bits and video display, from just a few TTL and memory chips. Instructions resemble 68000 / PDP-11.

roelhroelh 06/10/2019 at 08:320 Comments

This is a first design for the instruction set. In the final computer, the instruction set could be changed any moment by putting a new microcode in the Flash microstore.

This instruction set borrows from the 68000, PDP-11 and SPARC !

Here are the registers:

The register set R0 - R7 has general registers, they can be used as data or address registers, comparable to the registers in the PDP-11, but in this case the registers can also contain 32 bit data. They are located in memory. There can be many of these register sets, and the WP register points to the current register set. A called function does not have to push registers, it simply changes WP to get a fresh set of registers.

The registers A0 - A7 are global address registers, located at a fixed position in memory. Each of these registers can point to a structure (of 8 words max). The elements of such a structure can be read or written with a single instruction.

All instructions are 16 bit, as follows:

And the overview of instructions:

A few remarks:

It is expected that the "pointer + displacement" address mode will be used a lot. Note that the displacement is OR-ed to the address, so the address needs to be proper aligned. The following picture illustrates this addressing method

This is a rather ambitious instruction set. Perhaps it will be simplified if it is too much work to implement.

I am open to suggestions !

PS Several decoding details changed today (20190629). 

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