gil%pajaro@Sun.COM (Gilman Chesley) (03/18/87)
I don't want to flog a dead discussion (Kwh per Mhz) but with the advent of
the Am29000 the need still exists to evaluate single chip microprocessors
independently of the process generation, so I would like to suggest a figure
of merit for microprocessors: DHRYSTONES*microns^2.
The basic argument is that to normalize for process generation one should
adjust for density, which would then give a rough figure of merit for
architecture/implementation. For example, Figures 2 and 8 of Myers, et al,
MICROPROCESSOR TECHNOLOGY TRENDS, Proc. IEEE, Dec. 1986 show a good
correlation between the increase per year in the number of microprocessor
transistors and MIPS: a constant 10 IPS per transistor. Presumably an
architecture significantly over that ratio is more effective than one
significantly under that.
Gil Chesley {usual disclaimer}