Advanced Micro Devices Inc used the Microprocessor Forum to sketch out the first superscalar implementation of its 29000 family of embedded RISC processors. The new processor is a four-issue chip, optimised for the high-end of the embedded market. The processor – unnamed, and with no release dates – has two integer units, an integer multiply unit, a load-store unit, a branch unit and a funnel shifter (and no, we don’t know what one of those is). The CPU has 8Kb data and instruction caches and is pin-compatible with the existing Am29030/35 and Am29040. The clock runs at 2x, 3x or 4x the system frequency, to a maximum 100MHz internal, 33MHz external. Performance data for the thing is thin on the ground, but a performance graph depicts the new 75MHz/25MHz part handling Page Description Language processing at around nine times the speed of a standard 16MHz 29000.
