In Part 1 of this series you saw how programs on the POWER5 processor work using the 64-bit PowerPC instruction set, then in Part 2 you learned how the PowerPC instruction set addresses memory, and how to do position-independent code. In this article, you learn how to use the very powerful condition and branch instructions available in the PowerPC instruction set.
Great Processors… Not often the best technology is the one people use!
Edited 2007-01-24 22:05
So, where can I order some PowerPC barebone and bless it with couple of gigs or ram and descent hard drives to run my favorite operating system? What raid controller you’d recommend to this mission critical desktop rig?
What? you mean there is no barebones and even boards for Amiga OS were discontinued? Then whatta hell can I do with this CPU? You mean I have to buy myself Xbox 360? And how much I have to pay Microsoft for rights to produce some games for this crap?
So, what is the point of learning this instruction set?
Edited 2007-01-24 23:26
grab a second-hand power4 (or even power5) workstation on ebay. š those are cheaper than new power5+ workstations from IBM, but still quite fast.
There is also Genesi, that produce the Open Server Workstation “in the near future” ( ). That would be a very reasonable computer with enough power for todays applications.
Although I must admit, that it would be great to have more choices…