CPE 631 -
Advanced Computer Systems Architecture, Spring 2005

Top | Course Info | Slides | Homeworks | Links

Course Information

Term and Course Credit: Spring Semester 2005, 3 Credit Hours

Time and Place: Lecture: MW 2:20–3:40 PM, EB 239

Instructor: Dr. Aleksandar Milenkovic
Email: milenka@ece.uah.edu
Phone: (256) 824 6830
Office: 217-L

Office Hours: TR 7:00-8:00 PM or by appointment

Class Web page: http://www.ece.uah.edu/~milenka/cpe631-05S

Description:
This course surveys architecture and organization of modern computing systems including: CPU design, instruction sets, memory hierarchy, pipelined machines, and multiprocessors.
The emphasis is on the major component subsystems of high performance computers: pipelining, instruction level parallelism, memory hierarchies, input/output, and network-oriented interconnections.
The course focuses on the techniques of quantitative analysis and evaluation of modern computing systems, such as the selection of appropriate benchmarks to reveal and compare the performance of alternative design choices in system design.

Text Book: J. L. Hennessy and D. A. Patterson, Computer Architecture: A Quantitative Approach, 3^rd Edition, Morgan Kaufmann Publishing Co., Menlo Park, CA. 2002. ISBN: 1-55860-596-7 http://www.mkp.com/ca3

Reference Text(s):

· Dezso Sima, Terence Fountain, Peter Kacsuk,
Advanced Computer Architectures: A Design Space Approach, Addison-Wesley, 1998. ISBN: 0-201-42291-3.

· William Stalling, Computer Organization & Architecture: Designing for Performance, Prentice Hall, 2004. ISBN: 0-13-035119-9.

Prerequisite: CPE 431 / CPE 531

Academic Misconduct: All students will be trusted to pursue their academic careers with honesty and integrity. Academic dishonesty includes, but not limited to, cheating on a test or other course work, plagiarism, unauthorized collaboration with other persons. Academic misconduct of any type will not be tolerated. Students are expected to conform to the UAH policies concerning academic misconduct as outlined in Article III (starting on page 91) of the 2000-2001 UAH Student Handbook.

Exam Dates:
Midterm Exam - March 02 (Wednesday), 2005

Final Exam – April 29 (Friday), 2005

Grading Policy:
Final course grades will be determined in the manner outlined below. Grades will be determined on a 70-80-90 straight scale. On occasion I may use a slightly lower scale, but I will never raise the requirements.

#		% of Final Grade
1	Homeworks	20%
2	Midterm	20%
3	Project	30%
4	Final Exam	25%
5	Discretion	5%

Tentative Syllabus:

1. Fundamentals of Computer Design (Chapter 1)

2. Review: Pipelining Basic and Intermediate Concepts

3. Memory Hierarchy (Chapter 5)

4. Inside the Processor

Instruction Set Principles (Chapter 2)

Instruction Level Parallelism (Chapter 3)

Exploiting Software Level Parallelism with Software Approaches (Chapter 4)

5. Multiprocessors (Chapter 6)

6. Storage (Chapter 7)

7. Networks (Chapter 8)

Preliminary Project Info: Students will undertake a major computing system analysis and design project of their own choosing with the approval of the instructor. The projects will be done in groups of 2 students.

I reserve the right to change the above schedule based upon the needs of the course.

Top | Course Info | Slides | Homeworks | Links