What does 32-bit machine refer to the computer's CPU?

32-bit machine refers to the computer's CPU that can process 32-bit binary data at the same time. The word length of the CPU indicates the CPU's ability to process data each time, which is always in multiples of 8, such as 16-bit, 32-bit, 64-bit, etc.; while the CPU of a 32-bit computer can process up to 32-bit data at a time, that is 4-byte data, for example, its EAX register is 32-bit. Of course, 32-bit computers can usually handle 16-bit and 8-bit data.

The operating environment of this tutorial: Windows 7 system, Dell G3 computer.

32-bit machine refers to the computer's CPU that can process 32-bit binary data at the same time. The word length of the CPU indicates the CPU's ability to process data each time. It is always in multiples of 8, such as 16-bit, 32-bit, 64-bit, etc.

The number of bits in a computer refers to the maximum number of bits that the CPU can process at one time. The CPU of a 32-bit computer can process up to 32 bits of data at a time, which is 4 bytes of data, while a 64-bit CPU can process 64 bits of data at a time, which is 8 bytes of data.

The CPU of a 32-bit computer can process up to 32-bit data at a time. For example, its EAX register is 32-bit. Of course, a 32-bit computer can usually process 16-bit and 8-bit data. When Intel upgraded from the 16-bit 286 to the 386, in order to be compatible with the 16-bit system, it first launched the 386SX. This kind of CPU has an internal budget of 32 bits and external data transmission of 16 bits. Until the 386DX, all CPUs were 32-bit internally and externally.

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Central processing unit (CPU, central processing unit), as the computing and control core of the computer system, is The final execution unit for information processing and program execution. Since its creation, CPU has made great progress in logical structure, operating efficiency and function extension.

32-bit CPU can only process 32 bits, or 4 bytes of data at a time; while a 64-bit CPU can process 64 bits, or 8 bytes of data at a time. If we edit the 128-bit instructions in units of 16-bit, 32-bit, and 64-bit: the old 16-bit CPU (such as Intel 80286 CPU) requires 8 instructions, the 32-bit CPU requires 4 instructions, and 64-bit CPU only needs two instructions. Obviously, under the same operating frequency, the processing speed of 64-bit CPU is faster than that of 16-bit and 32-bit.

You can compare 32-bit and 64-bit CPUs. The number of 64-bit code streams has not changed, and its width changes with the width of the instruction code; while the width of the data stream has doubled. Although in theory a 64-bit system can process twice the amount of data in one clock cycle as a 32-bit system, there is usually a gap between theory and reality.

It should be noted that the CPU not only needs registers with a wide enough bit width, but also a sufficient number of registers to ensure large amounts of data processing. Therefore, in order to accommodate more data, the registers and internal data channels must also be doubled, so the number of registers in a 64-bit CPU is generally twice that of a 32-bit CPU.

However, although the number of register bits has increased, the instruction registers for executing instructions are all the same, that is, the data flow is doubled but the instruction flow remains unchanged. In addition, increasing the number of data bits can also expand the dynamic range. In the commonly used decimal system, you can only get up to 10 integers (in the case of one digit). This is because there are only 10 different symbols from 0 to 9 to express the corresponding meanings. If you want to express numbers above 10, you need to Add one digit and two digits (00-99) to represent 100 numbers.

The calculation formula of the decimal dynamic range can be obtained: DR=10^n (n represents the number of digits). In the binary system, we can get the corresponding formula: DR=2^n, then 32-bit can reach 2^32=4.3×109, and after upgrading to 64-bit, it can reach 2^64=1.8×1019. The dynamic range has been expanded by 4.3 billion times.

Tip: Expanding the dynamic range can improve the accuracy of the data in the register to a certain extent. For example, when using a 32-bit system to process meteorological simulation computing tasks, when the processed data exceeds the maximum dynamic range that 32-bit can provide, the system will appear such as Overflow (exceeding the largest positive integer) or Underflow (below the minimum Negative integer) error message, so the data in the register cannot be guaranteed to be accurate.

In addition to computing power, compared with 32-bit CPUs, the advantage of 64-bit CPUs is also reflected in the system's control of memory. Since addresses use special integers, an ALU (arithmetic logic unit) and registers of a 64-bit CPU can handle larger integers, which means larger addresses.

The maximum addressing space of traditional 32-bit CPU is 4GB, which makes many large-scale data processing programs that require large-capacity memory appear to be stretched thin at this time, forming a bottleneck in operating efficiency. The 64-bit processor can theoretically reach 18 million TB (1TB = 1024GB), which will be able to completely solve the bottleneck phenomenon encountered by 32-bit computing systems.

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