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From: lindsay@MATHOM.GANDALF.CS.CMU.EDU (Donald Lindsay)
Newsgroups: comp.arch
Subject: Re: Intel 860 Architecture
Keywords: divide rrounding
Message-ID: <7326@pt.cs.cmu.edu>
Date: 13 Dec 89 16:17:41 GMT
References: <3818@convex.UUCP> <112400013@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu>
Organization: Carnegie-Mellon University, CS/RI
Lines: 13

In article <112400013@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu> afgg6490@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu writes:
>
>    Use of N-R reciprocal algorithms was set back quite a bit by
>IEEE FP's exactness requirements: a true remainder is needed for
>correct rounding. 

The i860 supports some IEEE things in software. That is, the logic is
in trap handlers, rather than on the chip. 

This software is not yet available for divide. So, multiplies and
adds can underflow, but divides can't.
-- 
Don		D.C.Lindsay 	Carnegie Mellon Computer Science