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Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watnot!watmath!clyde!rutgers!princeton!allegra!alice!ark
From: ark@alice.UUCP
Newsgroups: comp.arch
Subject: Re: 64 Vs 32
Message-ID: <6743@alice.uUCp>
Date: Tue, 24-Mar-87 13:37:09 EST
Article-I.D.: alice.6743
Posted: Tue Mar 24 13:37:09 1987
Date-Received: Thu, 26-Mar-87 06:21:41 EST
References: <3810013@nucsrl.UUCP> <28200016@ccvaxa> <1500@masscomp.UUCP>
Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories, Liberty Corner NJ
Lines: 13
Keywords: 370 64 bits

In article <1500@masscomp.UUCP>, hank@masscomp.UUCP (Hank Cohen) writes:
> Well I haven't got a POO here just my trusty yellow card, the System
> 370 Reference Summary, but I don't remember any 64 bit integer
> operations on system 370.  There are decimal operations that can go up
> to 16 digits or 8 bytes, mabe more I never actually used them, but
> integer operations are limited to 32 bits.

True, more or less.  There are 64-bit shift instructions.  Moreover,
it is very easy to simulate a 64-bit add or subtract (3 instructions).
Multiply and divide are a good deal harder.

In general, the 370 architecture supports 64-bit arithmetic
about as well as the 68000 supports 32-bit arithmetic.