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Text Errata
Page 154, Figure 9.9 the number 599 in the lower left should
be 524.
Pages 230-234
Laboratory Exercises for Chapter 13 The references to figures
and pages in the Patterson & Hennessy Computer Organization and Design
are for the second edition. A third edition was released Fall 2004 and
the numbers have all changed. The material on the MIPS processor design
can still be found in Chapters 5 and 6 although there is less material
in the third edition.
The errata listed below have been corrected in the second printing for Fall 2002.
New Altera UP 2 Board
Altera has just released a new board called the UP 2. This new board
is identical to the older UP 1X, but it is a new lower cost PCB layout.
Follow the instructions for a UP 1X board in the text and compile for a
FLEX 10K70 Device. The book's designs should work without problems.
Page 164
In Figure 10.3 (the keyboard number layout) the bottom row of keys
between the two shift keys have the numbers labeled as 31..40. They should
be 46..55.
Altera Software
The third printing of the second edition for Fall 2003 contains version 10.22 of the Altera Software on the CDROM. You must install 10.2, run the 10.2->10.22 upgrade program, and install the new driver to use the new ByteBlaster IIs (see instructions on CDROM). Old ByteBlasters should work with any version. New UP2 boards are shipping from Altera with ByteBlaster IIs. If you have a new ByteBlaster II the “II” is printed on side of the connector. If you have problems with an old (perhaps almost worn out) ByteBlaster running correctly in 10.22 you will find that 10.1 is also still on the CDROM.
The VHDL function call TO_STANDARDLOGICVECTOR works correctly only if the Altera VHDL compiler option is set to VHDL87 and not VHDL93. This option is stored in the project's *.acf file. To set or check the VHDL version options, activate the compiler window, click interfaces at the top command bar, and select VHDL netlist reader settings. To avoid possible problems, all TO_STANDARDLOGICVECTOR function calls have been replaced in the CDROM example designs so that they will compile with either VHDL version option.
Wintim Software
We recently found a couple of bugs in the Wintim assembler. A misspelled
instruction mnemonic does not always generate an error. A line with this
problem appears on the listing, but no machine code is generated for that
line. We suggest you scan the listing for any such lines. If you use a
second ORG directive, the listing file is correct but the MIF file just
keeps going to the next address (does not re-org the MIF address). You
can avoid a second ORG directive or edit the MIF file address to agree
with the listing file. We are looking into the problem, but fixing it is
a little more complex than one would think at first glance. Source code
is posted on the web, if anyone wants to try to fix it.
A beta version of Wintim
that generates a nicer listing when several macros are used is now available
along with a MIPS assembly example.
Quartus VHDL Projects from book
We may switch to Alteras Quartus software in a future version of the
book. Most VHDL from the book will run correctly in Quartus. VHDL models
that use memory such as the simple computer or MIPS model will require
changes, Quartus requires some registered LPM_RAM memory options. If you
want to use Quartus, Douglas Hodson at AFIT has ported the book's projects
to Quartus. They are posted at http://www.RetroMicro.com
A PDF explanation of changes to the code is available here.
Mouse VHDL code
J. P. David at the Universite de Monreal has suggested an improvement
to the mouse.vhd code in chapter 11. His modification adds some additional
enable signals and requires only one clock for all of the processes. We
have not seen any problems in this small design with clock skew, but this
modification requires only one clock, which is already on the global clock
buffer. Typically, any problems with clock skew would show up in the simulator
as setup & hold violations or unpredictable operation of the actual
circuit. If you would like a copy of his suggested changes, send us an
email request to the address listed on the bottom of the book's web site
homepage. In the third printing of the second edition for Fall 2003, the
new code is on the CDROM in the file mouse2.vhd.