ARM Architecture

• ARM: Advanced RISC Machine

• ARM is RISC based processor ( Load and Store)
• 32 bit processor
• Multiple manufactures are producing ARM
processors by getting license from ARM corp.
• ARM is not manufacturing any processor ,they
give license, with license other companies can
produce arm based processors.
• Load and Store architecture:
– Data processing operations are only between registers and
does not involve any memory operations.
• It is a 32 bit processor and also has variants of 16 bit
and 8 bit architecture.
• So there are 16 bit ( THUMB) and 8 bit (Jazelle)
variants are embedded into 32 bit processor.
• ARM has also got very good speed vs power
consumption ratio.
• High speed : Millions of instructions per second (MIPS)
• Where we come across ARM processors
– Consumer electronics products and portable
devices such as smart phones ,Tablets ,
Multimedia players etc.
– Low power consumption and small size helps to
use in portable devices.
ARM Architecture
• There are 13 general purpose registers(r0-r12)
available for programmers to use.
• All registers are 32 bit in size
• There are 3 special function registers available
r13 (stack pointer) , r14(Link register)
r15(program counter)
• When a subroutine is called the return address is
stored( for reuse after subroutine execution is
over ) in link register
CPSR (Current Program Status Register)

• Store the status of current program through

flags…
• The control bits :
– The bottom eight bits of a Program Status Register (PSR),
incorporating I, F, T and M[4:0], are known collectively as the
control bits.
– The control bits change when an exception arises and can be
altered by software only when the processor is in a privileged
mode.
– Interrupt disable bits I and F are the interrupt disable bits: I bit
Disables IRQ interrupts when it is set.
– F bit Disables FIQ interrupts when it is set.
– T = 0 Indicates ARM execution.
– T = 1 Indicates Thumb execution.