Computer Architecture #

To paraphrase the course descriptions: At the end, I understood everything that happened to computer hardware from the time the power button was pressed.

We covered all sorts of topics:

Pipelined processors and hazards
Memory Hierarchy and Cache Types
Multi-threading
Multi-processor coherence
IO and Storage
Basic Networking

I took a total of 3 classes in this area, ECE 3058 (Computer Architecture), CS 3220 (Processor Design), and CS 4290 (Advanced COmputer Architecture).

As I moved onto the more advanced topics, I learned

Branch Prediction
VLIW Processors
Out-of-Order Processors
Super-scalar Processors
GPU Architecture
and more that I am forgetting right now

These courses were surprisingly hands on. The moment we covered something like a pipelined processor, I had to implement a 5-stage pipelined processor in Verilog along with a branch-predictor.

For some of the more complex hardware designs like branch predictors, out-of-order processor, or caches, I did software emulation of designs in C/C++. At the end, I would do a design space exploration of my design against various parameters like cache size, predictor size, etc, to find the optimal design against a set of benchmarks.