Need explanation about word length of a CPU

Asked By mila james 30 points N/A Posted on - 03/08/2012

Hi guys ,

Please someone explain me what is the meaning of word length of a CPU

Wikipedia says :" The size of a word is reflected in many aspects of a computer's structure and operation; the majority of the registers in a processor are usually word sized and the largest piece of data that can be transferred to and from the working memory in a single operation is a word in many (not all) architectures."

But I have no any clear idea about it

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Answered By Genebraldo Stan 15 points N/A #94562

Need explanation about word length of a CPU

Hi Mila James,

Word length" or "Word size" of a CPU is simply the size of the data that the processor can process at a time.

Naturally, the different CPU processors support different wordlengths like 32bit or 64bit. For example, 32bit processor means  the maximum register size of the word that the processor can handle is 32 bits.

In older version CPUs, max word length is about 16bits. Currently latest  Intel and AMD processors supports word lengths as long as 64bits.

Also 64bit processors can run 32bit programs or applications since most of those processors are backward-compatible.

But the same for the reverse process is not possible.

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• Posted on - 03/08/2012
• Question Category: CPU Processors