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32bitWikipedia,thefreeencyclopedia

32bit
FromWikipedia,thefreeencyclopedia

Incomputerarchitecture,32bitintegers,memory
addresses,orotherdataunitsarethosethatareatmost
32bits(4octets)wide.Also,32bitCPUandALU
architecturesarethosethatarebasedonregisters,
addressbuses,ordatabusesofthatsize.32bitisalsoa
termgiventoagenerationofmicrocomputersinwhich
32bitmicroprocessorsarethenorm.
A32bitregistercanstore232differentvalues.The
signedrangeofintegervaluesthatcanbestoredin32
bitsis2,147,483,648(1231)through2,147,483,647
(2311)theunsignedrangeis0through
4,294,967,295(2321).Since232is4,294,967,296,a
processorwith32bitmemoryaddressescandirectly
access4GiBofbyteaddressablememory.

Bit
1 4 8 12 16 18 24 26 31 32 36 48 60 64 128 256 512
Application
16 32 64
Floatingpointprecision
1 2 4
Floatingpointdecimalprecision
32 64 128

Contents
1Somehistoricalandtechnicalperspective
2Architectures
332bitapplication
4Images
532bitfileformat
6Seealso
7References
8Externallinks

Somehistoricalandtechnicalperspective
Memoryaswellasotherdigitalelectroniccircuitsandwiringwasexpensiveduringthefirstdecadesof32
bitarchitectures(the1960stothe1980s).Older32bitprocessorfamilies(orsimplerandcheapervariants
thereof)couldthereforehavemanycompromisesandlimitationsinordertocutcosts.Thiscouldbe16bit
ALU,forinstance,orexternal(orinternal)busesnarrowerthan32bits,limitingmemorysizeordemanding
morecyclesforinstructionfetch,executionand/orwriteback.
Despitethis,suchprocessorscouldbelabeled"32bit"basedonthefactthattheystillhad32bitregisters
andinstructionsabletomanipulate32bitquantities.Asanexamplefromthelate1970s,theoriginal
Motorola68000wasa16bitbaseddesignwith32bitregistersanda32bitbasedinstructionset.Such
designsweresometimesreferredtoas"16/32bit".
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However,theoppositeisoftentruefornewer32bitdesigns.Forexample,thePentiumProprocessorisa
32bitmachine,buttheexternaladdressbusis36bitswide,givingalargeraddressspacethan4GB,and
theexternaldatabusis64bitswide,primarilyinordertopermitamoreefficientprefetchofinstructions
anddata.[1]

Architectures
Prominent32bitinstructionsetarchitecturesusedingeneralpurposecomputingincludetheIBM
System/360andits32bitsuccessors,theDECVAX,theNS320xx,theMotorola68000family,theIntel
IA3232bitversionofthex86architecture,andthe32bitversionsoftheARM,SPARC,MIPS,PowerPC
andPARISCarchitectures.32bitinstructionsetarchitecturesusedforembeddedcomputingincludethe
68000familyandColdFire,x86,ARM,MIPS,PowerPC,andInfineonTriCorearchitectures.

32bitapplication
Onthex86architecture,a32bitapplicationnormallymeanssoftwarethattypically(notnecessarily)uses
the32bitlinearaddressspace(orflatmemorymodel)possiblewiththe80386andlaterchips.Inthis
context,thetermcameaboutbecauseDOS,MicrosoftWindowsandOS/2[2]wereoriginallywrittenforthe
8088/8086and/or80286,16bitmicroprocessorswithasegmentedaddressspacewhereprogramshadto
switchbetweensegmentstoreachmorethan64kilobytesofcodeand/ordata.Asthisisquitetime
consumingincomparisontoothermachineoperations,theperformancemaysuffer.Furthermore,
programmingwithsegmentstendtobecomecomplicatedspecialfarandnearkeywordsand/ormemory
modelshadtobeused(withcare),notonlyinassemblylanguagebutalsoinhighlevellanguagessuchas
Pascal,compiledBASIC,Fortran,C,etc.
The80386anditssuccessorsfullysupportthe16bitsegmentsofthe80286butalsosegmentsfor32bit
addressoffsets(usingthenew32bitwidthofthemainregisters).Ifthebaseaddressofall32bitsegments
issetto0,andsegmentregistersarenotusedexplicitly,thesegmentationcanbeforgottenandthe
processorappearsashavingasimplelinear32bitaddressspace.OperatingsystemslikeWindowsorOS/2
providethepossibilitytorun16bit(segmented)programsaswellas32bitprograms.Theformer
possibilityexistsforbackwardcompatibilityandthelatterisusuallymeanttobeusedfornewsoftware
development.

Images
Indigitalimages/pictures,32bitusuallyreferstoRGBAcolorspace24bittruecolorimageswithan8
bitalphachanneli.e.,8bitseachforred,green,blue,andtransparencyatotalof32bitsperpixel.Afew
othermuchmorerarelyusedimagesformatsalsorequire32bitsperpixel,suchasRGBEimageformat.
Indigitalimages,32bitsometimesreferstohighdynamicrangeimagingformatsthatuse32bitsper
channelatotalof96bitsperpixel.32bitperchannelimagesareusedtorepresentvaluesbrighterthan
whitethesevaluescanthenbeusedtomoreaccuratelyretainbrighthighlightswheneitherloweringthe
exposureoftheimageorwhenitisseenthroughadarkfilterordullreflection.

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Anexampleofthisisthereflectionseeninanoilslickeventhoughthereflectionisonlyafractionofthat
seeninamirrorsurface,thereflectionofhighlightscanstillbeseenasbrightwhiteareas,notdullgrey
shapes.

32bitfileformat
A32bitfileformatisabinaryfileformatforwhicheachelementaryinformationisdefinedon32bits(or4
Bytes).AnexampleofsuchaformatistheEnhancedMetafileFormat.

Seealso
16bit
64bit
Historyofvideogames(32bitera)
Word(datatype)
PhysicalAddressExtension(PAE)

References
1. Gwennap,Linley(16February1995)."IntelsP6UsesDecoupledSuperscalarDesign"(PDF).Microprocessor
Report.Retrieved3December2012.
2. TherewerealsovariantsofUNIXforthe80286.

ThisarticleisbasedonmaterialtakenfromtheFreeOnlineDictionaryofComputingpriorto1November
2008andincorporatedunderthe"relicensing"termsoftheGFDL,version1.3orlater.

Externallinks
HOWStuffWorks"HowBitsandByteswork"(http://computer.howstuffworks.com/bytes.htm)
KenColburnonLockerGnome.com:32BitVs.64BitWindows
(http://www.lockergnome.com/windows/2009/01/07/32bitvs64bitwindows/)
Retrievedfrom"https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=32bit&oldid=687130828"
Categories: Dataunit
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