• DocumentCode
    755725
  • Title

    Computational aspects of the Pentium affair

  • Author

    Coe, Tim ; Mathisen, Terje ; Moler, Cleve ; Pratt, Vaughan

  • Author_Institution
    Vitesse Semicond. Corp., Camarillo, CA, USA
  • Volume
    2
  • Issue
    1
  • fYear
    1995
  • Firstpage
    18
  • Lastpage
    30
  • Abstract
    The Pentium affair has been widely publicized. It started with an obscure defect in the floating-point unit of Intel Corporation´s flagship Pentium microprocessor. This is the story of how the Pentium floating-point division problem was discovered, and what you need to know about the maths and computer engineering involved before deciding whether to replace the chip, install the workaround provided here, or do nothing. The paper also discusses broader issues of computational correctness
  • Keywords
    floating point arithmetic; microprocessor chips; Intel Corporation; Pentium affair; Pentium microprocessor; computational aspects; computational correctness; computer engineering; floating-point division problem; floating-point unit; Application software; Computer aided instruction; Floating-point arithmetic; Internet; Marketing and sales; Mathematics; Microprocessors; Silicon; Surges; TV;
  • fLanguage
    English
  • Journal_Title
    Computational Science & Engineering, IEEE
  • Publisher
    ieee
  • ISSN
    1070-9924
  • Type

    jour

  • DOI
    10.1109/99.372929
  • Filename
    372929