Difference between revisions of "SuperH"

From Sega Retro

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The '''SuperH''' (or '''SH''') is a microprocessor architecture. The SuperH core is [[RISC]] based and found in a large number of embedded systems.
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The '''SuperH''' (or '''SH''') is a family of microprocessors, originally developed by [[Hitachi]] during the 1990s as the successor to the H8 family, and now supported by Renesas. They were notable for their time as being capable, yet relatively cheap units with low power consumption.
  
The SuperH family was first developed by [[Hitachi]] as the successor to the H8 Family and was outsourced to the newly-formed SuperH Inc., owned by Hitachi and ST Microelectronics. SuperH Inc now sells the designs of the CPU cores.
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Sega has used SuperH chips as the central processing unit for a number of video game consoles and arcade machines:
  
The SH-5 design added a SIMD Instruction Set called SHmedia and also supports the SHcompact instruction set, equivalent to the user-mode parts of the SH-4 instruction set. This is similar to the Thumb Instruction Set of ARM architecture.
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*[[SH-1]]: Used on [[Sega Saturn]] to control the CD-drive and to check copy protection on game discs
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*[[SH-2]]: The main processor behind both the the [[Sega 32X]] and [[Sega Saturn]] (both consoles in fact use two chips in parallel)
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*[[SH-4]]: Used in the [[Sega Dreamcast]] and derivatives such as the [[NAOMI]] and [[NAOMI 2]]
  
The older designs are now supported and sold by [http://www.renesas.com/ Renesas].
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SH-3 and SH-5 chips also belong to the family, but were never utilised by Sega. Towards the early 2000s, the family had perhaps out-lived its potential in video gaming, however the technology continues to see widespread use in other forms of electronics.
  
The family includes:
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{{disambig}}
 
 
* [[SH-1]] - 32-bit with maximum of 20MHz. (As used on [[Sega Saturn]] to control the CD-drive and to check the Copy Protection on the game's CD)
 
* [[SH-2]] - 32-bit with up to 28.7MHz/ (As used in the [[Sega 32X]] and [[Sega Saturn]])
 
* SH-3 - 32-bit with up to 200MHz. This spring introduced a memory management unit to the SH family. (As used in many [[Windows CE]] devices)
 
* [[SH-4]] - 32-bit dual-issue core with a 128-bit vector FPU. (As used in the [[Dreamcast]] and on some Sega [[arcade]] machines such as the [[NAOMI]] and [[NAOMI 2]])
 
* SH-5 - 64-bit core with a 128-bit vector FPU (64 32-bit registers) and an integer unit which includes the SIMD support and 63 64-bit registers. (The 64th register is hard-wired to zero.)
 
 
 
Examples include ST Microelectronics' ST40 or Hitachi's SH-4.
 
 
 
==Distinctions==
 
* Low price
 
* Low power consumption
 
 
 
==External links==
 
* http://www.superh.com
 
* http://www.renesas.com
 
Linux for SuperH
 
* http://www.sh-linux.org
 
* http://linuxdc.sourceforge.net
 
* [http://www.shlinux.com/ MPC Data SHLinux support]
 
NetBSD on SuperH
 
* http://www.netbsd.org/Ports/sh3/
 
* http://www.netbsd.org/Ports/sh5/
 
Programmer Resources
 
* [http://info.sonicretro.org/images/8/84/SH-1_SH-2_CPU_Core_Architecture.pdf SH-1 and SH-2 Programmer's Reference Manual]
 
* [http://info.sonicretro.org/images/6/61/SH-4_32-bit_CPU_Core_Architecture.pdf SH-4 Programmer's Reference Manual]
 
 
 
[[Category:Microchips]]
 

Revision as of 16:17, 20 October 2016

The SuperH (or SH) is a family of microprocessors, originally developed by Hitachi during the 1990s as the successor to the H8 family, and now supported by Renesas. They were notable for their time as being capable, yet relatively cheap units with low power consumption.

Sega has used SuperH chips as the central processing unit for a number of video game consoles and arcade machines:

SH-3 and SH-5 chips also belong to the family, but were never utilised by Sega. Towards the early 2000s, the family had perhaps out-lived its potential in video gaming, however the technology continues to see widespread use in other forms of electronics.



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