RISC: not necessarily ready for real time. (reduced instruction set computers in real-time applications) From: EDN | Date: March 8, 1990| Author: Vaughan, Jack | COPYRIGHT 1990 Reed Business Information. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan.  All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group.Copyright information

Reduced instruction set computing (RISC) devices eliminate all but the most essential microcoded instructions while integrating floating-point units, memory management units, cache memory, or other features. RISC chips are very fast but are not always suited for real-time applications because they rely heavily on optimizing compilers designed for Unix-based workstations. The drawbacks of RISC outweigh its speed in most embedded settings. Adding determinism to a RISC design is difficult becaus...