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Chapter 1 Introduction to the 80386


The 80386 is an advanced 32-bit microprocessor optimized for multitasking operating systems and designed for applications needing very high performance. The 32-bit registers and data paths support 32-bit addresses and data types. The processor can address up to four gigabytes of physical memory and 64 terabytes (2^(46) bytes) of virtual memory. The on-chip memory-management facilities include address translation registers, advanced multitasking hardware, a protection mechanism, and paged virtual memory. Special debugging registers provide data and code breakpoints even in ROM-based software.


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