PIC18LF452 Microchip Technology, PIC18LF452 Datasheet - Page 42

• Manufacturer Part Number: PIC18LF452
• Description: (PIC18LFxx2) Enhanced FLASH Microcontrollers
• Manufacturer: Microchip Technology

PIC18FXX2
4.6
An “Instruction Cycle” consists of four Q cycles (Q1,
Q2, Q3 and Q4). The instruction fetch and execute are
pipelined such that fetch takes one instruction cycle,
while decode and execute takes another instruction
cycle. However, due to the pipelining, each instruction
effectively executes in one cycle. If an instruction
causes the program counter to change (e.g., GOTO)
then two cycles are required to complete the instruction
(Example 4-2).
EXAMPLE 4-2:
4.7
The program memory is addressed in bytes. Instruc-
tions are stored as two bytes or four bytes in program
memory. The Least Significant Byte of an instruction
word is always stored in a program memory location
with an even address (LSB =’0’). Figure 4-5 shows an
example of how instruction words are stored in the pro-
gram memory. To maintain alignment with instruction
boundaries, the PC increments in steps of 2 and the
LSB will always read ’0’ (see Section 4.4).
FIGURE 4-5:
DS39564B-page 40
1. MOVLW 55h
2. MOVWF PORTB
3. BRA
4. BSF
5. Instruction @ address SUB_1
All instructions are single cycle, except for any program branches. These take two cycles since the fetch instruction
is “flushed” from the pipeline while the new instruction is being fetched and then executed.
Instruction Flow/Pipelining
Instructions in Program Memory
SUB_1
PORTA, BIT3 (Forced NOP)
Instruction 1:
Instruction 2:
Instruction 3:
INSTRUCTION PIPELINE FLOW
INSTRUCTIONS IN PROGRAM MEMORY
Fetch 1
Program Memory
Byte Locations
T
MOVLW
GOTO
MOVFF
CY
0
Execute 1
055h
000006h
123h, 456h
Fetch 2
T
CY
1
Execute 2
Fetch 3
T
CY
LSB = 1
2
0Fh
EFh
F0h
C1h
F4h
A fetch cycle begins with the program counter (PC)
incrementing in Q1.
In the execution cycle, the fetched instruction is latched
into the “Instruction Register” (IR) in cycle Q1. This
instruction is then decoded and executed during the
Q2, Q3, and Q4 cycles. Data memory is read during Q2
(operand read) and written during Q4 (destination
write).
The CALL and GOTO instructions have an absolute pro-
gram memory address embedded into the instruction.
Since instructions are always stored on word bound-
aries, the data contained in the instruction is a word
address. The word address is written to PC<20:1>,
which accesses the desired byte address in program
memory. Instruction #2 in Figure 4-5 shows how the
instruction “GOTO 000006h’ is encoded in the program
memory. Program branch instructions which encode a
relative address offset operate in the same manner.
The offset value stored in a branch instruction repre-
sents the number of single word instructions that the
PC will be offset by. Section 20.0 provides further
details of the instruction set.
Execute 3
Fetch 4
T
CY
LSB = 0
3
55h
03h
00h
23h
56h
Fetch SUB_1 Execute SUB_1
Flush (NOP)
Word Address
T
CY
000000h
000002h
000004h
000006h
000008h
00000Ah
00000Ch
00000Eh
000010h
000012h
000014h
2002 Microchip Technology Inc.
4
T
CY
5