hardware multiply/divide functionality in CPUs

On 9 Mar 2011 at 1:50, Eric Smith wrote: Well, the CP1600/1610 saw considerable use in video games (Intellivision). It never was very fast and had some rather odd characteristics, such as a 10-bit instruction word (the upper 6 bits DB mode) weren't used, even though the memory interface was 16 bits. The iAPX-432 was essentially dead a-borning. I remember the Intel sales guy mentioning it a couple of times as the Next Big Thing, then later pushing the discussion to the 8086 as if I'd brought up an unsavory relative. And it was HUGELY expensive, by the time you got the entire chipset (ca. $1000 IIRC). I don't believe it ever saw deployment in any commercial product (I could be wrong, but I never saw one that used it, other than Intel's own development system). National couldn't get the PACE off the ground--it was 16-bit, slow, and took its own bus interface chips.. By the time you were done, you had something that ran about as fast as an 8085, used MOS- interface support chips and required 3 supplies and was far more awkward to program. I got my PACE at a Wescon show where National was having trouble giving the things away. Not to mention National's somewhat capricious support attitude toward their microprocessor line. There may have been a hobbyist system that used the PACE or it's successor; I'm not sure. It was probably embedded in a few consumer/commercial products. The IMP-16 may have seen deployment in a minor hobbyist system, but its real value was as an embedded processor in things such as Sun auotomotive analyzers. As a hobbyist system, it probably was a bit daunting, being a multi-chip, microprogrammed CPU. The same story applies to the PPS-8. I believe that Diablo used the set in its dot matrix printer. It was also widely used in some arcade games as well as in automotive applications. So it found plenty of deployment in the consumer market. What piece of commercial non-military gear used the 9440? I remember when I was talking with the Fairchild rep, he kep trying to steer me toward the F8. It was frustrating. --Chuck