jump trace buffer

1 definition found

jump trace buffer - Free On-line Dictionary of Computing (26 May 2007) :

  jump trace buffer
  JTB
  
     (JTB) A feature of some pipelined processors (e.g. Amulet,
     Pentium?) which stores the source and destination addresses
     of the last few branch instuctions executed.  When a branch
     instruction is fetched, its source is looked for in the JTB.
     If found, the next instuction fetch will be from the previous
     destination of that branch.  If it turns out that the branch
     shouldn't have been taken this time, then the pipeline is
     flushed.  This means that in a tight loop it is not
     necessary to flush the pipeline every time you jump back to
     the start.
  
     (1994-12-15)