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In computer architecture, 256-bit integers, memory addresses, or other data units are those that are 256 bits (32 octets) wide. Also, 256-bit central processing unit (CPU) and arithmetic logic unit (ALU) architectures are those that are based on registers , address buses , or data buses of that size.
In 8-bit CP/M versions it is located in the first 256 bytes of memory, hence its name. The equivalent structure in DOS is the Program Segment Prefix (PSP), a 256-byte (page-sized) structure, which is by default located exactly before offset 0 of the program's load segment, rather than in segment 0.
On most modern computers, this is an eight bit string. Because the definition of a byte is related to the number of bits composing a character, some older computers have used a different bit length for their byte. [2] In many computer architectures, the byte is the smallest addressable unit, the atom of addressability, say. For example, even ...
The zero-page, the first 256 bytes of memory that were used as pseudo-registers, could now be moved to any page in main memory using the B(ase page) register. The stack register was widened from 8 to 16-bits using a similar page register, SPH (stack pointer high), allowing the stack to be moved out of page one and to grow to larger sizes.
For instance, a computer said to be "32-bit" also usually allows 32-bit memory addresses; a byte-addressable 32-bit computer can address 2 32 = 4,294,967,296 bytes of memory, or 4 gibibytes (GiB). This allows one memory address to be efficiently stored in one word. However, this does not always hold true.
The size of a page depends on the context, and the significance of zero page memory versus higher addressed memory is highly dependent on machine architecture. For example, the Motorola 6800 and MOS Technology 6502 processor families treat the first 256 bytes of memory specially, [1] whereas many other processors do not.
Designers of these processors included a partial remedy known as "zero page" addressing. The initial 256 bytes of memory ($0000 – $00FF; a.k.a., page "0") could be accessed using a one-byte absolute or indexed memory address. This reduced instruction execution time by one clock cycle and instruction length by one byte.
1,000 bits (125 bytes) 2 10: kibibit (Kibit) 1,024 bits (128 bytes) - RAM capacity of the Atari 2600: 1,288 bits (161 bytes) – approximate maximum capacity of a standard magnetic stripe card: 2 11: 2,048 bits (256 bytes) – RAM capacity of the stock Altair 8800: 2 12: 4,096 bits (512 bytes)