Rating: 
Summary: the worst reasoned text I've ever seen
Review: As a text for Computer Organization, this is simply the worst thing I've ever seen. Explanations are top-down but eventually rest on lower level facts unkown to the student or unmentioned by the authors. (e.g. 'explaing' PC-relative addressing with a 1 sentence explanation of what the PC is). The effect is heightened by the frequent uses of straw-men and half-truths which must later be emended, further confusing the student. Having written assembly and then taught assembly and assemblers for 20 years, I can read paragraphs and even pages before discovering what the authors mean to say. It can take half an hour to discover that something in a summarizing list or table has not yet been explained. I hope I am mis-guided and that this text was never meant for the course (Computer Organization) in which it is so widely used.
Rating: 
Summary: I need detail solution book for its exercise!
Review: Can u tell me if this text book has a detail answer book to its exercis ? I need to know... Please mail me about my question... Thank you so much
Rating: 
Summary: Could be 5 times shorter
Review: Good book but could have been 200 pages not 1000. Authors very often explain very primitive and easy to understand concepts in great details. Even though the material is good and both authors are incredibly knowledgable in the field, I simply didn't have time to read huge chapters on relatively obvious concepts.The book is good for freshmen level CS majors and beginners, but for junior/senior EE/CE majors I'd suggest to read the more advanced book from these authors
Rating:
Summary: Outstanding Coverage of Topics
Review: Great Book, but you must put a lot of time into it to get full use. Covers a lot, but not in full detail, leaving a lot of work for YOU. Buy it if you are serious on learning Comp Architecture
Rating:
Summary: Must Buy
Review: Hell, this is one of the best books on computer architecture. This book has been written by a master teacher: Hennessey is one of the popular teachers in Stanford. Starts with Instructional set and goes on to datapaths, pipelining, I/O devices and then goes over to some advanced topics. All the topics are covered and are mostly up to date with current trends in computer.
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Summary: Complicated and confusing
Review: How in the world can you understand this book.
This is too technical and extremely hard to follow.
The exercise in the chapter doesn't even relate to
the content in the chapter.
Rating: 
Summary: Depth and Breadth, both served with a smile
Review: I am a CS major and recently studied this book in the computer architecture course. The book does not presume prior logic design or assembly language experience. The writing style is quite lively, unlike the dry tone of most science authors. The book is a good mix of theory and history, and has a distinctive 'Fallacies and Pitfalls' section at the end of each chapter that lays to rest the common misconceptions and ill-practices pertaining to the topic of that chapter. The authors are quite well known in the computer design field and anything they say is authoritative and current. Unlike many other books on computer design and architecture, the authors follow a unified approach and build a RISC machine chapter by chapter, introducing new concepts gradually and thoroughly. The detail is remarkable, and the authors have favoured explaining in depth a particular, simple architecture rather than going for a sort of a survey of all the prevalent famous architectures. I found this to be very useful in understanding the basic concepts. Nevertheless, there is a 'Real Stuff' section at the end of most chapters to give one a flavour of full-blown, real-world computer architectures. The diagrams in the book progress from simple to very detailed for a particular portion of the architecture. The chapter on assembly language of MIPS is also very good. Some reviewers have complained about the progressive style of the book, whereby the authors continuously refine an idea. I found it helpful on the first read, as it takes you gradually to the final design. I am sure if they had not done this, students would then have complained about the book being too difficult. However, the book *is* verbose in places. Also, it would have been better to use more headings and other visual aids to categorise and demarcate topics. The exercises are pretty good and the complaint about the examples not having enough mathematics is really not valid, as that is the level of *mathematics* applicable to computer architecture. Overall, an interesting book that I enjoyed and benefitted from a lot.
Rating:
Summary: A good book if you have the time.
Review: I am an aspiring programmer doing an MSc CS during the evening. I have a background in Finance/Economics. The book would suit a full-time student of CS but for those who are already working it is too long and laborious to read. Always clear but very time consuming. Not simplistic at all - the books goes into subjects that more introductory books leave out. Overall a SUPERB book if you don't have anything else to do for the next 6 months and want to learn things you don't need to know.
Rating:
Summary: Good book
Review: I am doing the exercises at the end of each chapter, but I don't know if I am right or wrong. Are there any answers to these questions so I know where I stand? If there are, please let me know as soon as possible.
Rating:
Summary: Terrible
Review: I think it's a terrible book. Especially for beginners, I use this book at University in combination with the MIPSIM (a mips-architecture simulator) which is even worse. It's just much too complicated and I think i'll never (have to) use this information in a later job.
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