CHAPTER 3 CPU FUNCTIONS
User’s Manual U16896EJ2V0UD
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3.2.1 Program register set
The program register set includes general-purpose registers and a program counter.
(1) General-purpose registers (r0 to r31)
Thirty-two general-purpose registers, r0 to r31, are available. All of these registers can be used as a data
variable or address variable.
However, r0 and r30 are implicitly used by instructions and care must be exercised when using these registers.
r0 always holds 0 and is used for operations that use 0 and offset 0 addressing. r30 is used as a base pointer
when performing memory access with the SLD and SST instructions.
Also, r1, r3 to r5, and r31 are implicitly used by the assembler and C compiler. Therefore, before using these
registers, their contents must be saved so that they are not lost, and they must be restored to the registers
after the registers have been used. There are cases when r2 is used by the real-time OS. If r2 is not used by
the real-time OS, r2 can be used as a variable register.
Table 3-1. Program Registers
Name Usage
Operation
r0
Zero register
Always holds 0
r1 Assembler-reserved
register Working
register
for
generating 32-bit immediate
r2
Address/data variable register (when r2 is not used by the real-time OS to be used)
r3
Stack pointer
Used to generate stack frame when function is called
r4
Global pointer
Used to access global variable in data area
r5
Text pointer
Register to indicate the start of the text area (area for placing program code)
r6 to r29
Address/data variable register
r30
Element pointer
Base pointer when memory is accessed
r31
Link pointer
Used by compiler when calling function
PC
Program counter
Holds instruction address during program execution
(2) Program counter (PC)
This register holds the address of the instruction under execution. The lower 26 bits of this register are valid,
and bits 31 to 26 are fixed to 0. If a carry occurs from bit 25 to bit 26, it is ignored.
Bit 0 is fixed to 0, and branching to an odd address cannot be performed.
31
26 25
1 0
PC
Fixed to 0
Instruction address under execution
0
After reset
00000000H