NEXGEN DETAILS SIXTH GENERATION NX686 PROCESSOR TECHNOLOGY

First Nx686 Processor Silicon Demonstration Highlights Industry's Most
Advanced X86 Processor; Outshines Pentium Pro Up to Two-to-One on Existing
Applications

MILPITAS, California, October 10, 1995 - NexGen, Inc. (Nasdaq: NXGN) today
presented details of the technology for its sixth generation x86 processor
family at the 8th Annual Microprocessor Forum in San Jose, California. The
Nx686 processor, shown running Microsoft Windows on first silicon, is
designed for the highest levels of performance, yet will be targeted for
the mainstream, high-volume personal computer market. 

"The Nx686 product family is tile next step in the Company's commitment to
leadership in x86 processing solutions," said Vinod Dham, NexGen's Chief
Operating Officer. "The Nx686 processor builds upon many of the
technological firsts that NexGen pioneered with its Nx586 processor. We
are targeting to have this advanced x86 solution in the timeframe the
Pentium Pro is projected to be available to the mainstream PC
marketplace." 

Featured as the Forum's "mystery guest", Greg Favor, NexGen's Director of
Nx686 Processor Development, highlighted some of the processor's primary
goals. Among these are low cost sixth generation performance on both
existing 16-bit and new 32-bit code, acceleration of multimedia
algorithms, low power for portable applications, and configurability for
cost/performance tradeoffs. 

SUPERIOR PERFORMANCE

NexGen focused on speeding up both 16-bit and 32-bit "real code" in the
market. Performance estimates for the processor are up to twice the
performance on 16-bit applications than those announced for Intel's
Pentium Pro, and up to 33 percent higher on 32-bit code. 

The Nx686 processor is a single-chip x86-compatible superscalar processor
with approximately six million transistors. Targeted to be initially
available at 180MHz, it will be manufactured using IBM Microelectronics
advanced 0.35u, 5 layer metal CMOS production process. 

The Nx686 processor builds upon the RISC86 Microarchitecture pioneered in
NexGen's Nx586 processor. The Nx686 processor extends this RISC86
microarchitecture by decoding multiple x86 instructions per clock cycle
which are fed into seven execution units. These consist of two integer
execution units, one floating point, one multimedia, one memory load, one
memory store, and one branch execution unit. Advanced computer
architecture techniques of speculative out-of-order execution and
two-level branch prediction are used for increased performance. 

In order to feed the high speed execution units, the Nx686 processor
incorporates the industry's most advanced cache. The on-chip L1 caches
consist of a 16KB instruction cache and a 32KB data cache. Like the Nx586
processor, the Nx686 processor has an integrated L2 cache controller with
a private but, to off-chip SRAMs, allowing the L2 cache memory to operate
at the same speed as the Nx686 processor. The L2 cache size can be as
large as 2MB. 

TARGETED AT MAINSTREAM PC MARKET

From the onset, the Nx686 processor is targeted to be used in high volume
mainstream PCs in both commercial and home markets. The Nx686 processor
will incorporate a multimedia execution unit for acceleration of
multimedia algorithms and low power system management features for
portable PCs. 

The die size is projected to be smaller than Intel's announced die size for
the Pentium Pro, offering the potential for significantly lower costs. In
addition, the L2 cache is designed to be used with off-the-shelf
synchronous pipelined burst SRAMs. Such SRAMs are commodity products, with
wide availability, and thus have the potential to be lower in cost than
Pentium Pro's announced internal, single-chip SRAM which has an expensive
dual cavity package. The L2 cache was designed to offer system designers
programmable configurations which allow for a range of price/performance
PCs. 

The Nx686 processor is supported by the same NxPCI/NxMC chipsets that are
currently used in Nx586 based systems. 

NexGen, Inc. (Nasdaq: NXGN) develops and utilizes industry-leading
processor technologies to deliver high performance x86 processors to
mainstream PC users. The Milpitas, California-based company currently
holds many patents for its leading edge x86 processor technology and has
several more patents in process. For product information, call
1-800-8NEXGEN (1-800-863-9436) or (408) 435-0202, or you can reach us on
the Web at http://www.nexgen.com. 

NexGen Inc
1623 Buckeye Drive
Milpitas, CA 95035-7423
408-435-0202,  fax 408-435-0262
 
 =========================================================
 From the 'New Product News' Electronic News Service on...
 AOL (Keyword = New Products) and Delphi (GO COMP PROD)
 =========================================================
 This information was processed from data provided by the
 company/author mentioned. For additional details, please
 contact them directly at the address/phone# indicated.
 Trademarks are the property of their respective owners.
 =========================================================
 All submissions for this service should be addressed to:
 BAKER ENTERPRISES,  20 Ferro Dr,  Sewell, NJ  08080  USA
 Email: rbakerpc@delphi.com  -or- RBakerPC (on AOL/Delphi)
 =========================================================
