This chapter consists of a general description of the MC68020, the first 32-bit microprocessor within the Motorola M68000 family. It is a clear and comprehensive introduction to the main capabilities of the MC68020. The reader should have a background in microprocessor-based systems.

The author presents the architecture, the data organization, the addressing capabilities, an instruction set summary, a signal description, the operand transfer mechanism, the cache, the coprocessors, memory management, development system support, and software support.

Finally, the execution time of the microprocessor is compared with that of other microprocessors for several EDN benchmarks. Both its high performance and its compatibility with the other members of the M68000 family are emphasized.