Clock Speed: Difference between revisions

There'sMostly a new{{when}}a subject of research or specialized applications, there is a type of CPU called ''clockless'' CPUs. Where in a clocked CPU the CPU's components use the clock's signal to synchronize their activity, in a clockless CPU the components talk to each other to coordinate and synchronize their activity. A clockless CPU is capable of greater speeds than a clocked CPU, since the clock speed of a clocked CPU is limited by the worst case scenario (the slowest possible response time of the slowest component), but CPUs rarely deal with the worst case scenario, and most components will get their work done before the next clock tick comes; the time the components spend sitting there waiting for the next clock tick is time they could have spent actually doing something if they were in a clockless CPU. On the other hand, a clockless CPU is a lot trickier to design than a clocked one, and the massive amounts already existing software which helps humans design CPUs are geared towards designing clocked CPUs.