Patent ID: 8271766

Claim:
A method comprising: receiving an inter-register copy instruction to copy data of a first register to a second register, the inter-register copy instruction being a vector processing-type instruction; in response to receiving the inter-register copy instruction, reserving performance of the inter-register copy instruction within a reservation mechanism such that the performance of the inter-register copy instruction is not achieved immediately after the inter-register copy instruction has been received; after receiving the inter-register copy instruction, receiving one or more other instructions; performing the one or more other instructions; after performing the one or more other instructions, receiving a write instruction related to one or more of the first register and the second register, the write instruction being a mask arithmetic and logic operation instruction that controls an arithmetic and logic operation in accordance with a mask bit in relation to the one or more of the first register and the second register; in response to receiving the write instruction, determining that the performance of the inter-register copy instruction was previously reserved and not yet achieved; and, in response to determining that the performance of the inter-register copy instruction was previously reserved within the reservation mechanism and not yet achieved, performing the inter-register copy instruction simultaneously with the write instruction, such that the write instruction and the inter-register copy instruction are performed simultaneously even though the write instruction is not immediately adjacent to the inter-register copy instruction in a receiving order, but rather the one or more other instructions separate the write instruction from the inter-register copy instruction in the receiving order, such that execution time required for the inter-register copy instruction is effectively concealed because the inter-register copy instruction is performed simultaneously with the write instruction in that execution time of the write instruction masks the execution time of the inter-register copy instruction where the execution time of the write instruction is at least as great as the execution time of the inter-register copy instruction, and execution of the inter-register copy instruction is intentionally delayed so as to occur simultaneously with execution of the write instruction.