In computer architecture, 26-bit integers, memory addresses, or other data units are those that are 26 bits wide, and thus can represent unsigned values up to 67,108,863. Two examples of computer processors that featured 26-bit memory addressing are certain second generation IBM System/370 mainframe computer models introduced in 1981 (and several subsequent models), which had 26-bit physical addresses but had only the same 24-bit virtual addresses as earlier models, and the first generations of ARM processors.
History
IBM System/370
As data processing needs continued to grow, IBM and their customers faced challenges directly addressing larger memory sizes. In what ended up being a short-term "emergency" solution, a pair of IBM...