addiu    $8,$0,-86  

A good answer might be:

Yes. The immediate operand -86 is sign-extended to 32 bits then added to a 32-bit zero. The sum (-86) is loaded into $8.

The Absent Subtract Immediate

You would expect that since there are add, addu, addi, addiu and since there are sub, subu that there would be subtract immediate instructions. But there are not. The add immediate instruction is used. To subtract 201 from register $10 using an immediate operand, do this:

addiu    $8,$10,-201    #  $8 <-- $10 - 201 

Say that we want to compute 5 × x - 74 where the value x is in register $8. MIPS has an integer multiply instruction, but let us say that we don't want to use it. How can 5 × x be done using the instructions you have seen so far?


QUESTION 12:

How could you compute 4 × $8 + $8 ?