3DNow! is an extension to the x86 instruction set

Instruction set

An instruction set, or instruction set architecture , is the part of the computer architecture related to programming, including the native data types, instructions, registers, addressing modes, memory architecture, interrupt and exception handling, and external I/O...

 developed by Advanced Micro Devices

Advanced Micro Devices

Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. or AMD is an American multinational semiconductor company based in Sunnyvale, California, that develops computer processors and related technologies for commercial and consumer markets...

 (AMD). It adds single instruction multiple data

SIMD

Single instruction, multiple data , is a class of parallel computers in Flynn's taxonomy. It describes computers with multiple processing elements that perform the same operation on multiple data simultaneously...

  (SIMD) instructions to the base x86 instruction set, enabling it to perform simple vector processing, which improves the performance of many graphic-intensive applications. The first microprocessor to implement 3DNow! was the AMD K6-2

AMD K6-2

The K6-2 was an x86 microprocessor introduced by AMD on May 28, 1998, and available in speeds ranging from 266 to 550 MHz. An enhancement of the original K6, the K6-2 introduced AMD's 3D-Now! SIMD instruction set, featured a larger 64 KiB Level 1 cache , and an upgraded system-bus interface...

, which was introduced in 1998. When the application was appropriate this raised the speed by about 2-4 times.