Phase-based cache reconfiguration for a highly-configurable two-level cache hierarchy

ABSTRACT

Phase-based tuning methodologies specialize system parameters for each application phase of execution. Parameters are varied during execution, as opposed to remaining fixed as in an application-based tuning methodology. Prior work and logic suggests phase-based tuning may provide significant savings over application-based tuning. We investigate this hypothesis using a detailed cache model and tune a highly-configurable cache on a per-phase basis compared to tuning once per application, and found phase-based tuning to yield improvements of up to 37% in performance and 20% in energy over application-based tuning. Furthermore, we extend previous phase-based tuning of a configurable cache by significantly increasing configurability and show 14% energy improvement compared to previous methods. In addition, we quantify the overhead imposed due to cache reconfiguration.

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INDEX TERMS

Primary Classification:
  B. Hardware
  B.3 MEMORY STRUCTURES
      B.3.2 Design Styles
          Subjects: Cache memories

General Terms:
Design

Keywords:
cache tuning, caches, configurable architecture, configurable caches, phase prediction, phase-based reconfiguration, phase-based tuning