Adaptive prefetching for shared cache based chip multiprocessors

Mahmut Kandemir, Yuanrui Zhang, Ozcan Ozturk

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingConference contribution

7 Scopus citations

Abstract

Chip multiprocessors (CMPs) present a unique scenario for software data prefetching with subtle tradeoffs between memory bandwidth and performance. In a shared L2 based CMP, multiple cores compete for the shared on-chip cache space and limited off-chip pin bandwidth. Purely software based prefetching techniques tend to increase this contention, leading to degradation in performance. In some cases, prefetches can become harmful by kicking out useful data from the shared cache whose next usage is earlier than the prefetched data, and the fraction of such harmful prefetches usually increases when we increase the number of cores used for executing a multi-threaded application code. In this paper, we propose two complementary techniques to address the problem of harmful prefetches in the context of shared L2 based CMPs. These techniques, namely, suppressing select data prefetches (if they are found to be harmful) and pinning select data in the L2 cache (if they are found to be frequent victim of harmful prefetches), are evaluated in this paper using two embedded application codes. Our experiments demonstrate that these two techniques are very effective in mitigating the impact of harmful prefetches, and as a result, we extract significant benefits from software prefetching even with large core counts.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Title of host publicationProceedings - 2009 Design, Automation and Test in Europe Conference and Exhibition, DATE '09
PublisherInstitute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers Inc.
Pages773-778
Number of pages6
ISBN (Print)9783981080155
DOIs
StatePublished - 2009
Event2009 Design, Automation and Test in Europe Conference and Exhibition, DATE '09 - Nice, France
Duration: Apr 20 2009Apr 24 2009

Publication series

NameProceedings -Design, Automation and Test in Europe, DATE
ISSN (Print)1530-1591

Other

Other2009 Design, Automation and Test in Europe Conference and Exhibition, DATE '09
Country/TerritoryFrance
CityNice
Period4/20/094/24/09

All Science Journal Classification (ASJC) codes

  • General Engineering

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