Chapter 6: The Memory Hierarchy

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The Memory Hierarchy

6.1 Storage Technologies

6.1.1 Random Access Memory

Static RAM

Dynamic RAM

Conventional DRAMs

Aside A note on terminology

Memory Modules

Practice Problem 6.1 (solution page 696)

Enhanced DRAMs

Nonvolatile Memory

Aside Historical popularity of DRAM technologies

Accessing Main Memory

Aside A note on bus designs

6.1.2 Disk Storage

Disk Geometry

Disk Capacity

Aside How much is a gigabyte?

Practice Problem 6.2 (solution page 697)

Disk Operation

Practice Problem 6.3 (solution page 697)

Logical Disk Blocks

Practice Problem 6.4 (solution page 697)

Aside Formatted disk capacity

Connecting I/O Devices

Accessing Disks

Aside Advances in I/O bus designs

Aside Characteristics of a commercial disk drive

6.1.3 Solid State Disks

Practice Problem 6.5 (solution page 698)

6.1.4 Storage Technology Trends

(d) CPU trends

Practice Problem 6.6 (solution page 698)

6.2 Locality

Aside When cycle time stood still: The advent of multi-core processors

6.2.1 Locality of References to Program Data

6.2.2 Locality of Instruction Fetches

6.2.3 Summary of Locality

Practice Problem 6.7 (solution page 698)

Practice Problem 6.8 (solution page 699)

6.3 The Memory Hierarchy

6.3.1 Caching in the Memory Hierarchy

Aside Other memory hierarchies

Cache Hits

Cache Misses

Kinds of Cache Misses

Cache Management

6.3.2 Summary of Memory Hierarchy Concepts

6.4 Cache Memories

6.4.1 Generic Cache Memory Organization

Practice Problem 6.9 (solution page 699)

6.4.2 Direct-Mapped Caches

Set Selection in Direct-Mapped Caches

Line Matching in Direct-Mapped Caches

Word Selection in Direct-Mapped Caches

Line Replacement on Misses in Direct-Mapped Caches

Putting It Together: A Direct-Mapped Cache in Action

Conflict Misses in Direct-Mapped Caches

Aside Why index with the middle bits?

Practice Problem 6.10 (solution page 699)

Practice Problem 6.11 (solution page 699)

6.4.3 Set Associative Caches

Set Selection in Set Associative Caches

Line Matching and Word Selection in Set Associative Caches

Line Replacement on Misses in Set Associative Caches

6.4.4 Fully Associative Caches

Set Selection in Fully Associative Caches

Line Matching and Word Selection in Fully Associative Caches

Practice Problem 6.12 (solution page 699)

Practice Problem 6.13 (solution page 700)

Practice Problem 6.14 (solution page 700)

Practice Problem 6.15 (solution page 700)

Practice Problem 6.16 (solution page 701)

6.4.5 Issues with Writes

6.4.6 Anatomy of a Real Cache Hierarchy

6.4.7 Performance Impact of Cache Parameters

Impact of Cache Size

Impact of Block Size

Impact of Associativity

Impact of Write Strategy

6.5 Writing Cache-Friendly Code

Aside Cache lines, sets, and blocks: What’s the difference?

Practice Problem 6.17 (solution page 701)

Practice Problem 6.18 (solution page 702)

Practice Problem 6.19 (solution page 702)

Practice Problem 6.20 (solution page 702)

6.6 Putting It Together: The Impact of Caches on Program Performance

6.6.1 The Memory Mountain

Practice Problem 6.21 (solution page 702)

6.6.2 Rearranging Loops to Increase Spatial Locality

Web Aside MEM:BLOCKING Using blocking to increase temporal locality

6.6.3 Exploiting Locality in Your Programs

6.7 Summary

Bibliographic Notes

Homework Problems

6.22 ◆◆

6.23 ◆

6.24 ◆◆

6.25 ◆

6.26 ◆

6.27 ◆

6.28 ◆

6.29

6.31 ◆◆

6.32

6.33

6.34

6.35 ◆◆

6.36 ◆◆

6.37 ◆◆

6.38 ◆

Assume the following:

6.39 ◆

6.40 ◆

6.41 ◆◆

6.42 ◆◆

6.43 ◆◆

6.44 ◆◆◆

6.45 ◆◆◆◆

6.46 ◆◆◆◆

Solutions to Practice Problems

Solution to Problem 6.1 (page 620)

Solution to Problem 6.2 (page 628)

Solution to Problem 6.3 (page 631)

Solution to Problem 6.4 (page 631)

Solution to Problem 6.5 (page 637)

Solution to Problem 6.6 (page 640)

Solution to Problem 6.7 (page 644)

Solution to Problem 6.8 (page 645)

Solution to Problem 6.9 (page 652)

Solution to Problem 6.10 (page 660)

Solution to Problem 6.11 (page 660)

Solution to Problem 6.12 (page 664)

Solution to Problem 6.13 (page 664)

Solution to Problem 6.14 (page 665)

Solution to Problem 6.15 (page 665)

Solution to Problem 6.16 (page 666)

Solution to Problem 6.17 (page 672)

Solution to Problem 6.18 (page 673)

Solution to Problem 6.19 (page 674)

Solution to Problem 6.20 (page 674)

Solution to Problem 6.21 (page 679)

Part II

Running Programs on a System

Source footnotes