Abstract
Instruction caches typically consume 27% of the total power in modern high-end embedded systems. We propose a compiler-managed instruction store architecture (K-store) that places the computation intensive loops in a scratch-pad like SRAM memory and allocates the remaining instructions to a regular instruction cache. At runtime, execution is switched dynamically between the instructions in the traditional instruction cache and the ones in the K-store, by inserting jump instructions. The necessary jump instructions add 0.038% on an average to the total dynamic instruction count. We compare the performance and energy consumption of our K-store with that of a conventional instruction cache of equal size. When used in lieu of a 8KB, 4-way associative instruction cache, K-store provides 32% reduction in energy and 7% reduction in execution time. Unlike loop caches, K-store maps the frequent code in a reserved address space and hence, it can switch between the kernel memory and the instruction cache without any noticeable performance penalty.
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Suresh, D.C., Najjar, W.A., Yang, J. (2005). Power Efficient Instruction Caches for Embedded Systems. In: Hämäläinen, T.D., Pimentel, A.D., Takala, J., Vassiliadis, S. (eds) Embedded Computer Systems: Architectures, Modeling, and Simulation. SAMOS 2005. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 3553. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/11512622_20
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/11512622_20
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