Report Number: CSL-TR-94-634
Institution: Stanford University, Computer Systems Laboratory
Title: Architectural and Implementation Tradeoffs for Multiple-Context Processors
Author: Laudon, James P.
Date: September 1994
Abstract: Tolerating memory latency is essential to achieving high performance in scalable shared-memory multiprocessors. In addition, tolerating instruction (pipeline dependency) latency is essential to maximize the performance of individual processors. Multiple-context processors have been proposed as a universal mechanism to mitigate the negative effects of latency. These processors tolerate latency by switching to a concurrent thread of execution whenever one of the threads blocks due to a high-latency operation. Multiple context processors built so far, however, either have a high context-switch cost which disallows tolerance of short latencies (e.g., due to pipeline dependencies), or alternatively they require excessive concurrency from the software. We propose a multiple-context architecture that combines full single-thread support with cycle-by-cycle context interleaving to provide lower switch costs and the ability to tolerate short latencies. We compare the performance of our proposal with that of earlier approaches, showing that our approach offers substantially better performance for parallel applications. We also explore using our approach for uniprocessor workstations --- an important environment for commodity microprocessors. We show that our approach also offers much better performance for multiprogrammed uniprocessor workloads. Finally, we explore the implementation issues for both our proposed and existing multiple-context architectures. One of the larger costs for a multiple-context processor arises in providing a cache capable of handling multiple outstanding requests, and we propose a lockup-free cache which provides high performance at a reasonable cost. We also show that amount of processor state that needs to be replicated to support multiple contexts is modest and the extra complexity required to control the multiple contexts under both our proposed and existing approaches is manageable. The performance benefits and reasonable implementation cost of our approach make it a promising candidate for addition to future microprocessors.
http://i.stanford.edu/pub/cstr/reports/csl/tr/94/634/CSL-TR-94-634.pdf