Chapter 11. Understanding Caching and Performance

This chapter is intended as a general introduction to CPU caching and performance. Because cache is critical to keeping the processors described so far fed with code and data, you can’t understand how computer systems function without first understanding the structure and functioning of the cache memory hierarchy. To that end, this chapter covers fundamental cache concepts like spatial and temporal locality, set associativity, how different types of applications use the cache, the general layout and function of the memory hierarchy, and other cache-related issues.

Caching Basics

In order to really understand the role of caching in system design, think of the CPU and memory subsystem as operating ...

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