SCIMA-SMP: on-chip memory processor architecture for SMP

Abstract

In this paper, we propose a processor architecture with programmable on-chip memory for a high-performance SMP (symmetric multi-processor) node named SCIMA-SMP (Software Controlled Integrated Memory Architecture for SMP) with the intent of solving the performance gap problem between a processor and off-chip memory. With special instructions which enable the explicit data transfer between on-chip memory and off-chip memory, this architecture is able to control the data transfer timing and its granularity by the application program, and the SMP bus is utilized efficiently compared with traditional cache-only architecture. Through the performance evaluation based on clock-level simulation for various HPC applications, we confirmed that this architecture largely reduces the bus access cycle by avoiding redundant data transfer and controlling the granularity of the data movement between on-chip and off-chip memory.