An analytical model of high performance superscalar-based multiprocessors
David H. Albonesi, Israel Koren · 1995
Several shared memory multiprocessor models using approximate Mean Value Analysis (MVA) have been developed and used to evaluate a number of system architectures. Since this time, the complexity of multiprocessor systems has increased as superscalar processors and latency reduction techniques are employed in these systems. We present an MVA multiprocessor performance model which incorporates these new features and in addition, increases the level of modeling detail to improve flexibility and accuracy. We describe in detail extensions present in our model that allow us to analyze the impact of these new features. We then use the model to demonstrate some of the tradeoffs involved in designing modern multiprocessors, including the impact of highly superscalar architectures on the scalability of multiprocessor systems. 1 Introduction An analytical modeling technique that has been frequently used to evaluate shared memory multiprocessors is approximate Mean Value Analysis (MVA)[12]. In M...