The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.

The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.

Date of Patent:
Jan. 28, 2014

Filed:

Feb. 03, 2009
Applicants:

Gordon Bell, Research Triangle Park, NC (US);

Anil Krishna, Cary, NC (US);

Srinivasan Ramani, Cary, NC (US);

Inventors:

Gordon Bell, Research Triangle Park, NC (US);

Anil Krishna, Cary, NC (US);

Srinivasan Ramani, Cary, NC (US);

Attorney:
Primary Examiner:
Int. Cl.
CPC ...
G06F 12/08 (2006.01);
U.S. Cl.
CPC ...
Abstract

A system and method to optimize runahead operation for a processor without use of a separate explicit runahead cache structure. Rather than simply dropping store instructions in a processor runahead mode, store instructions write their results in an existing processor store queue, although store instructions are not allowed to update processor caches and system memory. Use of the store queue during runahead mode to hold store instruction results allows more recent runahead load instructions to search retired store queue entries in the store queue for matching addresses to utilize data from the retired, but still searchable, store instructions. Retired store instructions could be either runahead store instructions retired, or retired store instructions that executed before entering runahead mode.


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