Invention Grant
- Patent Title: Efficient branch target address cache entry replacement
- Patent Title (中): 高效的分支目标地址缓存条目替换
-
Application No.: US12575951Application Date: 2009-10-08
-
Publication No.: US08832418B2Publication Date: 2014-09-09
- Inventor: Thomas C. McDonald
- Applicant: Thomas C. McDonald
- Applicant Address: TW New Taipei
- Assignee: VIA Technologies, Inc.
- Current Assignee: VIA Technologies, Inc.
- Current Assignee Address: TW New Taipei
- Agent E. Alan Davis; James W. Huffman; Eric W. Cernyar
- Main IPC: G06F9/38
- IPC: G06F9/38 ; G06F9/30

Abstract:
A microprocessor includes a branch target address cache (BTAC), each entry thereof configured to store branch prediction information for at most N branch instructions. An execution unit executes a branch instruction previously fetched in a fetch quantum. Update logic determines whether the BTAC is already storing information for N branch instructions within the fetch quantum (N is at least two), updates the BTAC for the branch instruction if the BTAC is not already storing information for N branch instructions, determines whether a type of the branch instruction has a higher replacement priority than a type of the N branch instructions if the BTAC is already storing information for N branch instructions, and updates the BTAC for the branch instruction if the type of the branch instruction has a higher replacement priority than the type of the N branch instructions already stored in the BTAC.
Public/Granted literature
- US20110055529A1 EFFICIENT BRANCH TARGET ADDRESS CACHE ENTRY REPLACEMENT Public/Granted day:2011-03-03
Information query