Memory Hierarchy Q.34

0. A CPU has a cache with block size 64 bytes. The main memory has k banks, each bank being c bytes wide. Consecutive c-byte chunks are mapped on consecutive banks with warp-around. All the k banks can be assessed in parallel, but two accesses to the same bank must be serialized. A cache block access may involve multiple iterations of parallel bank accesses depending on the amount of data obtained by accessing all the k banks in parallel. Each iteration requires decoding the bank numbers to be accessed in parallel and this takes k/2 ns. The latency of one bank access is 80 ns. If c = 2 and k = 24, then latency of retrieving a cache block starting at address zero from main memory is

  • Option : D
  • Explanation : The main memory consists of 24 banks, each of 2 bytes. Since parallel accesses t o all banks are possible, only two parallel accesses of all banks are needed to traverse the whole data.
    For one parallel access,
    Total time = Decoding Time + Latency Time
    = 24/2 + 80
    = 92ns
    Hence, for 2 such accesses,
    time = 2 * 92
    = 184 ns
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