On Tue, Dec 11, 2001 at 01:17:30PM -0500, David Teague wrote: | | | If you put more RAM in a computer system than the caching system | will suppport, the system will run more slowly than it would with | less RAM. IF I understand correctly, the amount of RAM depends on | the amount of tag RAM. | | I have 512 MB on my Abit MoBo with a 1GHz Athlon. | | How do I determine how much RAM the L1 cache in a 1GHz Athlon will | support?
According to http://www.amd.com/us-en/Processors/ProductInformation/ 0,,30_118_756_759%5E1151,00.html (all on one line) Cache Architecture: The AMD Athlon processor boasts a 384K total full-speed on-chip system cache including 128K L1 cache--four times that of Intel's Pentium III processor--and 256K on-chip full-speed L2 cache. There is no limit on the amount of system RAM based on processor cache. Certainly when you have many cache misses, you lose performance, but the whole purpose of cache is to try and guess which memory you will need next (through some hueristic algorithms) so that you have a cache hit and don't have to go all the way out to that very (relatively!) slow memory. HTH, -D -- What good is it for a man to gain the whole world, yet forfeit his sould? Or what can a man give in exchange for his soul? Mark 8:36-37