Computer system with self-consistent ordering mechanism

Details Computer system with self-consistent ordering mechanism Computer system with self-consistent ordering mechanism

1997-01-03

1998-05-12

Lall, Parshotam S.

395473, 395800, G06F 938, G06F 1516

Patent

active

057519862

ABSTRACT:
A computer system including a processor having a inherently weakly-ordered memory model comprising a mechanism for emulating strong-ordering to produce self-consistent ordering on a system-wide basis. The processor snoops the system bus externally to determine if a STORE on the external bus hits a LOAD buffer inside the memory subsystem of the processor. If so, the situation is flagged as one which carries the risk of violating processor ordering rules. When the STORE hits the same LOAD address in the LOAD buffer of the processor's memory subsystem, the speculative state of the processor is erased. This cancels the LOAD operation in all subsequent operations. The processor then begins executing from the aborted LOAD; this time loading the newly updated value.

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