Design of a second-level cache chip for shared-bus multimicroprocessor systems

The design of a second-level cache chip with the most suitable architecture for shared-bus multiprocessing is described. This chip supports high-speed (160-MB/s) burst transfer between multilevel caches and a newly proposed cache-consistency protocol. The chip, which supports a 50-MHz CPU and uses 0.8 mu m CMOS technology, includes a 32 kB data memory, 42 kb tag memory. and 21.7 K-gate logic. >