Patent application number | Description | Published |
20080234873 | Power efficient resource allocation in data centers - A data center may be operated to achieve reduced power consumption by matching workloads to specific platforms. Attributes of the platforms may be compiled and those attributes may be used to allocate workloads to specific platforms. The attributes may include performance attributes, as well as power consumption attributes. | 09-25-2008 |
20080235364 | Method and apparatus for using dynamic workload characteristics to control CPU frequency and voltage scaling - Some embodiments involve determining a processor performance characteristic associated with a workload, determining a workload characteristic associated with the workload, and determining a processor performance state for the workload based on the performance characteristic and the workload characteristic. Other embodiments are disclosed and claimed. | 09-25-2008 |
20090083523 | PROCESSOR POWER MANAGEMENT ASSOCIATED WITH WORKLOADS - Some embodiments provide determination of a processor performance characteristic associated with a first workload, and determination of a processor performance state for the first workload based on the performance characteristic. Further aspects may include determination of a second processor performance characteristic associated with a second workload, determination of a second processor performance state for the second workload based on the performance characteristic, determination of a similarity between the first performance characteristics and the second performance characteristics, determination of a cluster comprising the first workload and the second workload, and association of a third processor performance state with the cluster, wherein the third processor performance state is identical to the first processor performance state and to the second processor performance state. | 03-26-2009 |
20090248994 | MEMORY RANK BURST SCHEDULING - A method, device, and system are disclosed. In one embodiment the method includes grouping multiple memory requests into multiple of memory rank queues. Each rank queue contains the memory requests that target addresses within the corresponding memory rank. The method also schedules a minimum burst number of memory requests within one of the memory rank queues to be serviced when the burst number has been reached in the one of the plurality of memory rank queues. Finally, if a memory request exceeds an aging threshold, then that memory request will be serviced | 10-01-2009 |
20110264938 | METHOD AND SYSTEM FOR DETERMINING AN ENERGY-EFFICIENT OPERATING POINT OF A PLATFORM - A method and system for determining an energy-efficient operating point of the platform or system. The platform has logic to dynamically manage setting(s) of the processing cores and/or platform components in the platform to achieve maximum system energy efficiency. By using the characteristics of the workload and/or platform to determine the optimum settings of the platform, the logic of the platform facilitates performance guarantees of the platform while minimizing the energy consumption of the processor core and/or platform. The logic of the platform identifies opportunities to run the processing cores at higher performance levels which decreases the execution time of the workload and transitions the platform to a low-power system idle state after the completion of the execution of the workload. Since the execution time of the workload is reduced, the platform spends more time in the low-power system idle state and therefore the overall system energy consumption is reduced. | 10-27-2011 |
20110320839 | MEMORY POWER MANAGEMENT VIA DYNAMIC MEMORY OPERATION STATES - Described herein are techniques for dynamic memory frequency/voltage scaling to augment existing memory power management techniques and further improve memory power efficiency. Each operating point is defined as an operational state for the memory. | 12-29-2011 |
20110320846 | ADAPTIVE MEMORY FREQUENCY SCALING - Methods and apparatuses for adaptive memory operational state management. A memory performance parameter is determined for at least a portion of a memory system. The memory performance parameter is compared to one or more threshold values. An operating frequency of the memory system can be modified based on results of the comparison of the memory performance parameter and the one or more threshold values. | 12-29-2011 |
20120017099 | METHOD AND APPARATUS TO LIMIT MEMORY POWER - In one embodiment, the present invention includes a power manager to receive a memory power usage value, to determine an available power based at least in part on a power budget and the memory power usage value, and to change a memory power state based at least in part on the available power, wherein the memory power state comprises a memory frequency and a memory voltage. Other embodiments are described and claimed. | 01-19-2012 |
20130007486 | METHOD AND SYSTEM FOR DETERMINING AN ENERGY-EFFICIENT OPERATING POINT OF A PLATFORM - A method and system for determining an energy-efficient operating point of the platform or system. The platform has logic to dynamically manage setting(s) of the processing cores and/or platform components in the platform to achieve maximum system energy efficiency. By using the characteristics of the workload and/or platform to determine the optimum settings of the platform, the logic of the platform facilitates performance guarantees of the platform while minimizing the energy consumption of the processor core and/or platform. The logic of the platform identifies opportunities to run the processing cores at higher performance levels which decreases the execution time of the workload and transitions the platform to a low-power system idle state after the completion of the execution of the workload. Since the execution time of the workload is reduced, the platform spends more time in the low-power system idle state and therefore the overall system energy consumption is reduced. | 01-03-2013 |
20130318370 | MIDDLEWARE POWER MANAGEMENT - A system can include multiple devices each configured to run an application at an application level and each having varying performance, power, and other capabilities. A middleware power management facility spanning each of the devices can transfer applications from one device to another responsive to a determination based on capabilities of the devices, with the goal of optimizing the individual power consumption or collective energy efficiency of the devices, within application quality of service constraints. | 11-28-2013 |
20140181830 | THREAD MIGRATION SUPPORT FOR ARCHITECTUALLY DIFFERENT CORES - According to one embodiment, a processor includes a plurality of processor cores for executing a plurality of threads, a shared storage communicatively coupled to the plurality of processor cores, a power control unit (PCU) communicatively coupled to the plurality of processors to determine, without any software (SW) intervention, if a thread being performed by a first processor core should be migrated to a second processor core, and a migration unit, in response to receiving an instruction from the PCU to migrate the thread, to store at least a portion of architectural state of the first processor core in the shared storage and to migrate the thread to the second processor core, without any SW intervention, such that the second processor core can continue executing the thread based on the architectural state from the shared storage without knowledge of the SW. | 06-26-2014 |
20140189297 | HETERGENEOUS PROCESSOR APPARATUS AND METHOD - A heterogeneous processor architecture is described. For example, a processor according to one embodiment of the invention comprises: a set of two or more small physical processor cores; at least one large physical processor core having relatively higher performance processing capabilities and relatively higher power usage relative to the small physical processor cores; virtual-to-physical (V-P) mapping logic to expose the set of two or more small physical processor cores to software through a corresponding set of virtual cores and to hide the at least one large physical processor core from the software. | 07-03-2014 |
20140189299 | HETERGENEOUS PROCESSOR APPARATUS AND METHOD - A heterogeneous processor architecture is described. For example, a processor according to one embodiment of the invention comprises: a set of large physical processor cores; a set of small physical processor cores having relatively lower performance processing capabilities and relatively lower power usage relative to the large physical processor cores; virtual-to-physical (V-P) mapping logic to expose the set of large physical processor cores to software through a corresponding set of virtual cores and to hide the set of small physical processor core from the software. | 07-03-2014 |
20140189302 | OPTIMAL LOGICAL PROCESSOR COUNT AND TYPE SELECTION FOR A GIVEN WORKLOAD BASED ON PLATFORM THERMALS AND POWER BUDGETING CONSTRAINTS - A processor includes multiple physical cores that support multiple logical cores of different core types, where the core types include a big core type and a small core type. A multi-threaded application includes multiple software threads are concurrently executed by a first subset of logical cores in a first time slot. Based on data gathered from monitoring the execution in the first time slot, the processor selects a second subset of logical cores for concurrent execution of the software threads in a second time slot. Each logical core in the second subset has one of the core types that matches the characteristics of one of the software threads. | 07-03-2014 |
20140189377 | APPARATUS AND METHOD FOR INTELLIGENTLY POWERING HETERGENEOU PROCESSOR COMPONENTS - An intelligent power allocation architecture for a processor. For example, one embodiment of a processor comprises: a plurality of processor components for performing a corresponding plurality of processor functions; a plurality of power planes, each power plane associated with one of the processor components; and a power control unit (PCU) to dynamically adjust power to each of the power planes based on user experience metrics, workload characteristics, and power constraints for a current use of the processor. | 07-03-2014 |
20140189385 | INTELLIGENT RECEIVE BUFFER MANAGEMENT TO OPTIMIZE IDLE STATE RESIDENCY - Methods and systems may provide for determining a plurality of buffer-related settings for a corresponding plurality of idle states and outputting the plurality of buffer-related settings to a device on a platform. The device may determine an observed bandwidth for a channel associated with a receive buffer and identify a selection of a buffer-related setting from the plurality of buffer-related settings based at least in part on the observed bandwidth. In one example, each buffer-related setting includes a latency tolerance and a corresponding idle duration. | 07-03-2014 |
20140189398 | TECHNIQUES FOR PLATFORM DUTY CYCLING - Various embodiments are generally directed to an apparatus, method and other techniques for detecting active and semi-active workloads during execution on a platform processing device and enabling a duty cycle process to reduce thermal output and power consumption, and align unaligned activity. In various embodiments, the duty cycle processing may be enabled during an active workload when thermal output or power consumption is above a thermal threshold or power consumption threshold that is below an efficient operating point for the platform processing device. The duty cycle processing may also be enabled during semi-active workloads when the workload causes the platform processing device to be underutilized and unaligned. The duty cycle processing may comprise enabling a forced idle period for the platform processing device. Other embodiments are described and claimed. | 07-03-2014 |
20140189403 | PERIODIC ACTIVITY ALIGNMENT - Methods and systems may provide for determining a latency constraint associated with a platform and determine an idle window based on the latency constraint. In addition, a plurality of devices on the platform may be instructed to cease one or more activities during the idle window. In one example, the platform is placed in a sleep state during the idle window. | 07-03-2014 |
20140189704 | HETERGENEOUS PROCESSOR APPARATUS AND METHOD - A heterogeneous processor architecture is described. For example, a processor according to one embodiment of the invention comprises: a first set of one or more physical processor cores having first processing characteristics; a second set of one or more physical processor cores having second processing characteristics different from the first processing characteristics; virtual-to-physical (V-P) mapping logic to expose a plurality of virtual processors to software, the plurality of virtual processors to appear to the software as a plurality of homogeneous processor cores, the software to allocate threads to the virtual processors as if the virtual processors were homogeneous processor cores; wherein the V-P mapping logic is to map each virtual processor to a physical processor within the first set of physical processor cores or the second set of physical processor cores such that a thread allocated to a first virtual processor by software is executed by a physical processor mapped to the first virtual processor from the first set or the second set of physical processors. | 07-03-2014 |
20140281457 | METHOD FOR BOOTING A HETEROGENEOUS SYSTEM AND PRESENTING A SYMMETRIC CORE VIEW - A heterogeneous processor architecture and a method of booting a heterogeneous processor is described. A processor according to one embodiment comprises: a set of large physical processor cores; a set of small physical processor cores having relatively lower performance processing capabilities and relatively lower power usage relative to the large physical processor cores; and a package unit, to enable a bootstrap processor. The bootstrap processor initializes the homogeneous physical processor cores, while the heterogeneous processor presents the appearance of a homogeneous processor to a system firmware interface. | 09-18-2014 |
20140380019 | SYSTEMS AND METHODS FOR MANAGING RECONFIGURABLE PROCESSOR CORES - Systems and methods for managing reconfigurable processor cores. An example processing system comprises a plurality of processor cores; a control register including a plurality of state bits, each state bit indicating a state of a corresponding processor core, the control register further including a plurality of inhibit bits, each inhibit bit indicating whether a corresponding processor core is allowed to merge with other processor cores; and a core management logic configured to merge a first processor core and a second processor core, responsive to determining that a first state bit corresponding to the first processor core is set, a first inhibit bit corresponding to the first processor core is cleared, a second state bit corresponding to the second processor core is cleared, and a second inhibit bit corresponding to the second processor core is cleared. | 12-25-2014 |