Importance

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Abstract

An apparatus for performing speculative stores is provided. The apparatus reads the original data from a cache line being updated by a speculative store, storing the original data in a restore buffer. The speculative store data is then stored into the affected cache line. Should the speculative store later be canceled, the original data may be read from the restore buffer and stored into the affected cache line. The cache line is thereby returned to a pre-store state. In one embodiment, the cache is configured into banks. The data read and restored comprises the data from one of the banks which comprise the affected cache line. Instead of forwarding store data to subsequent load memory accesses, the store is speculatively performed to the data cache and the loads may subsequently access the data cache. Dependency checking between loads and stores prior to the speculative performance of the store may stall the load memory access until the corresponding store memory access has been performed. Similar functionality to forwarding of store data is obtained through the performance of load memory accesses to the data cache. Additionally, speculative load memory accesses which are partially overlapped by a prior speculative store memory access may be performed more efficiently.

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First Claim