Abstract

The ubiquity of handhelds is causing an unprecedented increase in the range of performance demands imposed on mobile platforms, and at the same time, battery life and energy efficiency remain critical concerns. Yet modern processors are typically designed to meet only one, not both, of these two conflicting goals: to offer high performance vs. provide power savings. This work explores an approach in which heterogeneous processors, i.e., a mix of different cores, are used to extend the dynamic power/performance range of client devices. Unlike previous work addressing server systems, we focus on the client workloads typically seen in modern end-user devices. Further, we evaluate the importance of taking into account ‘uncore’ power in total SoC power consumption, with results that indicate the need for additional uncore power scalability when seeking to extend a platform’s dynamic power range. Experimental evaluations based on characterization of several client applications and usage scenarios seen on mobile devices use a unique experimental testbed comprised of heterogeneous cores that strongly differ in power/performance and with a shared uncore component.

Authors

• Georgia Institute of Technology: Vishal Gupta, Karsten Schwan
• Intel Labs: Paul Brett†, Scott Hahn†, David Koufaty, Dheeraj Reddy
• Intel Corporation: Mishali Naik, Paolo Narvaez, Abirami Prabhakaran, Ganapati Srinivasa

Published

3rd Workshop on SoCs, Heterogeneous Architectures and Workloads (SHAW-3) http://www.ece.lsu.edu/hpca-18/shaw-3/ PDF