Tiered Memory Ranks for Power-Constrained Capacity
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Solution Overview
Problem
Power-constrained data processing systems face limitations in memory capacity due to restricted power budgets, leading to performance degradation from frequent page-outs and page-ins, as existing methods either conserve power by degrading performance or accept performance degradation to conserve power.
Innovation Solution
Implementing a tiered memory organization with a hot tier for frequently accessed pages in active mode and a cold tier for infrequently accessed pages in low-power mode, allowing for increased memory capacity while maintaining power consumption within the budget by throttling requests and dynamically reconfiguring ranks based on workload demands.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Quantity of substance
If memory size is increased to improve application performance, then memory capacity increases, but power consumption increases
Solution Approach 1:
The memory system is divided into multiple ranks that can be independently controlled and powered. This segmentation allows the system to activate only the necessary portion of memory capacity based on current workload requirements, rather than powering the entire memory array, thus providing increased capacity when needed while consuming less power during normal operation.
2Use of energy by moving object
If power budget is constrained to reduce power consumption, then power usage decreases, but memory capacity is limited
Solution Approach 1:
The memory system implements dynamic power management where ranks can be dynamically activated or deactivated based on real-time workload demands. The system monitors memory access patterns and adjusts the number of active ranks accordingly, allowing the memory capacity to dynamically scale with the workload while maintaining power consumption within the budget constraints.
3Use of energy by moving object
If memory capacity is limited to conserve power, then power consumption decreases, but page-out and page-in operations increase
Solution Approach 1:
The system proactively manages memory ranks by keeping potentially needed memory pages in active ranks before they are actually accessed. By monitoring access patterns and pre-loading data into the limited active memory capacity, the system reduces the frequency of page-outs to secondary storage and subsequent page-ins, thereby improving application performance while maintaining power-constrained operation.
Data Source
AI summary
A method for increasing a capacity of a memory is provided in the illustrative embodiments. Using an application executing using a processor wherein the memory includes a set of ranks, the memory is configured to form a cold tier and a hot tier, the cold tier including a first subset of ranks from the set of ranks in the memory, and the hot tier including a second subset of ranks from the set of ranks in the memory. A determination is made whether a page to which a memory access request is directed is located in the cold tier in the memory. In response to the page being located in the cold tier of the memory, the processing of the memory access request is throttled by processing the memory access request with a delay.