SIE ain't dead - it's now default behavior?

Oz

----- Original Message -----
From: "Rob van der Heij" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sent: Saturday, December 29, 2001 3:37 AM
Subject: Re: S390/zSeries CPU questions


> > Also, I think there is a misunderstanding about the performance
> > counters: they (the ones I ment) are CPU architecture specific and
> > neither gcc nor gprof knows about them. They are implemented as "extra"
>
> fwiw: I never have seen anything like that published (or even mentioned).
> Things like the number of clock cycles to execute a specific sequence of
> instructions have never been published afaik. The RPP ratings of a model
are
> determined by running well-defined instruction mix benchmarks (and these
> probably are aimed more towards running z/OS than Linux). Most likely
> processor design was done to favor common instruction sequences (e.g.
> an XC instruction with memory operands may not really fetch the operand
> if both addresses are the same).
> I would not be surprised if such low level instrumentation were only
present
> in the hardware simulators they use for processor design.
>
> The particular model number is not shown by Q CPUID. The processor type
> for all S/390 (9672 in your case) and Freeway machines (2064) is the same.
> Changes in clock speed, cache size, look aside tables, extra instruction
sets
> etc tend to mark 'generations' (like G5 vs G6).
>
> And since you run in a virtual machine you probably care about CP
overhead.
> A virtual machine runs at native speed under control of SIE until it
touches any
> of the architecture items marked for interception (at that point the
control
> program will further complete the virtualisation or deal with the
intercept otherwise).
> The smaller the number of SIE intercepts, the closer the virtual machine
gets to
> native speed.
>
> Rob

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