Method and apparatus for application of power density multipliers optimally in a multicore system

摘要

A method and an apparatus are described that delay application of a higher order Power Density Multiplier (PDM) using a time based moving average of a number of active cores in a multicore system. A PDM is applied to a thermal design power budget of a thermal entity and performance of the thermal entity is increased by transferring available power from a thermal entity not in an active state to a thermal entity in an active state. Sufficient time is allowed for the cooling effect of reduced active cores, to influence the active core that receives the extra power (a higher PDM). Similarly delaying application of a lower PDM with the same moving average, but a different threshold, allows a core to retain a higher power allocation until the more active neighbor core(s) cause it to heat up, thereby boosting core performance.