MACAU: A Markov model for reliability evaluations of caches under single-bit and multi-bit upsets

Due to the growing trend that a Single Event Upset (SEU) can cause spatial Multi-Bit Upsets (MBUs), the effects of spatial MBUs has recently become an important yet very challenging issue, especially in large, last-level caches (LLCs) protected by protection codes. In the presence of spatial MBUs, the strength of the protection codes becomes a critical design issue. Developing a reliability model that includes the cumulative effects of overlapping SBUs, temporal MBUs and spatial MBUs is a very challenging problem, especially when protection codes are active. In this paper, we introduce a new framework called MACAU. MACAU is based on a Markov chain model and can compute the intrinsic MTTFs of scrubbed caches as well as benchmark caches protected by various codes. MACAU is the first framework that quantifies the failure rates of caches due to the combined effects of SBUs, temporal MBUs and spatial MBUs. 1