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Subject: Re: Move ordering ?

Author: James T. Walker

Date: 18:08:06 10/22/98

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On October 22, 1998 at 09:00:23, Kai Skibbe wrote:

>On October 22, 1998 at 08:17:59, Robert Hyatt wrote:
>
>>On October 22, 1998 at 01:12:46, Kai Skibbe wrote:
>>
>>>On October 21, 1998 at 11:08:15, James Robertson wrote:
>>>
>>>>On October 21, 1998 at 10:54:16, James T. Walker wrote:
>>>>
>>>>>If I understood a previous thread, Dr. Hyatt indicated that there is >effectively
>>>>>no move ordering done by most programs(At least Crafty)?
>>>>
>>>>Crafty orderes moves by firstly trying the hash move, then killers? (I'm not
>>>>sure), then gainful captures, etc. There is actually a lot of move ordering
>>>>done, but for Crafty, it is all in *generating* more promising moves first. My
>>>>program has very primitive move ordering, using only pv search, gainful
>>>>captures, and killer moves. Each one of these heuristics has reduced move time
>>>>by 25% to 50%, so obviously move ordering is really important. I plan to add
>>>>hash, history (this will profoundly rearrange your move list), and other stuff
>>>>as soon as I find out I failed biology, and say "the heck with it. Might as well
>>>>work on my program!" :)
>>>>
>>>>>Can anyone please
>>>>>answer this for me??  It seems unreal that there would be no attempt to order
>>>>>the moves so that the most promising moves were searched first.
>>>>>
>>>>>Another question-- Can anyone tell me if there is any advantage to having 1 meg
>>>>>of L2 cache vs 512K relative to chess programs?
>>>
>>>Hi Jim,
>>>
>>>the speed difference will be minimal, but with most motherboards the cacheable
>>>area with 1MB L2Cache is twice as with 512KCache. So I think 1M L2 Cache is
>>>worth the extra money.
>>>For example I have the NMC 5VMMX with 1MB Cache and the cacheable area is 256MB
>>>RAM. With only 512KB Cache the cacheable area would be only 128MB RAM.
>>>
>>>
>>>Best Regards
>>>Kai
>>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>This isn't always true.  IE the PII's (anything 300mhz and up at least)
>>can cache the full 32 gigs of main memory, if you can afford it.  The
>>size of cache should have no effect on how much memory can be cached.  It
>>depends on the design of the cache and the size of the tag ram used for
>>verifying cache hits.
>>
>>However, I haven't seen any designs where doubling cache doubles the amount
>>of cacheable RAM...  because the size of the cache is usually a jumper on
>>motherboards.  There were some few pentiums and pentium II's that could
>>only cache the first 64MB...  but for any pentium II, external cache
>>doesn't exist, so we are talking about regular pentiums or clones I assume,
>>since the pro's and II's have the L2 cache internal...
>
>Hi Bob,
>
>I think you are right with intel pentium II chips. But my motherboard has a
>Socket 7 and the available processors for this socket doesn´t have the L2-cache
>inside. With 1MB L2-Cache my motherboard has a chacheable area of 256MB RAM. You
>can´t change the tag ram to increase the cacheable area.
>I think that doubling the cache size has the same affect of doubling the
>cacheable area to all motherboard with the VIA-chipset. Other none
>Intel-chipsets may have the same affect.
>Another influence of the cacheable area is the cache strategy. I think with
>"write back" the cacheable area is half (128MB) as with "write through" (256MB).
>
>
>Best regards
>Kai
Thanks for the info.  I thought I read somewhere that the 486 had like 16k of L1
cache(On the Chip) and later the Pentiums came with 32K of L1 cache.  I thought
the L2 cache was just an extension of the L1 only on the motherboard instead of
inside the chip.  I had no idea how it covers the main memory size wise but had
also heard of what you said about certain cache size covering certain amount of
main memory.  I just don't know how this affects the speed of chess programs.  I
am considering a new computer and wavering between a K6-2 with 1 meg L2 versus a
Pentium II with 512K of L2.  Again thanks for the info.

Jim Walker

>
>
>>
>>>
>>>>
>>>>I haven't a clue!
>>>>
>>>>>Thanks,\
>>>>>Jim Walker
>>>>
>>>>Hope I helped,
>>>>James



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