The inaccuracy of trace-driven simulation using incomplete multiprogramming trace data

Trace-driven simulation is commonly used to predict the performance of computer systems. However, existing tracing techniques produce traces inadequate for some studies: they do not usually record operating system references, and they produce relatively short traces. The paper explores the impact of these trace distortions on the performance estimates of uniprocessor memory hierarchies using multiprogramming workloads. We used a hardware monitor to capture traces under a variety of workloads and operating systems. Our monitor captures every reference and can. Record arbitrarily long traces. We quantify memory hierarchy performance using traces of the SPEC SDM1.1 benchmark suite executing on an i486 CPU. To evaluate variations due to operating systems, we compare these results under both Mach 3.0 and UNIX Sys V R4. We conclude that for current uniprocessors, long but incomplete traces result in modest errors in estimated performance, but for proposed architectures with large delays to main memory, the errors can be significant.