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CHAPTER
7 Scalable Multiprocessors
710 CONCLUDING REMARKS
We have seen in this chapter that most modern large-scale machines are constructed
from general-purpose nodes with a complete local memory hierarchy augmented by
a communication assist interfacing to a scalable network. However, a wide range of
design options is available for the communication assist. The design is influenced
very strongly by where the communication assist interfaces to the node architecture:
at the processor, at the cache controller, at the memory bus, or at the I/O bus. It is
also strongly influenced by the target communication architecture and programming
model ...