L2 Cache on K315S

[boeingpete]

Just bought a Vaio K Series 315s, and according to the Specification sheet that comes with it it has 1Mb Cache memory, though all the other specs I have seen on this notebook indicate it is only 512Kb. Would like to know which it is, so I can tweak it it since XP defaults to 128Kb.

Would have asked e-Support, but can't get through because the my e-mail address isn't recognised !!!! No other way of contacting them without running up my phone bill.

Would appreciate it if anyone out there could confirm what the L2 Cache value really is.

Cheers

[TygerTyger]

I'm not sure quite all of this adds up.......the processor will define for XP what the level 2 cache is.....and XP will always use all of it. It's integral to the operation of the processor, if it were only using 128kb then you would be lucky if anything works at all.

[Woody27]

The K315S has 512K level 2 cache on the processor!

As Tyger says, the computer will use all of it and you cannot adjust the settings.... ....nor should you..... .....(again as Tyger says) the computer would run very slowley with less than this!

Try a Celeron based VAIO the next time you are in a shop and notice the performance difference, this is due to the Celeron chip having no cache (sorry Celeron users)!

CW

[boeingpete]

Thanks Guys. It answers my question re. the size of the cache, but I have checked with Microsoft and had it confirmed that on installation XP defaults to 128K L2 Cache.

This can be checked in the Registry or by using something like Tweak Manager, which I did when I got my Vaio (had it on my HP Desktop too, when I installed XP as an upgrade) and it was giving 128Kb too. Using Tweak Manager I have adjusted it to 512Kb.

Important thing is I am now getting the optimum from it !!

[jammold]

I have to agree, another tool I use is XTeq Systems X-Setup, which has exactly the same tweak inside it for an L2 Cache... God only knows why M$ decided to do this...

My Celeron (Intel FC-PGA2) has an L2 Cache of 128Kb so tweaking it on mine will be useless - this is according to the Intel Processor ID Utility...

[TygerTyger]

Wait a minute is this right? Is only 128Kb of my 1028K being used? There's something I'm not clear about here though.........is it that XP only uses 128kb by default, hence the rest being wasted.......or is it that XP only uses 128Kb in order to leave the rest free for other software to use?

Now I think about it the second one is much more likely and I'm sure that's the answer in which case a bit of tweaking is probably a bad idea but I'd be interested to have it confirmed......

[jammold]

Its true TT - Windows XP can only natively use 128Kb straight off-the-shelf, I'll try to find an M$ document to prove it, but i'm pretty sure XP cannot use 1024Kb for instance without a tweak, since I dont like directly editing the registry I use X-Setup to do this for me from a safe user-friendly GUI...

[TygerTyger]

Yeah I'm just trying to work out why it only uses that. If the rest is deliberately left over for other programs I don't want to cripple everything else by giving all the resources to XP.

[jammold]

Your call TT - do you want me to post a link to download X-Setup? It is the easiest tweak manager and it has a safe mode associated with it, and System Restore should keep your bases covered...

God knows why XP doesn't use all of the L2 cache... Surely this would affect performance!

[TygerTyger]

No I think I'll leave it until I know for sure thanks. I'm pretty sure that XP must utilise it like RAM......take a chunk (128K) for itself, and then let others use is as they need. So.......best not to. I don't see that even MS would make such a phenomenal blunder as to get it wrong.