Cache in Hand: Expander-Driven CXL Prefetcher for Next Generation CXL-SSD

Abstract

Integrating compute express link (CXL) with SSDs allows scalable access to large memory but has slower speeds than DRAMs. We present ExPAND, an expander-driven CXL prefetcher that offloads last-level cache (LLC) prefetching from host CPU to CXL-SSDs. ExPAND uses a heterogeneous prediction algorithm for prefetching and ensures data consistency with CXL.mem's back-invalidation. We examine prefetch timeliness for accurate latency estimation. ExPAND, being aware of CXL multi-tiered switching, provides end-to-end latency for each CXL-SSD and precise prefetch timeliness estimations. Our method reduces CXL-SSD reliance and enables direct host cache access for most data. ExPAND enhances graph application performance by 3.5x, surpassing CXL-SSD pools with diverse prefetching strategies.