Patent ID: 8341355

Claim:
A method, in a data processing system, for accessing a set associative cache of the data processing system, comprising: receiving, in the data processing system, a request to access data from the set associative cache of the data processing system, the request specifying an address of the data; identifying, by the data processing system, a set of cache lines in the set associative cache associated with the address; determining, by the data processing system, whether a mode of operation for the set is a first mode of operation or a second mode of operation; wherein determining whether the mode of operation for the set is the first mode of operation or the second mode of operation is performed by retrieving a mode bit value, of a mode bit corresponding to the set, from a mode bit storage device; and in response to the mode of operation for the set being the first mode of operation, the data processing system: determines if there is a cache hit in a subset of cache lines in the set of cache lines without accessing other cache lines in the set of cache lines; retrieves data from the subset of cache lines in the set of cache lines without accessing the other cache lines in the set of cache lines, if it is determined that there is a cache hit in the subset of cache lines; and accesses each of the other cache lines in the set of cache lines to determine if there is a cache hit in any of these other cache lines only in response to there being a cache miss in the subset of cache lines.