US Patent 8943272 Variable cache line size management

According to one aspect of the present disclosure, a method and technique for variable cache line size management is disclosed. The method includes: determining whether an eviction of a cache line from an upper level sectored cache to an unsectored lower level cache is to be performed, wherein the upper level cache includes a plurality of sub-sectors, each sub-sector having a cache line size corresponding to a cache line size of the lower level cache; responsive to determining that an eviction is to be performed, identifying referenced sub-sectors of the cache line to be evicted; invalidating unreferenced sub-sectors of the cache line to be evicted; and storing the referenced sub-sectors in the lower level cache.