When you buy a processor or a prefab computer (heaven forbid), you’ll notice that it comes with two specifications. Processor speed and cache side - processor speed is the GHz or Mhz, and is what most people are familiar with. The cache on the other hand is the value after L1 or L2, and is usually 64k, 512k, 2MB or 4MB. Many people have no idea what the cache is, or why its important.

When given the option between a cheaper processor with a smaller cache and a slightly more expensive processor with a larger cache, they’ll take the cheaper one. This isn’t always a good idea - the cache serves an essential purpose.

Most motherboard can only send information to your processor at 500-900mhz. Obviously, most processors can perform computations much faster than that. The L1 and L2 caches serve to store the most used data on the CPU so it can be accessed without having to go through the 500-900 Mhz bottleneck.

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