1. It is external to the processor core. 2. Same processor can be used with different L2 cache. 3. Larger L2 cache increases the performance of the system. 4. Cache performance can be measured in terms of Miss Rate, Hit, Time, Miss Penalty. 5. Miss Rate = Fraction of memory references not found in cache 6. Hit Time = Time to deliver a line in the cache to the processor (includes time to determine whether the line is in the cache) 7. Miss Penalty = Additional time required because of a miss