a method and device are provided for reading data from a trace cache in a manner that reduces the time and power consumed by such an operation . a mini - tag is provided for comparing to a requested address to reduce the amount of data that must be read . mini - tag read and compare operations may be performed in parallel to a full tag read operation , and a data read operation of only the data identified by a matching mini - tag may be performed in parallel to a full tag compare operation . a victim selection method for writing data into the trace cache is used to maintain the uniqueness of the mini - tags .