Just one example of what makes all this work:
AMD Phenom II X4 900 series die: 258mm2 4-cores and a 6MB L3 cache
(The level 3 cache is the dark area covering the right 1/3rd. The CPU cores and L1/L2 cache areas are the repeated 4 structures covering the left 2/3rds.)
If only Babbage could have kept true to his design and not fallen out with his engineers!
Who knows?!
Cheers,
Martin