A method and apparatus for avoiding tag compares when writing to a cache. In a cache hierarchy, location information of the cache entries are linked and supplied to the other caches, during caching of the data from memory. When the processor is ready to update the content of the memory location, the location information loaded into a write buffer allows the write buffer to update the cache(s), without the need for tag comparisons to determine if particular entries are present. The avoidance of the tag compare operation during cache update saves a clock cycle, so that overall processor performance is improved.