Intel Xeon Phi co-processor (GPGPU)

[proffesso]

Originally Posted by NSanity

Intel isn't selling them at Retail. Channel Partner only (but is working with EDU to get them in their hands).

Honestly these cards are aimed, initially, at HPC. That said they have a "workstation" variant.



If your x86/64 renderer runs on linux and can be run "remotely" today, yes.

If no, they need to recompile with the Intel Toolchain.

It's 22nm, and we have no news on power usage (outside of maximums) at this point.

the workstation varient is what im interested in, current cuda solutions work OK, but the renderers today are either Cuda or x86...with no compatibility. something that accelerates x86 is of great interest to me

[DrFrag]

According to Intel, it runs at 1 teraflop and occupies a PCIE slot (double width looking at the picture).

My HD4850, a 5 year old GPU, can do a teraflop. And it's a single width card.

Can someone eplain to me in simple terms what the benefit of the Xeon Phi is?

[stmok]

Originally Posted by DrFrag

Can someone explain to me in simple terms what the benefit of the Xeon Phi is?

Depending how one's code is implemented, Xeon Phi's advantage is that it runs x86/64 code. Effectively, Intel has lowered the entry requirements needed to implement GPGPU technology. If you know how to code in x86 and about parallelism, then you're pretty much set...However, this is at the cost of highly efficient performance compared to other GPGPU solutions and product availability is only to a specific audience.

Nvidia and AMD GPGPU solutions need specific software frameworks that lock you into their respective ecosystems. As well, GPU architecture understanding is needed to properly implement them in the GPGPU role. (One eventually finds various limitations with their solutions and you have to work around them. Some limitations are due to the generation of GPU you're working on!) ...AMD and Nvidia GPGPUs have the advantage of being more performance-efficient than the Xeon Phi. The other "pro" is that you can start learning their stuff right now with their readily available consumer GPUs. (Radeon and Geforce)...Although, they have been intentionally crippled in performance as they want people buying FireStream and Tesla GPGPUs respectively. (Its more crippled with Nvidia's current Geforce line.)

...So there is no free lunch at this time. One needs to assess solutions from all three companies to see which best suits them, their organisation, and the long term future.


Nvidia's CUDA/Tesla solution currently has the biggest marketshare in HPC; as it has been around the longest and its software framework is the most mature. Both AMD and Intel want a piece of this pie as well. They have a very tiny share of the market at this time...Overall, the market hasn't fully embraced GPGPU (the majority has not) as a whole. The main issue is that not everyone wants to be locked into Nvidia's CUDA ecosystem. Intel sees that as a potential weakness to widespread adoption. They want everyone using x86/64 instead.

[cvidler]

Originally Posted by stmok

Depending how one's code is implemented, Xeon Phi's advantage is that it runs x86/64 code. Effectively, Intel has lowered the entry requirements needed to implement GPGPU technology. If you know how to code in x86 and about parallelism, then you're pretty much set...

This entirely.

It may also be seen as a 'baby' or test environment for supercomputer labs (for those supers that run x86).

so devs can code and test on a Phi, before wasting expensive (and hard to get) super computer time.

[jtir]

More importantly, when will software released to use teh Xeon Phi to do the following:

• hashcat
• folding client
• Bitcoin mining

[Dezza Bot]

Originally Posted by jtir

More importantly, when will software released to use teh Xeon Phi to do the following:

• hashcat
• folding client
• Bitcoin mining

Should already all exist in theory, as it can execute x86 code.
Hashcat is a different story, but there's plenty of equivalent tools designed for multi core x86 processors, which is what Phi is.