gpgpu

OpenCL adapts for control-freak programming

The Khronos Group announced version 1.2 of OpenCL today, an update that gives programmers tighter control over how they run software on graphics chips.

OpenCL is a standard interface that makes it easier for programmers to tap into the "GPGPU" idea--general-purpose graphical processing unit, which runs software such as game physics engines on a computing device's graphics hardware rather than on its central processing unit (CPU). With OpenCL, or with another technology such as Microsoft's rival DirectCompute, a programmer can use a GPGPU approach without having to worry about the particulars of individual graphics chips. … Read more

AMD quits benchmark group, implying Intel bias

Advanced Micro Devices has quit a PC industry consortium, implying the integrity of a widely used benchmark is biased toward Intel chips.

In a blog Wednesday, an AMD executive provided a long explanation about why AMD has quit the BAPCo industry consortium, which develops and distributes the SYSmark benchmark.

"Customers need clear and reliable measurements to understand the expected performance and value of their systems," Nigel Dessau, senior vice president and chief marketing officer at AMD, said in a statement. "AMD does not believe SM2012 (SYSMark 2012) achieves this objective. Hence AMD cannot endorse or support SM2012 … Read more

Amazon adds graphics-chip computing service

Reflecting a growing trend in the tech industry, Amazon Web Services has added a new computing style that uses computers' graphics chips.

AWS' Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2) lets people pay to use different varieties of online computing resources, paying as they go. EC2 began with a conventional business server setup, but Amazon has been adding different instance types tuned to particular computing needs.

The new Cluster GPU Instance is a server with two quad-core Intel Nehalem-series Xeon X5570 processors, two Nvidia Fermi-series Tesla M2050 graphics chips, 22GB of memory, 1.7TB of storage, and a 10 gigabit per second Ethernet … Read more

Intel, Microsoft event to highlight Windows 7 improvements

Intel and Microsoft will hold an event next week to discuss collaboration on improvements to Windows 7.

The event, on September 1 in San Francisco, will "share how the two companies collaborated on key enhancements during the development of Windows 7," according to Intel. Steve Smith, vice president and director, Intel's Digital Enterprise Group Operations, and Michael Angiulo, general manager of Windows Planning and PC Ecosystem at Microsoft, will talk at the event. Microsoft plans to launch Windows 7 on October 22.

Windows 7 collaboration will be demonstrated by engineers from both companies, according to Intel. Not … Read more

Windows 7 will give boost to PC hardware

Windows 7 will be more than just a better interface. Under-the-hood changes will allow chips from Intel, Nvidia, and Advanced Micro Devices to ratchet up Windows 7 performance above previous Microsoft operating systems.

Microsoft on Wednesday said it has finalized the code for Windows 7, set to ship with new PCs starting October 22. Improvements will include how Windows handles multitasking, graphics acceleration, and solid-state drives.

Microsoft is working closely with Intel, whose chips will power the vast majority of PCs running Windows 7. A July 22 post from Intel's Joakim Lialias, Alliance Manager responsible for Microsoft, described how … Read more

Apple: Next Mac OS X unlocks chip power

This story was corrected. See below for details.

SAN FRANCISCO--Apple wants Mac OS X to do a better job dealing with the new directions that Moore's Law has taken computer chips.

At its Apple Worldwide Developer Conference here, Bertrand Serlet, senior vice president of software engineering, shed light on technology called Grand Central Dispatch that's designed to make Mac OS X 10.6, called Snow Leopard, take better advantage of multicore processors and graphics processors.

Computer chips for years improved in performance through faster clock speeds, but processor engineers ran into problems with chips consuming inordinate amounts of … Read more

Needs of big firms foretell Intel, Nvidia battle

As Intel prepares to invade Nvidia turf, large companies at the Intel server chip rollout Monday stated--in some cases quite objectively--what graphics chip suppliers need to do to make this technology more palatable for high-performance computing.

Besides competing in the gaming graphics market, Intel is eying large high-performance computing customers such as Dreamworks Animation (whose "Monsters vs. Aliens" opened last weekend to large box office numbers) for its future Larrabee graphics chip.

Nvidia is already a player in the so-called General Purpose GPU space, which applies graphics processing units (GPUs) to high-performance computing. As described by Nvidia, high-performance … Read more