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Nvidia Working on a CPU+GPU Combo
Max Romantschuk writes "Nvidia is apparently working on an x86 CPU with integrated graphics. The target market seems to be OEMs, but what other prospects could a solution like this have? Given recent development with projects like Folding@Home's GPU client you can't help but wonder about the possibilities of a CPU with an integrated GPU. Things like video encoding and decoding, audio processing and other applications could benefit a lot from a low latency CPU+GPU combo. What if you could put multiple chips like these in one machine? With AMD+ATI and Intel's own integrated graphics, will basic GPU functionality be integrated in all CPU's eventually? Will dedicated graphics cards become a niche product for enthusiasts and pros, like audio cards already largely have?" The article is from the Inquirer, so a dash of salt might make this more palatable.
What I don't understand is that I thought GPUs were made to offload a lot of graphics computations from the CPU. So why are we merging them again? Isn't a GPU supposed to be an auxillary CPU only for graphics? I'm so confused.
What I'm not confused about is the sentence from the above article: Oh, I've worked with my fair share of DAAMIT engineers. They're the ones that go, "Yeah, it's pretty good but
My work here is dung.
AMD and Intel have their own fabs that are at the leading edge of semiconductor technology. I highly doubt that nVidia will open up a fab for their chips. But who knows, IBM may produce their chips for them.
I think the better option would be to have a graphics chip fit into a Socket 939 on a dual socket motherboard, with an AMD chip. It will have a high-speed link through hyper-transport, and would act just like a co-processor. I'm no chip designer, so I have no idea what the pros/cons of this are, or if it's even possible.
With this integration, does that mean a standard for 3-d? No more Nvidia/ATI drivers. The OSDEV guys would love this if it came to that. But how would this integration work? A co-processor space like MIPS? If so, does that mean that graphics calculations have somewhat been moved back to the CPU? And what about the actual workings itself, I'm guessing the actual registers would still be memory mapped in someway (or I/O ports for x86, whatever).
I'm thinking way too much. It did alleviate boredom for about a minute though...
Unless Nvidia is partnering with Intel to release this chip, I think they're getting too far out of their confort zone to be successful. Sure, a dual or even quad core chip with half of the cores handling graphics would be great, but can Nvidia deliver? I doubt it ... look how many companies have gone down the tubes after spending millions/billions after trying to make an x86 compatible chip, let alone trying to integrate top end graphics as well.
Nvidia is a fantastic graphics card company - they should continue to innovate focus on what they're good at rather than try to play follow the leader in an arena they know nothing about.
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There seems to be a cycle of integrating and decoupling things.
We had separated math co-processors, that later were integrated in the CPU.
Then the separated GPU, which will soon be integrated back too.
factor 966971: 966971
GPUs are going the way of the math co-processor. I think it's inevitable.
"False hope is why we'll never run out of natural resources!" - Lewis Black
It's quite clear that the AMD-ATI merger was to aquire the IP and expertise necessary to integrate gpu core(s) on the same die as cpu core(s). Nvidia does not have to actually market a design, but rather patent some key concepts, and this could provide revenue or protection.
I would very much doubt that they could compete with AMD and Intel who have already patented many x86 cpu concepts.
It's a shame that Intel has decided not to buy nvidia, and go it alone with it's own design staff.
Okay, I admit, I haven't RTFA yet, but if GPUs do get folded back into CPUs, I think we need to thank MS.
... Seriously. Think for a minute.
:)
No.
The major driving force right now in GPU development and purchase are games.
The major factor that they have to contend with is DirectX.
As of DirectXv10. A card either IS, or IS NOT compliant. None of this "We are 67.3% compliant".
This provides a known target that can be reached. I wouldn't be surprised if the DirectX10 (video) featureset becomes synonymous with 'VGA Graphics' given enough time.
Yeah, sure, MS will come out with DX11, and those CPUs won't be compatible, but so what?, If you upgrade your CPU and GPU regularly anyway to maintain the 'killer rig', why not just upgrade them together?
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A while ago -- and maybe it was in the Slashdot discussion about ATI, I'm not sure -- somebody described a cycle in computer design, where various components are built-in monolithically, then broken out as separate components, and then swallowed back up into monolithic designs again.
Graphics chips seem to have done this cycle at least once; perhaps now we're just looking at the next stage in the cycle? We've had graphics as a separate component from the processor for a while, perhaps the next stage in the cycle is for them to combine together into a G/CPU, to take advantage of the design gains in general-purpose processors.
Then at some point down the road, the GPU (or more likely, various GPU-like functional units) might get separated back out onto their own silicon, as more application-specific processors become advantageous once again.
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Why is everyone getting excited about this? Now we're going to have a CPU that's only partially documented, and we lose even moreso to closed-source blobs.
This isn't a good thing unless they also release documentation for it!
I prefer my articles with a dash of accuracy.
Haven't they already???
The vast majority of machines (at least, from my experience, which could not be broad enough) seem to be shipping with integrated graphics on the motherboard. Certainly, my last 3 computers have had this.
Granted, I buy on the trailing edge since I don't need gamer performance, but I kind of thought most consumer machines were no longer using a separate graphics card.
Anyone have any meaningful statistics as opposed to my purely anecdotal observations?
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
I've been expecting this for a while, ever since the transistor count of the GPU passed that of the CPU. Actually, I thought it would happen sooner. It's certainly time. Putting more transistors into a single CPU doesn't help any more, which is why we now have "multicore" machines. So it's time to put more of the computer into a single part.
NVidia already makes the nForce line, the "everything but the CPU" part, with graphics, Ethernet, disk interface, etc. If they stick a CPU in there, they have a whole computer.
Chip designers can license x86 implementations; they don't have to be redesigned from scratch. This isn't going to be a tough job for NVidia.
What we're headed for is the one-chip "value PC", the one that sits on every corporate desk. That's where the best price/performance is.
The Inquirer is more of a rumor site than a news site. They have a pretty good track record for their rumors, but they don't have people on record backing this one up.
What NVidia eventually does may not bear much resemblance to the story.
When I saw this headline I immediately thought of this article, an interview with Jen-Hsun Huang (CEO: nVidia) by Wired dated July '02. In it, the intention of overthrowing Intel is made quite clear, and ironically enough they even mention the speculation from a time when it was rumored that nVidia and AMD would merge.
It's actually a very good article for those interested in nVidia's history and Huang's mentality. Paul Otellini ought to be afraid. Very afraid.
do you really want to take away system ram for video ram?
If using larger chips means I can get 2GB combined RAM for the price of 1GB system RAM and 256MB video RAM? Absolutely.
Why are the multiprocessor units suddenly so popular, relative to why e.g. the Voodoo graphics cards failed? I remember them being ridiculed and ending up in the performance backwaters through their 2-4-8(-16) multiprocessor cards, but it seems that there are engineering reasons why multiple processors are now suddenly coming into favour, or?
multiple processors (CPU, GPU or otherwise) are a way to add more 'cycles' based on current technology. This has the advantage of being able to get more out of your current designs and manufacturing technology, but comes at the cost of increased complexity in both the supporting hardware, and in software.
Getting a single core implementation faster is always the more efficient way to add processing capacity, but it is very impractical beyond a certain point due to power and heat considerations (where that point is exactly depends on the state of technology at any given moment but in the end is limited by the physical size of molecules, at least for as far as current technology goes)
So, multiple processors is not directly better from an engineering point of view, rather, it is a solution to overcome the speed limits of current technology, provided you can deal with the extra complexity (moving much of the hardware complexity into the chip itself like AMD and Intel are doing now removes the burden from systemboard designers, but the complexity itself is still there, esp. on the software side of the picture).
With regards to 3dfx, it seems to me that:
1. They failed to manage the additional complexity
2. As their competition showed, limits of technology at that time were much higher then what 3dfx managed, which indicates there were problems with either their design or manufacturing technology, or more likely, with both.
System RAM is SLOW compared to GPU RAM. PCIe actually allows very high speed access to system RAM, but the RAM itself is too slow for GPUs. That's one of the reasons their RAM amounts are so small, they use higher speed and thus more expensive RAM. Also because of the speed you end up dealing with cooling and signal issues which makes it impractical (or perhaps impossible) to simply stick it in addon slots to allow for upgrades.
Even fast as it is, it's still slower than the GPU would really like.
What you've suggested is already done by low end accelerators like the Intel GMA 950. Works ok, but as I said, slow.
Unless you are willing to start dropping serious amounts of cash on system RAM, we'll be needing to stick with dedicated video RAM here for some time.
1) Processors are wicked fast at floating point these days. Have a look at the benchmarks a modern chip using SSE2 can do some time. Integer doesn't inherently mean faster, and chips these days have badass FPUs.
2) For many things, it DOES make a difference. You might ask why do we need more than 24-bit (or 32-bit if you consider the alpha channel) integer colour? After all, it's enough to look highly realistic. Yes well that's fine for a final image, but you don't want to do the computation like that. Why? Rounding errors. You find that with iterative things like shaders doing them integer adds up to nasty errors which equals nasty colours and jaggies. There's a reason why pro software does it as 128-bit FP (32-bits per colour channel) and why cards are now going that way as well.
3) In modern games, everything is handled in the GPU anyhow. The CPU sends over the the data and the GPU does all the transform, lighting, texturing and rasterizing. The CPU really is responsible for very little. With vertex shaders the GPU even handles a good deal of the animation these days. The reason is that not only is it more functional but it's waaaaay faster. You can spend all the time you like trying to make a nice optimised integer T&L path in the CPU, the GPU will blow it away. You actually find that some older games run slower than new ones because they rely on the CPU to do the initial rendering phases like T&L before handing it off, whereas newer games let the GPU handle it and thus run faster even though having higher detail.
Yes the SYSTEMS Tom used to test have normal speed ram for systems. Duh. The graphics cards, however, have much faster RAM. For example my system at home has DDR2-667 RAM. That's spec'd to run at 333MHz which is 667MHz is DDR RAM speak. My graphics card, a 7800GT, on the other hand has RAM clocked at 600MHz, or 1200MHz in RAM speak.
Not a small difference, really. My system RAM is rated to somewhere around 10GB/second max bandwidth (it gets like 6 in actuality). The graphics card? 54GB/sec.
Video cards have fast RAM subsystems. They use fast, expensive chips and they have controllers designed for blazing fast (and exclusive) access. You can't just throw normal, slow, system RAM at it and expect it to perform the same.