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.

Comments

Thank MicroSoft

[powerlord]

Okay, I admit, I haven't RTFA yet, but if GPUs do get folded back into CPUs, I think we need to thank MS.

No. ... Seriously. Think for a minute.

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? :)

Re:Heard This One Before

[TheRaven64]

It's not just floating point. Originally, CPUs did integer ops and comparisons/branches. Some of the things that were external chips and are now found on (some) CPU dies include:

1. Memory Management Units. Even in microcomputers there are some (old m68k machines) that have an off-chip MMU (and some, like the 8086 that just don't have one).
2. Floating Point Units. The 80486 was the first x86 chip to put one of these on-die.
3. SIMD units. Formerly only found in high-end machines as dedicated chips, now on a lot of CPUs.
4. DSPs. Again, formerly dedicated hardware, now found on-die in a few of TI's ARM-based cores.

A GPU these days is very programmable. It's basically a highly parallel stream processor. Integrating it onto the CPU makes a lot of sense.

Re:A cyclic process?

[shizzle]

Yup, the idea is pushing 30 years old now, and came out of the earliest work on graphics processors. The term "wheel of reincarnation" came from "On the Design of Display Processors", T.H. Myer and I. E. Sutherland, Communications of the ACM, Vol 11, No. 6, June 1968.

http://www.cap-lore.com/Hardware/Wheel.html

Re:Heard This One Before

[LWATCDR]

I am an old school programmer so I tend to use ints a lot. The sad truth if that float using SSE are as fast and sometimes faster than the old tricks we used to avoid floats!
Yes we live in an upside down world where floats are faster than ints some times.

What's that got to do with anything?

[Sycraft-fu]

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.