Multi-Core GPU

[nukemdukem]

Hi All,

After reading about the RX 480 it got me thinking...

Why don't AMD or NVIDIA to multi-core GPU's in a similar fashion to what is happening in CPU architecture?

Would there be limiting factors in terms of the message bus or bandwidth?

AMD have developed a really cheap card with good performance on its own and then have the option for 2 cards in sli to match 1 GTX 1080.

So why not just do a dual core RX 480? Why wouldn't NVIDIA to a dual core GTX 1080?

Apologies if this is a really stupid question.

 

[new boy]

like a hd7990 or a 295x2? They make dual GPU cards all the time.

 

[joeyjojo]

Each product line normally does get a dual-GPU card. The latest from AMD and Nvidia were the Pro Duo and the Titan Z, respectively.

 

[nukemdukem]

So why didnt AMD do a dual core RX 480 (lets call it a RX 490) so they have a single card that can match the GTX 1080? Or is that something they will do further down the line to extend the lifecycle of the product?

 

[Orangey]

Because mGPU is dead and they're dumping the corpse.

 

[David Bisset]

Hi All,

After reading about the RX 480 it got me thinking...

Why don't AMD or NVIDIA to multi-core GPU's in a similar fashion to what is happening in CPU architecture?

Would there be limiting factors in terms of the message bus or bandwidth?

AMD have developed a really cheap card with good performance on its own and then have the option for 2 cards in sli to match 1 GTX 1080.

So why not just do a dual core RX 480? Why wouldn't NVIDIA to a dual core GTX 1080?

Apologies if this is a really stupid question.

When you say "like CPU" multi-core - this is in place and has been for some time. GPUs are massively multi-core (hundreds to thousands of cores) while CPUs have only a few, though the cores are not nearly as individually powerful.

multi-GPU others are referring to is not like CPUs.

 

[sgavan]

This has some info about CPU vs. GPU cores, http://www.nvidia.com/object/what-is-gpu-computing.html

 

[andybird123]

When you say "like CPU" multi-core - this is in place and has been for some time. GPUs are massively multi-core (hundreds to thousands of cores) while CPUs have only a few, though the cores are not nearly as individually powerful.

multi-GPU others are referring to is not like CPUs.

this ^
CPU's are relatively small in terms of silicon, so they can easily keep adding cores and keep it on a single piece... with GPU's they easily hit the limits on size that are practical and yields start to drop to uneconomic levels so to have keep raising the core count you end up with separate pieces of silicon and connecting them together means you need special software (SLI/crossfire) support and even then the maximum throughput starts to drop off (not perfect scaling)

they need to come up with a better interconnect and a way for multiple GPU's to be seen by the OS as a single GPU for it to really take off, otherwise multiGPU is just going to keep languishing as a niche thing that developers don't really support properly

 

[meldarthx]

When you say "like CPU" multi-core - this is in place and has been for some time. GPUs are massively multi-core (hundreds to thousands of cores) while CPUs have only a few, though the cores are not nearly as individually powerful.

multi-GPU others are referring to is not like CPUs.

beat me to it solid explanation...

 

[LeMson]

It's a good question, get reading about CPU and GPU architecture and then you will know why GPU's owned for bit-coin mining

 

[WesleyBurns]

CPU's and GPUs work very differently.

In a sence GPUs are multi core because of their programmable CUDA cores. If you want to add more processing power, adding more CUDA cores + Memory bandwidth will increase the processing power.

Here is a linus video (not the best video): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1kypaBjJ-pg

 

[nukemdukem]

cool thanks guys - a lot of reading and videos to watch for me - but very interesting indeed

 

[joeyjojo]

When you say "like CPU" multi-core - this is in place and has been for some time. GPUs are massively multi-core (hundreds to thousands of cores) while CPUs have only a few, though the cores are not nearly as individually powerful.

multi-GPU others are referring to is not like CPUs.

If that's what the OP meant then, yes, as others have said, each stream processor is a bit like a thread in a CPU, and a GPU has hundreds or thousands of them.

There are many differences though. The first answer here has a good overview: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/36681920/cpu-and-gpu-differences