4 ms·

Has anyone used one of the Nvlink switches? That must be a power and heat beast.

by mmastrac 4y ago

solardev 4y ago
Are those the things that kept melting and blowing up computers with the 4090s?
- mastax 4y ago
  No. Some 4090s had issues with power connectors. The 4090 does not support NVLink (though there is evidence that they were designed with the capability).
  - marcyb5st 4y ago
    Probably they are using the same PCBs as their Datacenter counterparts and there NVLink is extremely important to minimize overhead.
    - verall 4y ago
      They're not using the same PCBs because 4090 has the blow-through cooler and so a downsized pcb but the DC cards have big fanless heatsinks for cooling by chassis fans. 3090 had nvlink so it was probably considered for 4090 but eventually cut for some reason
      - gambiting 4y ago
        I imagine the reason was that hardly anyone used it, and those that did use it were the same group of clients who would traditionally buy Quadro cards.
        spookie 4y ago
        Oh yeah, the artificial market segmentation.
        ChuckNorris89 4y ago
        Is there natural market segmentation as well?
        my123 4y ago
        The AD102 die this gen doesn’t have NVLink on silicon. RTX 6000 Ada Generation doesn’t have NVLink, and neither does the L40.
        touisteur 4y ago
        Is the white paper out and precise specs available for L40? Last time I looked nvlink was still with a question mark on L40? Doesn't make sense to remove the nvlink feature from the A40 line that had some nvlink, that would piss off a bunch of users hoping to upgrade to not-H100...
  - buildbot 4y ago
    Entertainingly, they do use molex micro fit connectors on SXM boards - the same ones as the 4090.
- dotnet00 4y ago
  Your question is understandable given the hysteria about those connectors, but they're power connectors and it seems there were only ~50 cases in total, mostly down to the connector not being inserted fully (with a handful due to manufacturing defects).
  - solardev 4y ago
    It happens
wmf 4y ago
NVSwitch looks around 1/4th the size of a contemporary Ethernet switch so it may be only ~100 W which is pretty small relative to the GPUs it's connecting.
- ShehryarShahid 4y ago
  [dead]

Has anyone used one of the Nvlink switches? That must be a power and heat beast.

solardev 4y ago

Are those the things that kept melting and blowing up computers with the 4090s?

mastax 4y ago
No. Some 4090s had issues with power connectors. The 4090 does not support NVLink (though there is evidence that they were designed with the capability).
- marcyb5st 4y ago
  Probably they are using the same PCBs as their Datacenter counterparts and there NVLink is extremely important to minimize overhead.
  - verall 4y ago
    They're not using the same PCBs because 4090 has the blow-through cooler and so a downsized pcb but the DC cards have big fanless heatsinks for cooling by chassis fans. 3090 had nvlink so it was probably considered for 4090 but eventually cut for some reason
    - gambiting 4y ago
      I imagine the reason was that hardly anyone used it, and those that did use it were the same group of clients who would traditionally buy Quadro cards.
      - spookie 4y ago
        Oh yeah, the artificial market segmentation.
        ChuckNorris89 4y ago
        Is there natural market segmentation as well?
        my123 4y ago
        The AD102 die this gen doesn’t have NVLink on silicon. RTX 6000 Ada Generation doesn’t have NVLink, and neither does the L40.
        touisteur 4y ago
        Is the white paper out and precise specs available for L40? Last time I looked nvlink was still with a question mark on L40? Doesn't make sense to remove the nvlink feature from the A40 line that had some nvlink, that would piss off a bunch of users hoping to upgrade to not-H100...
- buildbot 4y ago
  Entertainingly, they do use molex micro fit connectors on SXM boards - the same ones as the 4090.
dotnet00 4y ago
Your question is understandable given the hysteria about those connectors, but they're power connectors and it seems there were only ~50 cases in total, mostly down to the connector not being inserted fully (with a handful due to manufacturing defects).
- solardev 4y ago
  It happens

wmf 4y ago

NVSwitch looks around 1/4th the size of a contemporary Ethernet switch so it may be only ~100 W which is pretty small relative to the GPUs it's connecting.

ShehryarShahid 4y ago
[dead]