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For a fresh Linux install with a 7900 XT/XTX, would Debian or Ubuntu be better (for Pytorch)?

hnarayanan 3y ago
I would love the answer to this question. I’ve tried with Debian and Fedora and gotten to different stages of the journey, but not successfully in either case.
- hackerlight 3y ago
  How long ago did you try? Before or after official AMD support? https://www.phoronix.com/news/Radeon-RX-7900-XT-ROCm-PyTorch https://www.phoronix.com/news/Radeon-RX-7900-XT-ROCm-PyTorch
  - hnarayanan 3y ago
    After. I am still currently trying. (Apologies I missed your response earlier as this thread suddenly had a lot going on.)
    - hackerlight 3y ago
      Does this help? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39144894 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39144894
    - kaanyalova 3y ago
      Did you try installing wheel package like in AMD's documentation. [0] Option 3. After installing the dependencies using apt go to pytorch's getting started page [1] select Stable/Linux/pip/Python/ROCm and run the command [0] https://rocm.docs.amd.com/projects/install-on-linux/en/latest/how-to/3rd-party/pytorch-install.html#using-wheels-package https://rocm.docs.amd.com/projects/install-on-linux/en/lates... [1] https://pytorch.org/get-started/locally/ https://pytorch.org/get-started/locally/
ckastner 3y ago
As of right now, the most recent versions would probably be Debian 'testing' (our next release-in-development). But eventually, this shouldn't matter. As with all other Debian development, we target the 'unstable' distribution for packaging work (similar to git HEAD). Packages eventually migrate from 'unstable' to the 'testing' distribution once they pass certain checks. And when Debian is ready for a new release, 'testing' will basically be tagged as '13 (trixie)'. Ubuntu periodically syncs their packages from Debian 'unstable', so eventually they will have they same packages that Debian has. Either way, we realize that running bleeding-edge distributions is probably not for everyone, so we intend to provide backports for both Debian and Ubuntu. Hence why I said earlier that eventually, it shouldn't matter. With "eventually" being sometime in the next few months. (Site note: our own PyTorch does not yet ROCm support, we're still working on a few dependencies.)
- hackerlight 3y ago
  > (Site note: our own PyTorch does not yet ROCm support, we're still working on a few dependencies.) Can I clarify something. If we install a stable release of Ubuntu now, we wouldn't be able to get PyTorch to work with a 7900 XT/XTX? At least not until you've worked your magic and that's made its way to Ubuntu in a few months?
  - ckastner 3y ago
    You wouldn't be able to use the PyTorch as built and provided by Ubuntu, as in 'apt-get install python3-torch' [1], as that version currently only has CPU support. You could still use a version provided by a third party, for example directly from pytorch.org, or a containerized version provided by ROCm upstream [2]. [1] https://packages.ubuntu.com/mantic/python3-torch https://packages.ubuntu.com/mantic/python3-torch [2] https://hub.docker.com/r/rocm/pytorch https://hub.docker.com/r/rocm/pytorch

I would love the answer to this question. I’ve tried with Debian and Fedora and gotten to different stages of the journey, but not successfully in either case.

hackerlight 3y ago
How long ago did you try? Before or after official AMD support? https://www.phoronix.com/news/Radeon-RX-7900-XT-ROCm-PyTorch https://www.phoronix.com/news/Radeon-RX-7900-XT-ROCm-PyTorch
- hnarayanan 3y ago
  After. I am still currently trying. (Apologies I missed your response earlier as this thread suddenly had a lot going on.)
  - hackerlight 3y ago
    Does this help? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39144894 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39144894
  - kaanyalova 3y ago
    Did you try installing wheel package like in AMD's documentation. [0] Option 3. After installing the dependencies using apt go to pytorch's getting started page [1] select Stable/Linux/pip/Python/ROCm and run the command [0] https://rocm.docs.amd.com/projects/install-on-linux/en/latest/how-to/3rd-party/pytorch-install.html#using-wheels-package https://rocm.docs.amd.com/projects/install-on-linux/en/lates... [1] https://pytorch.org/get-started/locally/ https://pytorch.org/get-started/locally/

ckastner 3y ago

As of right now, the most recent versions would probably be Debian 'testing' (our next release-in-development). But eventually, this shouldn't matter. As with all other Debian development, we target the 'unstable' distribution for packaging work (similar to git HEAD). Packages eventually migrate from 'unstable' to the 'testing' distribution once they pass certain checks. And when Debian is ready for a new release, 'testing' will basically be tagged as '13 (trixie)'. Ubuntu periodically syncs their packages from Debian 'unstable', so eventually they will have they same packages that Debian has. Either way, we realize that running bleeding-edge distributions is probably not for everyone, so we intend to provide backports for both Debian and Ubuntu. Hence why I said earlier that eventually, it shouldn't matter. With "eventually" being sometime in the next few months. (Site note: our own PyTorch does not yet ROCm support, we're still working on a few dependencies.)

hackerlight 3y ago
> (Site note: our own PyTorch does not yet ROCm support, we're still working on a few dependencies.) Can I clarify something. If we install a stable release of Ubuntu now, we wouldn't be able to get PyTorch to work with a 7900 XT/XTX? At least not until you've worked your magic and that's made its way to Ubuntu in a few months?
- ckastner 3y ago
  You wouldn't be able to use the PyTorch as built and provided by Ubuntu, as in 'apt-get install python3-torch' [1], as that version currently only has CPU support. You could still use a version provided by a third party, for example directly from pytorch.org, or a containerized version provided by ROCm upstream [2]. [1] https://packages.ubuntu.com/mantic/python3-torch https://packages.ubuntu.com/mantic/python3-torch [2] https://hub.docker.com/r/rocm/pytorch https://hub.docker.com/r/rocm/pytorch