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It is an x86 with very weak in-order cores, which instead have very large (512-bit) vector units. Very much like an NVIDIA "symmetric multiprocessor". If you tr
by pbsd 13y ago
It is an x86 with very weak in-order cores, which instead have very large (512-bit) vector units. Very much like an NVIDIA "symmetric multiprocessor". If you try to program the Xeon Phi anything like a general-purpose CPU, you will not get within 5% of its power --- the programming model is essentially that of a GPU. The one thing that makes the Xeon Phi more general-purposy than current GPUs is the cache-coherence across cores.
- zurn 13y agoThey are programmed the way shared memory parallel machines have been used since time immemorial in the HPC world. Hundreds of cores is normal there. The same Intel software stack (OpenMP, Threaded Building Blocks, parallel Fortran etc) is used, same one that Intel markets for regular HPC. Yeah, you have slower cores and the SIMD is twice as wide, but its main selling point is that you get to keep the regular programming model - unlike with NVidia or AMD. Along with benefits that come with it (mature software, openness, etc). See eg. Intel's Xeon Phi Programmin Guide for an intro: http://software.intel.com/sites/default/files/article/330164/an-overview-of-programming-for-intel-xeon-processors-and-intel-xeon-phi-coprocessors.pdf http://software.intel.com/sites/default/files/article/330164...