Intel threw out the graphics card project based on Larrabee, but even if the retail plans were scrapped the base architecture is still alive. Intel Many-Integrated-Cores is the name of the project and it is now talking about the next generation of MIC products called Knights Corner, which will use 22nm and 3D transistors.
Intel Knights Ferry are the development platforms that Intel is shipping to partners and looks like any regular PCIe graphic cards, but the Larrabee-based circuit is built around ten or so smaller x86 cores. The relation to Intel’s Xeon processors and x86 achitecture will make it easy for CPU applications to make use of the parallel workhorse that is Knights Ferry and with Intel’s new and energy efficient 22nm technology performance should improve significantly.
Currently Intel’s MIC solutions use 45nm technology with up to 32 separate x86 cores, which results in a performance up to 1 TeraFLOPS in SGEMM. This can be compared to abuut 800-900 GigaFLOPS for NVIDIA Tesla and around 1.6-1.8 TeraFLOPS for AMD FireStream. With the new 22nm technology Intel is expected to squeeze in 50 or so x86 cores into Knigts Ferry, which according to Intel will make it possible to double the current performance.
Intel says it is working alongside with several big server builders for developing systems around Knigts Corner, something that could result in heavy competition for AMD and NVIDIA on the GPGPU market when the new products launch next year.
Source: HPC Wire
