Larrabee: A Many-Core x86 Architecture for Visual Computing

Author

Seiler, Larry ; Carmean, Doug ; Sprangle, Eric ; Forsyth, Tom ; Dubey, Pradeep ; Junkins, Stephen ; Lake, Adam ; Cavin, Robert ; Espasa, Roger ; Grochowski, Ed ; Juan, Toni ; Abrash, Michael ; Sugerman, Jeremy ; Hanrahan, Pat

Volume

29

Issue

1

fYear

2009

Firstpage

10

Lastpage

21

Abstract

The Larrabee many-core visual computing architecture uses multiple in-order x86 cores augmented by wide vector processor units, together with some fixed-function logic. This increases the architecture´s programmability as compared to standard GPUs. The article describes the Larrabee architecture, a software renderer optimized for it, and other highly parallel applications. The article analyzes performance through scalability studies based on real-world workloads.

Keywords

microprocessor chips; rendering (computer graphics); vector processor systems; GPU; Larrabee many-core x86 architecture; fixed-function logic; software renderer; vector processor unit; visual computing; Application software; Computer architecture; Graphics; Logic; Performance analysis; Pipelines; Registers; Scalability; Software standards; Vector processors; GPGPU; SIMD; graphics architecture; many-core computing; parallel processing; real-time graphics; software rendering; throughput computing; visual computing;

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Micro, IEEE

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

0272-1732

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/MM.2009.9

Filename

4796165