Author Topic: Hardware survey  (Read 20212 times)

Offline Botsareus

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Re: Hardware survey
« Reply #15 on: April 12, 2013, 06:02:25 PM »
well I am making a big push with sexual reproduction in the next release, maybe you can get back into it.  ;)

Offline Botsareus

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Re: Hardware survey
« Reply #16 on: May 12, 2013, 11:01:37 AM »
Numsgil, I know you have very specific hardware requirements to run the full version of DB3.
What I am interested in is if I have less hardware does DB3 automatically figure out what hardware I do have or do I need a separate version of DB3 for each hardware configuration?
Also, how much slower will the program run with no CPU calculations on the GPU, no AVX, and only two cores?


This has been bugging me for a while, I might as well ask it.

Offline Numsgil

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Re: Hardware survey
« Reply #17 on: May 12, 2013, 06:46:24 PM »
What I am interested in is if I have less hardware does DB3 automatically figure out what hardware I do have or do I need a separate version of DB3 for each hardware configuration?

It'll automatically detect what your hardware can do.  The only caveat is that I think it'll force you to restart the program to switch between standard and High Octane mode.

Quote
Also, how much slower will the program run with no CPU calculations on the GPU, no AVX, and only two cores?

It really depends on a lot of factors that are difficult to predict until I have something to test.  In theory AVX would let it run up to 4x faster, and a GPU at peak can run about 10-20x faster than a CPU, but there's memory bandwidth issues.  On the CPU, transferring data from memory to the CPU is often the bottleneck, so AVX might only give 1.5-2x improvement.  For the GPU, you have to physically copy the data from RAM to the card before you can do any calculations on it, which can take a LONG time.  Which might mean the GPU isn't any faster than the CPU, but it should still let you go much wider (ie: have more bots in the sim).

You should still be more than capable of running a reasonable sim with older hardware.  But if you're looking to do a long term experiment, better hardware is going to be worth it.

Offline rwill128

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Re: Hardware survey
« Reply #18 on: May 12, 2013, 10:59:43 PM »
Sounds pretty exciting. Can't wait to be see more details on the simulation model for DB3.

Offline Peter

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Re: Hardware survey
« Reply #19 on: May 13, 2013, 01:07:47 PM »
For the GPU, you have to physically copy the data from RAM to the card before you can do any calculations on it, which can take a LONG time.  Which might mean the GPU isn't any faster than the CPU, but it should still let you go much wider (ie: have more bots in the sim).
Might mean that darwinbots could run quicker in on a AMD system then intel in the near future. AMD's Kaveri system is going to use unified addressing space, pointers can then be shared between GPU and CPU. Similar to the PS4 system coming out later this year.
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Offline Numsgil

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Re: Hardware survey
« Reply #20 on: May 13, 2013, 02:10:07 PM »
For the GPU, you have to physically copy the data from RAM to the card before you can do any calculations on it, which can take a LONG time.  Which might mean the GPU isn't any faster than the CPU, but it should still let you go much wider (ie: have more bots in the sim).
Might mean that darwinbots could run quicker in on a AMD system then intel in the near future. AMD's Kaveri system is going to use unified addressing space, pointers can then be shared between GPU and CPU. Similar to the PS4 system coming out later this year.

Intel's also aiming for this sort of thing with its Skylake architecture supposedly, which is due out sometime in 2015.

But I'm a bit skeptical about the technology for consumer level hardware.  My guess is that you end up with an on-chip GPU, which limits the power the GPU can have.  More than likely it just means that integrated video cards are going to be better, but for high end power you'll still use dedicated GPU cards.

Offline Peter

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Re: Hardware survey
« Reply #21 on: May 13, 2013, 03:42:07 PM »
For the GPU, you have to physically copy the data from RAM to the card before you can do any calculations on it, which can take a LONG time.  Which might mean the GPU isn't any faster than the CPU, but it should still let you go much wider (ie: have more bots in the sim).
Might mean that darwinbots could run quicker in on a AMD system then intel in the near future. AMD's Kaveri system is going to use unified addressing space, pointers can then be shared between GPU and CPU. Similar to the PS4 system coming out later this year.

Intel's also aiming for this sort of thing with its Skylake architecture supposedly, which is due out sometime in 2015.

But I'm a bit skeptical about the technology for consumer level hardware.  My guess is that you end up with an on-chip GPU, which limits the power the GPU can have.  More than likely it just means that integrated video cards are going to be better, but for high end power you'll still use dedicated GPU cards.
Currently you're right. The current AMD trinity is pretty much aimed at budget PC's, far from high end. CPU nor GPU is special, but it got a pretty good price. The AMD A10 GPU is mostly limited by the DDR3 ram. Kaveri will support GDDR5, that'll bring the on-chip speed closer to dedicated GPU's. I assume more improvements will be made to get the gap smaller along the years. Might take a while till a GPU/CPU chip can be called 'high end', but I'm sure it'll arrive at some point.
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Offline theblaze

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Re: Hardware survey
« Reply #22 on: July 06, 2013, 08:06:20 AM »
Just a P4, but want an upgrade to a 4-GPU 7950 setup to mine bitcoin

Offline Peter

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Re: Hardware survey
« Reply #23 on: July 29, 2013, 04:50:52 PM »
Might be good to remark budget processors like the Pentium G don't support AVX. I though all new processors would have the new instruction sets, but turns out they don't.
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Offline Numsgil

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Re: Hardware survey
« Reply #24 on: July 29, 2013, 05:11:46 PM »
Ah, good to know.  I'll program around the idea that there's some N-width SIMD style operations, but just leave the loops themselves scalar at the moment.  It makes for reasonably fast code even using the slow FPU, and makes it easy-ish to add support for proper SIMD and AVX down the line.

Offline SlyStalker

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Re: Hardware survey
« Reply #25 on: August 06, 2013, 10:52:45 PM »
Getting a new laptop soon!  :D The budget is only $1000, but that still would be a major upgrade for me.
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Offline Numsgil

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Re: Hardware survey
« Reply #26 on: August 06, 2013, 11:08:57 PM »
Let me know what processor you get

Offline Testlund

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Re: Hardware survey
« Reply #27 on: August 08, 2013, 12:05:09 PM »
My tower is in the same room where I sleep, and I can not sleep with it on  :(

Exactly the same situation as me.
------------------------------------------

My hardware is:

CPU: AMD Quad-Core 3.60 GHz
Ram: 16 GB
Graphics: ASUS EAH6770 Series

I expect it to last 3-5 more years. Then I don't know what I will buy, but if the hardware Numsgil suggests would work well with Bioware and Bethesda games then I wouldn't mind getting that.
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Offline Panda

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Re: Hardware survey
« Reply #28 on: August 08, 2013, 12:45:21 PM »
I'm a student so I have the inability to leave my PC or laptop on to afford the price of bills. Plus, they'll be in the same room that I sleep in.



Desktop:

CPU - AMD Quad-Core 3GHz
RAM - 4GB
GPU - nVidia GeForce GT 430



Laptop:

CPU - i3 Dual-Core 2.4GHz
RAM - 6GB
GPU - onboard

Offline Botsareus

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Re: Hardware survey
« Reply #29 on: August 08, 2013, 12:48:46 PM »
Ay, my laptop specs are about the same  ;)