Snow Leopard and OpenCL

[memo]

So I was in the macstore yesterday and I asked a sales person what are some advantages of the new aluminum macbook, over the new (kinda) plastic macbook. She mentioned that snow leopard is going to take advantage of using the GPU which will make the overall system faster. I was a bit skeptical until I got home and saw that Apple is advertising OpenCL with snow leopard. How good is this feature going to be would you guys says? Is it worth it to pay 299+ for this? The new features aren't too terribly appealing to me (trackpad, glossy screen, brick format etc).

Is there something else I am missing that makes purchasing the 1299 macbook over the 999 macbook a no brainer?

 

[Tyranicus]

Well, there have been multiple reports that the new Nvidia GPU helps to significantly reduce CPU load during .h264 decoding on the new MacBooks now. My guess is that OpenCL will apply much the same technique to other processes. IMHO, the new MacBooks are definitely worth it. Don't forget, you're also getting an LED backlight, which means a brighter, less power-hungry screen.

 

[TheStu]

Originally posted by: memo
So I was in the macstore yesterday and I asked a sales person what are some advantages of the new aluminum macbook, over the new (kinda) plastic macbook. She mentioned that snow leopard is going to take advantage of using the GPU which will make the overall system faster. I was a bit skeptical until I got home and saw that Apple is advertising OpenCL with snow leopard. How good is this feature going to be would you guys says? Is it worth it to pay 299+ for this? The new features aren't too terribly appealing to me (trackpad, glossy screen, brick format etc).

Is there something else I am missing that makes purchasing the 1299 macbook over the 999 macbook a no brainer?

Well, apparently the new MacBooks have significantly better video playback since they have the ability to offload data to the GPU and take advantage of the chipset's native h.264 decoding capabilities. So if you watch a lot of HD stuff (like I do) then that is a huge deal, and would definitely be worth the extra money to me.

 

[manly]

I think the new MacBook is worth the price delta, but I wouldn't base my decision on a salesperson's pitch of a future OS. Granted, it doesn't sound completely wrong as salespeople often are. My opinion on GPGPU programming is in the recent new vs. old MBP thread. But my opinion aside, AT has a strong write-up:

http://www.anandtech.com/weblog/showpost.aspx?i=461

 

[bearxor]

The GF8600 is every bit as capable of offloading video and doing OpenCL and CUDA as the GF9600. I hope Apple will release a software update to allow the GF8600-equipped machines to offload h.264 decoding and that it will be fully supported in 10.6 as well.

I have a GF8500 in my HTPC just for HD decoding and it works great.

 

[KeithP]

I understand this thread is a bit old but I was going to title my thread exactly the same so I figured why not bump it.

OpenCL is one of the major features mentioned by Apple for Snow Leopard. However, hasn't one of the biggest problems with Apple's hardware been the lack of current, reasonably priced GPU offerings in their line up?

Take their current selection of iMacs, the GPU upgrades you can order are available only with the highest priced models. The new Mac Pro's big video card upgrade, the 4870 comes with only 512MB of memory and carries an enormous price tag. Also, the only Mac in their line that can take a video upgrade after purchase is the workstation class Mac Pro.

I REALLY don't want this to become an "apple overpriced hardware" bashing thread. I love my MacBook. It just seems to me there is a weird disconnect between the features of the next OS and the hardware they are currently selling.

Does anyone see it this way?

-KeithP

 

[silverpig]

Originally posted by: KeithP
I understand this thread is a bit old but I was going to title my thread exactly the same so I figured why not bump it.

OpenCL is one of the major features mentioned by Apple for Snow Leopard. However, hasn't one of the biggest problems with Apple's hardware been the lack of current, reasonably priced GPU offerings in their line up?

Take their current selection of iMacs, the GPU upgrades you can order are available only with the highest priced models. The new Mac Pro's big video card upgrade, the 4870 comes with only 512MB of memory and carries an enormous price tag. Also, the only Mac in their line that can take a video upgrade after purchase is the workstation class Mac Pro.

I REALLY don't want this to become an "apple overpriced hardware" bashing thread. I love my MacBook. It just seems to me there is a weird disconnect between the features of the next OS and the hardware they are currently selling.

Does anyone see it this way?

-KeithP

I don't really. There aren't many games for the mac, and thus you won't need a powerful video card. A 4870 would just sit there doing absolutely nothing 99.9% of the time in an iMac.

It's kind of like being mad at toyota because they don't offer a twin-turbo option on their corolla.

 

[KeithP]

OpenCL is not just for games, from Apple's web site:

Another powerful Snow Leopard technology, OpenCL (Open Computing Language), makes it possible for developers to efficiently tap the vast gigaflops of computing power currently locked up in the graphics processing unit (GPU). With GPUs approaching processing speeds of a trillion operations per second, they?re capable of considerably more than just drawing pictures. OpenCL takes that power and redirects it for general-purpose computing.

emphasis is mine

I think part of the point of OpenCL is because what you say is correct. Most of the time the GPU is sitting around doing nothing. OpenCL would allow general purpose applications to tap that power.

As far as the iMac goes, I didn't mean to suggest it should get the 4870 (although why not). However, the two lowest priced models don't have the same GPU options as the high priced models. I can't imagine that there is a technical reason for this but rather, it is simply a marketing/pricing decision on Apple's part.

Which brings me back to my point which I will rephrase, if OpenCL is so important in Snow Leopard, why would Apple make it a point to limit how well people will be able to take advantage of it because of their limited GPU options? It would seem that if more people had a more powerful GPU developers would have more incentive to code for this new feature.

I guess the simple answer is money. Apple has done a very good job of maintaining their margins and being a profitable company. Another possibility is that OpenCL might be limited on how well it can take advantage of extra GPU power. Maybe the 9400m on the base iMac performs nearly as well as 4850 of the high end iMac so the upgrade isn't so important. Who knows?

-KeithP

 

[randomlinh]

Originally posted by: KeithP
OpenCL is not just for games, from Apple's web site:

Another powerful Snow Leopard technology, OpenCL (Open Computing Language), makes it possible for developers to efficiently tap the vast gigaflops of computing power currently locked up in the graphics processing unit (GPU). With GPUs approaching processing speeds of a trillion operations per second, they?re capable of considerably more than just drawing pictures. OpenCL takes that power and redirects it for general-purpose computing.

emphasis is mine

I think part of the point of OpenCL is because what you say is correct. Most of the time the GPU is sitting around doing nothing. OpenCL would allow general purpose applications to tap that power.

As far as the iMac goes, I didn't mean to suggest it should get the 4870 (although why not). However, the two lowest priced models don't have the same GPU options as the high priced models. I can't imagine that there is a technical reason for this but rather, it is simply a marketing/pricing decision on Apple's part.

Which brings me back to my point which I will rephrase, if OpenCL is so important in Snow Leopard, why would Apple make it a point to limit how well people will be able to take advantage of it because of their limited GPU options? It would seem that if more people had a more powerful GPU developers would have more incentive to code for this new feature.

I guess the simple answer is money. Apple has done a very good job of maintaining their margins and being a profitable company. Another possibility is that OpenCL might be limited on how well it can take advantage of extra GPU power. Maybe the 9400m on the base iMac performs nearly as well as 4850 of the high end iMac so the upgrade isn't so important. Who knows?

-KeithP

OpenCL will likely scale... seems rather stupid not to. But you're right, Apple is a business, the choice of graphics cards and what's available is simply what they do.

But I will say this, snow leopard isn't out yet. Who knows if they'll do a hardware refresh for a few things to take advantage of OpenCL.

Also, this is the first attempt... they may want to see how it performs in the real world on what's out there, and then move from there.

 

[Kaido]

Well just look at Nvidia's Badaboom if you don't believe OpenCL will do anything:

http://store.nvidia.com/DRHM/s...SE&productID=107685300

http://www.badaboomit.com/?q=node/308

OpenCL + Grand Central = mmm!