Monday, November 1st 2021
Intel Drops Xe-HP Server GPU Plans, to Stick with HPC and Client Graphics
Intel has dropped plans to build Xe-HP server GPUs commercially. This line of products would have powered cloud-based graphics rendering instances, for cloud-gaming or cloud-rendering applications. An announcement to this effect came from Raja Koduri, overseeing the development and monetization of Xe. Koduri stated that Xe-HP based instances were originally set up to power Intel's oneAPI devcloud as a software development vehicle for oneAPI and the upcoming Aurora supercomputer of the Argonne National Laboratory.
The company will now focus on Xe as a compute accelerator in the form of Xe-HPC "Ponte Vecchio," and discrete graphics in the client segment, leveraging the Xe-HPG graphics architecture. The smallest derivatives, the Xe-LP, powers integrated graphics solutions found in the company's Core processors (11th Gen and later). Back in the August 2021 Architecture Day presentation, Intel's technical brief for Xe HPC revealed that the silicon itself features certain on-die hardware relevant to graphics rendering (more here). This would have gone on to power the Xe-HP server GPU solutions.
Sources:
Raja Koduri (Twitter), AnandTech
The company will now focus on Xe as a compute accelerator in the form of Xe-HPC "Ponte Vecchio," and discrete graphics in the client segment, leveraging the Xe-HPG graphics architecture. The smallest derivatives, the Xe-LP, powers integrated graphics solutions found in the company's Core processors (11th Gen and later). Back in the August 2021 Architecture Day presentation, Intel's technical brief for Xe HPC revealed that the silicon itself features certain on-die hardware relevant to graphics rendering (more here). This would have gone on to power the Xe-HP server GPU solutions.
20 Comments on Intel Drops Xe-HP Server GPU Plans, to Stick with HPC and Client Graphics
As a corporate GPU buyer I don't buy server GPUs for the GPU performance, I buy them because those are the specific make and model recommended by the software solution we need to run on them.
Intel NEED TO GET XE/ARC PRODUCTS OUT ONTO THE MARKET YESTERDAY
- If the consumer cards are successful enough to show a reliable track-record to big-dollar, risk-averse corporate buyers
- If they are cost-effective in a cut-throat market
- If the drivers turn out to be robust
- If the developers adopt Intel's standards instead of Nvidia proprietary APIs
- ....then, and only then, will Intel have a chance to get into the general GPGPU server market.
As I've said dozens of times already, Intel Xe/Arc news is just irrelevant noise until they finally put their product on the market. Every single article I post this on marks another week/fortnight/month of Intel failing to release a product that they told us was imminent at the end of 2017. I'll probably still be posting this paragraph well into 2022.Also, Raja and miscalculating the market/marketing... what's new?
I feel bad for the guy at this point, so much hype the train is at terminal speed with the track ending at Argonne, an unproven tech sold to the public (let’s go Brandon) before they roll back other segments in the coming months or “adjust performance expectations”’on products, IE muzzle their jackass.
Great omen for the Xe family if they got to kill 1/3 of it before it even launches..
Only the cache, EMIB and interposer tiles are made by Intel internally.
Happened to me last night.
It would align with the similarities
Imho Intel cards will pop like dead flies in the market. They will be expensive, slow and buggy, and already outdated.
It be about time when was the last time 1980's ?.