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June 2012 |
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Premiere Pro is a suite of serious software for video content creation and is very popular in the professional market. It is also one of the 7 high end applications certified by Nvidia by June 2012 to run Maximus. What is Maximus and why only 7 applications in the world are certified? This article is about the findings we obtained recently through 2 months of in-house testing.
Maximus is a scheme using a combination of CUDA enabled GPU hardware to handle visualisation and computation in the same workstation (PC). Quadro is designed for visualisation (interactive design) as the main purpose, whereas Tesla is designed for computation as the main purpose. Normally a 3D content creation workstation would be fitted with Quadro, and a high performance computational station would be fitted with Tesla. A Maximus workstation has both Quadro and Tesla and employs their unique designs for their respective top performances. Instead of waiting for Quadro to do the computation parts, Tesla can do them better and in parallel. The result is a much shorter turnaround time of design tasks.
In order to benchmark the additional performance of Tesla to Quadro, our first target is Premiere Pro CS 5.5 due to its popularity. We tested PPBM5 which is a standard and well documented benchmarking application to find out the time to complete selected functions of Premiere Pro by various computer and GPU hardware. There is in fact a PPBM5 website which explains what the tests are about and it records all test results submitted by whoever care to release their results to the website. PPBM5 is therefore a good starting point. Nevertheless we must remember that PPBM5 is not Premiere Pro, and time to complete PPBM5 test sets does not equate to test to complete Premiere Pro data sets.
We tested Quadro 600, Quadro 2000, Tesla C2075 separately and singly, and then Q600+C2075 and Q2000+C2075 under Maximus. The price of the GPU hardware goes up in the same sequence as listed here. The performance can be said to follow the same sequence but not quite. The combination of Q600+C2075 produced the same performance as Q2000+C2075. This implies the extra CUDA cores of Q2000 over Q600 are useless as far as PPBM5 is concerned. Another observation is that the increase in performance is not in the same ratio of the increase in price. This reinforces the same implication as above. If we look at the PPBM5 website for scores submitted by various people around the world, the top scores were achieved with GeForce cards which are much cheaper than Quadro. This is another reinforcement of the same implication.
These observations have a huge limitation to be useful. The limitation is that the PPBM5 is not Premiere Pro. PPBM5 may not have been tuned to respond to Quadro and Maximus as Premiere Pro has. The exercise however has indicated the “without-tuning” scenarios for running various GPU on Premiere Pro. Nvidia website has good information on how tuned applications would perform. The chart shown here was obtained in June 2012 from http://www.nvidia.com/object/media-entertainment-with-maximus.html
These are the other 6 applications certified for Maximus by Nvidia by June 2012
- Autodesk 3ds Max 2012
- Solidworks 2011
- PTC Pro/Engineer 5.0
- Dassault Systemes Catia V5/V6
- Simulia Abaquo 6.11-1
- ANSYS Mechanical V13SP2/V14
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June 2012 |
Nvidia announced a GPU (graphical processing unit) card and claimed it to be the most powerful and most power efficient in March 2012. The card is GeForce GTX680. It is double the performance of the previous performance leader as in GTX580 but it consumes lesser electricity than GTX580. GTX680 GPU is made up of 3.4 billion transistors (this is an impressive quantity as the current top desktop CPU Core i7-3960X has 2.27 billion only) and yet its thermal design power limit is 195 watt as against 244 watt for GTX580. The performance of GTX680 is shown in the chart as obtained from http://www.geforce.com/whats-new/articles/introducing-the-geforce-gtx-680-gpu/. At this date (June 2012), we are able to supply GTX670 only as the new crown has not reached our shores yet.
A bit of recent history would help in understanding how this new crown is placed. Just over two years ago, NVIDIA launched the Fermi architecture with the GeForce GTX 480. Named after the Italian nuclear physicist Enrico Fermi, this new architecture brought two key advancements. First, it brought full geometry processing to the GPU, enabling a key DirectX 11 technique called tessellation with displacement mapping. Used in video games this technique greatly improves the geometric realism of water, terrain, and game characters. Second, Fermi greatly improved the GPU performance in general computation that would be needed for visualisation and beyond. Now Nvidia has released the Kepler architecture with GTX680. Johannes Kepler was a German Astronomer (1571-1630) and he was well recorded in history for his law of planetary motions. Why Nvidia named a newer technology with an older person is not known to us! Our Fiordland National Park has a range of mountains named after Kepler too, called the Kepler Mountains and a 3-day Walking Trail known as the Kepler Track through the Mountains.
First, Kepler Architecture has a redesigned streaming multiprocessor (SMX) which is the most important building block of GPU for optimal performance per watt. Second, it has a new feature called GPU Boost that dynamically increases clock speed to improve performance within the card's power budget. SMX has 192 CUDA cores, and GTX680 has a total of 1536 CUDA cores. GTX670 has 1344 cores. For reference, GTX580 has 512 cores only. The new series has PCI Express v3 interface. The current model of GTX570 graphics card has 2x DVI, 1x HDMI, and 1x Display Port for graphics output.
GeForce is for the consumer market such as for online games with new features such as FXAA, TXAA, and Adaptive V-Sync for smooth gaming experience. Nvidia will progressively release Kepler to Quadro for the professional 3D CAD and content creation market and to Tesla for the high performance computing market over the next 12 months.
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June 2012 |
Nvidia announced a GPU (graphical processing unit) card and claimed it to be the most powerful and most power efficient in March 2012. The card is GeForce GTX680. It is double the performance of the previous performance leader as in GTX580 but it consumes lesser electricity than GTX580. GTX680 GPU is made up of 3.4 billion transistors (this is an impressive quantity as the current top desktop CPU Core i7-3960X has 2.27 billion only) and yet its thermal design power limit is 195 watt as against 244 watt for GTX580. The performance of GTX680 is shown in the chart as obtained from http://www.geforce.com/whats-new/articles/introducing-the-geforce-gtx-680-gpu/. At this date (June 2012), we are able to supply GTX670 only as the new crown has not reached our shores yet.
A bit of recent history would help in understanding how this new crown is placed. Just over two years ago, NVIDIA launched the Fermi architecture with the GeForce GTX 480. Named after the Italian nuclear physicist Enrico Fermi, this new architecture brought two key advancements. First, it brought full geometry processing to the GPU, enabling a key DirectX 11 technique called tessellation with displacement mapping. Used in video games this technique greatly improves the geometric realism of water, terrain, and game characters. Second, Fermi greatly improved the GPU performance in general computation that would be needed for visualisation and beyond. Now Nvidia has released the Kepler architecture with GTX680. Johannes Kepler was a German Astronomer (1571-1630) and he was well recorded in history for his law of planetary motions. Why Nvidia named a newer technology with an older person is not known to us! Our Fiordland National Park has a range of mountains named after Kepler too, called the Kepler Mountains and a 3-day Walking Trail known as the Kepler Track through the Mountains.
First, Kepler Architecture has a redesigned streaming multiprocessor (SMX) which is the most important building block of GPU for optimal performance per watt. Second, it has a new feature called GPU Boost that dynamically increases clock speed to improve performance within the card's power budget. SMX has 192 CUDA cores, and GTX680 has a total of 1536 CUDA cores. GTX670 has 1344 cores. For reference, GTX580 has 512 cores only. The new series has PCI Express v3 interface. The current model of GTX570 graphics card has 2x DVI, 1x HDMI, and 1x Display Port for graphics output.
GeForce is for the consumer market such as for online games with new features such as FXAA, TXAA, and Adaptive V-Sync for smooth gaming experience. Nvidia will progressively release Kepler to Quadro for the professional 3D CAD and content creation market and to Tesla for the high performance computing market over the next 12 months.
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June 2012 |
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4:00pm – 5:30pm IT Industry & Compucon Roadmaps (TN)
5:30pm – 6:00pm Muffin Break (in lieu of Wine and Cheese)
6:00pm – 7:15pm Learning from 20 Years of Relating to Customers (TN & Hamish Fenn)
7:30pm Finish
IT Industry & Compucon Roadmaps
This session consists of 3 parts. Part 1 is on major events that happened over the last 6 months having an impact on our survival as threats and opportunities. Events include both economical and technological. Economic issues are about the government budget related to science and technology and the rollout of Ultra Fast Broadband. Technological events are Chrome PC, Suicide Malware, and IPVS Traffic Enforcement. Part 2 is on global technology trends that relate to our channel. We will look at 4 areas: Connectivity via wired and wireless (Wi-Di, Wi-Gig, Thunderbolt, Display Port), Computing Platforms via serial and parallel schemes (CUDA, Maximum, Tesla for High Performance Computing), Windows 8 for tablets and PC, and Virtualisation as in clouds and on land (PC over IP for LAN). Part 3 is on Compucon Roadmaps. We will disclose how Compucon performed for the last 20 years relative to New Zealand Incorporated, and how to turn an external factor dependent business to a digital economy business model. We will invest for growth for the next 5 years and have identified 5 technology teams. We will support this growth initiative with investments in a senior staff development scheme. Planning for 1 year is very difficult not to mention 5 years. We will get there.
Learning from 20 Years of Relating to Customers
Every business needs to sell and to create paths for customers to buy. This is about marketing! If a company has survived 20 years in a cut-throat industry, it must know how to market itself and to sell. Both Compucon and ITCL have done 20 years and have no plan to stop. Compucon is a system builder. ITCL is an IT consulting and service provider. They are in different positions in the supply chain. How did they do their marketing then? This session is for the 2 companies to reflect their learning over 20 years for sharing with peers.
In order to provide a framework for these reviews, we will take an academic approach and explain the progression of marketing concepts over the last 20 years in 3 generations (as in 1G, 2G and 3G).
Hamish has spoken many times before and his views have always been well received for his mix of technical knowledge and customer expectation management skills.
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May 2012 |
Compucon took up a stand and a seminar session in the Expo organised by the North Harbour Business Association as a major public relations and branding exercise. With the help of 3 Compucon Advocates, we obtained 62 links, 400 impressions, and 23 clicks in Google Ad terminologies. There were 64 exhibition spaces in the event. Compucon took 2 and linked with 62 other exhibitors. Our stand faced the main entrance and the Compucon House wall poster was the biggest signage in the hall. We got over 400 visitors who saw us when they came into the event. They saw Compucon again when they paused for coffee or lunch in the lounge which was adjacent to the Compucon stand. We obtained 23 survey records from visitors who came close by to see and talk with us. Our 3 Compucon Advocates are Paul Andersen, Hamish Fenn and Sion Roberts. They supplied the persona and charisma to impart a professional image on visitors passing by. Dave Fielder also came in to assist in our seminar on Digital Age and helped explain Digital trends to the audience. What a big signature from these four gentlemen, big thanks to them!
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