vivster said:
No they don't work better because they're on the same chip. They will still communicate outside of the chip through the RAM anyway, which in a lot of cases is a bottleneck for APUs because CPU and GPU have to share it instead of each having their own. APUs are also extremely limited in power due to being on the same chip. The same heat that's usually generated on 2 chips and cooled by 2 coolers is crammed on a single small surface. If it's about performance APUs(or SOCs) will never beat dedicated CPU + GPU. But since an Intel and Nvidia always demand premium price for their products going with AMD was the natural step. APUs are a great compromise but do not excel in anything. |
Actually they do.
Thats why AMDs chips are differnt than intels + its GPU.
Intels cpu and igpu even if they are on the same chip they are still seperate from one another.
AMD calls their cpu+gpu chips APUs (accelerated processing units).
They have HSA (Heterogeneous System Architecture) instructions that allow for the integration of central processing units and graphics processors on the same bus, with shared memory and tasks.
Notice how it says "shared" tasks.
That is something Intel cannot do with their igpu.
They cannot take 1 work task, and use both the cpu and gpu at the same time, to work on the same problem.
That is why AMD does these small igpu on their chips.
Because if you code for it, you get much higher perf/watt.
This is why Sony went with 1 pool of memory thats shared.
Sony can if they want too, use HSA to off load work from the CPU and put it to work on the cpu+gpu combo, getting much higher results.
Im not sure if anyone not first party, will ever use this (on the ps4), but the option is there.
