Intel’s Sandy Bridge i7-2820QM: Upheaval in the Mobile Landscape

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• tipoo - Monday, January 3, 2011 - link

  Sorry if I missed this somewhere in the review, but does the graphics component support OpenCL?

• RyuDeshi - Monday, January 3, 2011 - link

  Second to last paragraph on the "Extended compatibility and performance results:"
  
  "Ultimately, Sandy Bridge’s IGP is far more capable than many would have expected. Sure, it doesn’t even try to support DX11 or OpenCL, but at least for gaming DX11 is typically too much for even midrange GPUs."

• CharonPDX - Monday, January 3, 2011 - link

  An Intel rep has said that Sandy Bridge will support OpenCL. (http://news.cnet.com/8301-13924_3-20024079-64.html ) The trick is that it may be a combo CPU+GPU to do it. So it may not be what you are thinking by OpenCL being solely GPU, but OpenCL code should be able to run.
  
  And in the end, what does it matter, really, as long as it runs? As the desktop Sandy Bridge review points out, video encoding is just as fast using solely the x86 codepaths as using nVidia's CUDA or ATI's Stream.

• Voldenuit - Monday, January 3, 2011 - link

  OpenCL was designed from the outset to run on heterogenous resources, including CPU.
  
  So intel claiming that they "support" OpenCL is nothing special - they just needed the right drivers/API.
  
  However, don't expect OpenCL code running solely on the CPU (my guess as to how SB will handle it) to be any faster than the x86 codepath running on the same CPU.
  
  Checkbox feature.

• jameskatt - Monday, January 3, 2011 - link

  What Intel wants to do is to have the CPU run OpenCL code.
  
  This totally defeats the purpose of OpenCL.
  
  OpenCL is suppose to allow both the GPU and the CPU to run code simultaneously. This is to allow significant acceleration in running OpenCL code compared to using just the CPU.
  
  Sure. OpenCL code will run. But it will run MORE SLOWLY than with a discrete GPU. And the 16 GPUs in Sandy Bridge will be wasted.
  
  Intel's Sandy Bridge has non-programmable GPUs. This is a serious limitation and deal killer when it comes to running OpenCL code.
  
  I expect Apple to continue use nVidia's or AMD's discrete GPUs with the MacBooks and Mac Book Pros.
  
  This is very disappointing. It shows that Intel still doesn't have the talent to produce decent GPUs.

• PlasmaBomb - Monday, January 3, 2011 - link

  And the 16 GPUs in Sandy Bridge will be wasted.

  
  
  *cough* I think you mean 12 EU *cough*

• Guspaz - Monday, January 3, 2011 - link

  <i>What Intel wants to do is to have the CPU run OpenCL code.
  
  This totally defeats the purpose of OpenCL.
  
  OpenCL is suppose to allow both the GPU and the CPU to run code simultaneously. This is to allow significant acceleration in running OpenCL code compared to using just the CPU.</i>
  
  No, this is the *primary* purpose of OpenCL. The goal of OpenCL is not to "allow the GPU and CPU to run code simultaneously", but to provide a single unified code path that can be used with any hardware, be it CPU or GPU. There are/were already code paths specific to each vendor/type (CUDA for nVIDIA GPUs, Stream for AMD/ATI GPUs, x86 for Intel/AMD CPUs). The problem is that fully supporting all three platforms requires three separate code paths.
  
  OpenCL unifies this, and allows a single codepath to be used regardless of the GPU's type or existence. You've completely misunderstood the purpose of OpenCL.

• Wiggy McShades - Tuesday, January 4, 2011 - link

  You need to ask what applications on a desktop actually use OpenCL in a meaningful way? Intel added hardware for media transcoding, which makes transcoding on something besides the cpu useless and that was roughly all openCL can be used for on the desktop, laptop, or cellphone.
  OpenCL is for vector calculations, AVX is for vector calculations. All four cores running AVX instructions would just be a faster choice than OpenCL on a low end gpu. Intel most likely could get sandybridge's gpu running OpenCL, but it would be pointless. OpenCL just is not a desktop feature.

• strikeback03 - Wednesday, January 5, 2011 - link

  Given how much money they have, I doubt Intel is lacking the "talent" to do anything they want. OpenCL execution on the GPU portion of the SNB chips was probably just not that big a deal to them, and given the number of other things (such as speed and battery life) SNB brings to the table they probably won't have trouble selling lots of these to the average consumer.

• 8steve8 - Monday, January 3, 2011 - link

  which mobile cpus on pg1 support TXT or VT-d or AES-NI or VT-x or Quick Sync?