NVIDIA goes for the win
Obviously, Windows 7 will be able to take advantage of both NVIDIA and AMD GPUs, but Microsoft is apparently working very specifically with NVIDIA to tweak Windows machines, both server and desktop, to take full advantage of the massively parallelisable Cuda architecture. This will purportedly ensure the systems will work to get the very best out of Tesla cards, pushing the various apps to use the substantial power of the GPU to its utmost.
This is being achieved by tinkering with the various sorting algorithms which run on a system to accelerate the GPU. Microsoft is also ensuring that certain pieces of code are more suitable for acceleration on Tesla, achieved partly by Microsoft researchers using Cuda to write more GPU-enabled code, and partly through NVIDIA's efforts to develop apps for Windows - especially Server 2008 - which make more use of Tesla, such as ray-tracing, for example.
But so far, any suping-up of the GPU will be limited to Microsoft and NVIDIA's current efforts, as no plans have been announced about bundling the Cuda programming environment for Teslas into workstation versions of Windows 7 or Server 2008.
"My GPU's better than your GPU"
It's still a start, however, and one NVIDIA is touting as "a great benefit for the industry." The company's spokesperson also told HEXUS the gains could be quantifiably measured in energy and cost savings because "GPU computing delivers 10x the performance in the same power budget."
"A desktop system with Tesla GPUs delivers the same performance as clusters with 16 to 32 CPU servers. Similarly, a small Tesla GPU cluster can outperform clusters that are almost 10-20 times bigger and thus significantly save energy," she told us.
