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All 5 Flashcards — The GPU
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Question
What is the role of a GPU?
Answer
To perform many simple calculations at the same time. It has thousands of small cores, which suits work made of many identical independent sums — pixels, machine learning, simulations.
Question
How does a GPU's architecture differ from a CPU's?
Answer
A CPU has a few powerful cores that handle complicated varied work in order. A GPU has thousands of simple cores that do the same calculation simultaneously.
Question
Give two non-graphics uses of a GPU and say why they fit.
Answer
Machine learning (multiplying huge grids of numbers) and large simulations (updating millions of independent points). Both repeat one calculation across many values.
Question
When is a GPU a poor choice?
Answer
When the work is a chain of steps that each need the previous answer. Nothing can run in parallel, and GPU cores are individually weaker than CPU cores.
Question
How do the CPU and GPU divide a job between them?
Answer
The CPU runs the program, decides what needs doing, sends the repetitive part and its data to the GPU, and collects the result when it is finished. The GPU never chooses its own work.
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Topic 1.1 hub
Hardware and operation
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