AMD Confirms Instinct MI200 With Aldebaran HPC GPU Features MCM Design With One Primary & One Secondary Die

Jun 9, 2021 at 08:44am EDT
AMD Instinct MI200 CDNA 2 'Aldebaran' MCM HPC GPU Accelerator Launching Later This Year

AMD is gearing up to launch its first MCM GPU, the Instinct MI200 based on the Aldebaran HPC chip. The Instinct MI200 would be featuring the CDNA 2 graphics architecture and offer twice the horsepower thanks to the industry-leading multi-chip-module packaging design.

AMD Instinct MI200 'Aldebaran' HPC GPU All Set To Introduce MCM CDNA 2 Architecture

The latest information on the Instinct MI200 comes within the Linux Patch which confirms that the graphics card is indeed based on an MCM design. The patch references the two dies onboard the GPU as primary and secondary. It is stated that the primary die will fetch the valid power data while the secondary die will communicate with the first die to distribute the power balance. This will be the first time we will be getting an MCM GPU & even though those are not planned for consumers yet, AMD's next-gen RDNA 3 is expected to introduce a similar (chiplet) design on Navi 31 and Navi 32 GPUs.

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Other than that, the AMD MI200 is listed as an MCM 'Special FIO Accelerator' for HPE Cray EX. That could explain where the MI200 name comes from. An MCM (Multi-Chip-Module) design could mean that we could still be looking at a Vega Compute GPU but two of them fused over the same PCB & connected by a next-generation Infinity Fabric interconnect. Following is a representation of what the AMD Aldebaran GPU could look like:

The block diagram of AMD's CDNA 2 powered Aldebaran GPU which will power the Instinct MI200 HPC accelerator has been visualized. (Image Credits: Locuza)

Here's Everything We Know About AMD's CDNA 2 Architecture Powered Instinct Accelerators

The AMD CDNA 2 architecture will be powering the next-generation AMD Instinct HPC accelerators. We know that one of those accelerators will be the MI200 which will feature the Aldebaran GPU. It's going to be a very powerful chip and possibly the first GPU to feature an MCM design. The Instinct MI200 is going to compete against Intel's 7nm Ponte Vecchio and NVIDIA's refreshed Ampere parts. Intel and NVIDIA are also following the MCM route on their next-generation HPC accelerators but it looks like Ponte Vecchio is going to be available in 2022 and the same can be said for NVIDIA's next-gen HPC accelerator as their own roadmap confirmed.

In the previous Linux patch, it was revealed that l that the AMD Instinct MI200 'Aldebaran' GPU will feature HBM2E memory support. NVIDIA was the first to hop on board the HBM2E standard and will offer a nice boost over the standard HBM2 configuration used on the Arcturus-based MI100 GPU accelerator. HBM2E allows up to 16 GB memory capacity per stack so we can expect up to 64 GB HBM2E memory at blisteringly fast speeds for Aldebaran.

The latest Linux Kernel Patch revealed that the GPU carries 16 KB of L1 cache per CU which makes up 2 MB of the total L1 cache considering that the GPU will be packing 128 Compute Units. The GPU also carries 8 MB of shared L2 cache but carries 14 CUs per Shader Engine compared to 16 CUs per SE in the previous Instinct lineup. Regardless, it is stated that each CU on Aldebaran GPUs will have a significantly higher computing output.

Other features listed include SDMA (System Direct Memory Access) support which will allow data transfers over PCIe and XGMI/Infinity Cache subsystems. As far as Infinity Cache is concerned, it's looking like that won't be happening on HPC GPUs. Do note that AMD's CDNA 2 GPU will be fabricated on a brand new process node & are confirmed to feature a 3rd Generation AMD Infinity architecture that extends to Exascale by allowing up to 8-Way coherent GPU connectivity.

AMD Radeon Instinct Accelerators

Accelerator NameAMD Instinct MI400AMD Instinct MI350XAMD Instinct MI300XAMD Instinct MI300AAMD Instinct MI250XAMD Instinct MI250AMD Instinct MI210AMD Instinct MI100AMD Radeon Instinct MI60AMD Radeon Instinct MI50AMD Radeon Instinct MI25AMD Radeon Instinct MI8AMD Radeon Instinct MI6
CPU ArchitectureZen 5 (Exascale APU)N/AN/AZen 4 (Exascale APU)N/AN/AN/AN/AN/AN/AN/AN/AN/A
GPU ArchitectureCDNA 4CDNA 3+?Aqua Vanjaram (CDNA 3)Aqua Vanjaram (CDNA 3)Aldebaran (CDNA 2)Aldebaran (CDNA 2)Aldebaran (CDNA 2)Arcturus (CDNA 1)Vega 20Vega 20Vega 10Fiji XTPolaris 10
GPU Process Node4nm4nm5nm+6nm5nm+6nm6nm6nm6nm7nm FinFET7nm FinFET7nm FinFET14nm FinFET28nm14nm FinFET
GPU ChipletsTBDTBD8 (MCM)8 (MCM)2 (MCM)
1 (Per Die)
2 (MCM)
1 (Per Die)
2 (MCM)
1 (Per Die)
1 (Monolithic)1 (Monolithic)1 (Monolithic)1 (Monolithic)1 (Monolithic)1 (Monolithic)
GPU CoresTBDTBD19,45614,59214,08013,3126656768040963840409640962304
GPU Clock SpeedTBDTBD2100 MHz2100 MHz1700 MHz1700 MHz1700 MHz1500 MHz1800 MHz1725 MHz1500 MHz1000 MHz1237 MHz
INT8 ComputeTBDTBD2614 TOPS1961 TOPS383 TOPs362 TOPS181 TOPS92.3 TOPSN/AN/AN/AN/AN/A
FP16 ComputeTBDTBD1.3 PFLOPs980.6 TFLOPs383 TFLOPs362 TFLOPs181 TFLOPs185 TFLOPs29.5 TFLOPs26.5 TFLOPs24.6 TFLOPs8.2 TFLOPs5.7 TFLOPs
FP32 ComputeTBDTBD163.4 TFLOPs122.6 TFLOPs95.7 TFLOPs90.5 TFLOPs45.3 TFLOPs23.1 TFLOPs14.7 TFLOPs13.3 TFLOPs12.3 TFLOPs8.2 TFLOPs5.7 TFLOPs
FP64 ComputeTBDTBD81.7 TFLOPs61.3 TFLOPs47.9 TFLOPs45.3 TFLOPs22.6 TFLOPs11.5 TFLOPs7.4 TFLOPs6.6 TFLOPs768 GFLOPs512 GFLOPs384 GFLOPs
VRAMTBDHBM3e192 GB HBM3128 GB HBM3128 GB HBM2e128 GB HBM2e64 GB HBM2e32 GB HBM232 GB HBM216 GB HBM216 GB HBM24 GB HBM116 GB GDDR5
Infinity CacheTBDTBD256 MB256 MBN/AN/AN/AN/AN/AN/AN/AN/AN/A
Memory ClockTBDTBD5.2 Gbps5.2 Gbps3.2 Gbps3.2 Gbps3.2 Gbps1200 MHz1000 MHz1000 MHz945 MHz500 MHz1750 MHz
Memory BusTBDTBD8192-bit8192-bit8192-bit8192-bit4096-bit4096-bit bus4096-bit bus4096-bit bus2048-bit bus4096-bit bus256-bit bus
Memory BandwidthTBDTBD5.3 TB/s5.3 TB/s3.2 TB/s3.2 TB/s1.6 TB/s1.23 TB/s1 TB/s1 TB/s484 GB/s512 GB/s224 GB/s
Form FactorTBDTBDOAMAPU SH5 SocketOAMOAMDual Slot CardDual Slot, Full LengthDual Slot, Full LengthDual Slot, Full LengthDual Slot, Full LengthDual Slot, Half LengthSingle Slot, Full Length
CoolingTBDTBDPassive CoolingPassive CoolingPassive CoolingPassive CoolingPassive CoolingPassive CoolingPassive CoolingPassive CoolingPassive CoolingPassive CoolingPassive Cooling
TDP (Max)TBDTBD750W760W560W500W300W300W300W300W300W175W150W

News Source: Coelacanth-Dream

About the author: A Software Engineer by training and a PC enthusiast by passion, Hassan Mujtaba serves as Wccftech's Senior Editor for hardware section. With years of experience in the industry, he specializes in deep-dive technical analysis of next-generation CPU and GPU architectures, motherboards, and cooling solutions. His work involves not only breaking news on upcoming technologies but also extensive hands-on reviews and benchmarking.

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