News AMD Helping to Bring Smart Access Memory to Nvidia GPUs

[Admin]

AMD is enabling smart access memory capabilities on Nvidia graphics cards.

AMD Helping to Bring Smart Access Memory to Nvidia GPUs : Read more

 

[Kamen Rider Blade]

I like this co-operative side of doing things.

 

[drea.drechsler]

Quote from article:

"AMD stated in an interview with PCWorld that its Radeon group is working with Intel to get this feature supported with RX 6000-series GPUs and Intel's latest CPUs and motherboards. "​

So why can't AMD work with AMD to get it supported on AMD's motherboard's and CPU's? Namely, B450/X470 and 3rd Gen Ryzen.

 

[TJ Hooker]

Since then, AMD stated in an interview with PCWorld that its Radeon group is working with Intel to get this feature supported with RX 6000-series GPUs and Intel's latest CPUs and motherboards. The same goes with AMD's Ryzen group, which is working with Nvidia to get Smart Access Memory working with GeForce GPUs.

In the video they're talking about future hypothetical. I.e. if Intel/Nvidia want to support SAM, AMD will work with them if/when that happens. Not that they're currently working on it with them. Small but important distinction IMO. That's how I interpreted it anyway.

 

[TJ Hooker]

Quote from article:

"AMD stated in an interview with PCWorld that its Radeon group is working with Intel to get this feature supported with RX 6000-series GPUs and Intel's latest CPUs and motherboards. "​

So why can't AMD work with AMD to get it supported on AMD's motherboard's and CPU's? Namely, B450/X470 and 3rd Gen Ryzen.

Maybe it's a PCIe 3.0 vs 4.0 thing? Although whether that's a real limitation, or an artificial one that AMD is creating, I have no idea. On paper it sounds like resizeable BAR shouldn't require 4.0 though...

 

[tiggers97]

Hmm... I wonder if in exchange AMD gets some help implementing DLSS as a standard...

 

[spongiemaster]

Hmm... I wonder if in exchange AMD gets some help implementing DLSS as a standard...

No, they'll get help getting SAM working on Intel boards for their video cards.

 

[clsmithj]

Quote from article:

"AMD stated in an interview with PCWorld that its Radeon group is working with Intel to get this feature supported with RX 6000-series GPUs and Intel's latest CPUs and motherboards. "​

So why can't AMD work with AMD to get it supported on AMD's motherboard's and CPU's? Namely, B450/X470 and 3rd Gen Ryzen.

or simply work with all of Ryzen, it should benefit Ryzen 1000 and 2000 as well as Ryzen Threadripper 1000-3000.

 

[drea.drechsler]

Hmm... I wonder if in exchange AMD gets some help implementing DLSS as a standard...

I'd have to imagine that, if 'doable', it could be done by paying appropriate licensing fees that would necessarily increase cost of Radeon GPU's that implement it, similar to SLI on motherboards and G-Sync on monitors. I'd much rather AMD implement something of their own that relies more on open standards.

As I'm understanding it, the thing about SAM is it is just an implementation of an open standard built into PCIE specificantions and doesn't require licensing a proprietary innovation. This is similar to FreeSync that relies on open display interface standards in the HDMI spec.

 

[TechLurker]

Quote from article:

"AMD stated in an interview with PCWorld that its Radeon group is working with Intel to get this feature supported with RX 6000-series GPUs and Intel's latest CPUs and motherboards. "​

So why can't AMD work with AMD to get it supported on AMD's motherboard's and CPU's? Namely, B450/X470 and 3rd Gen Ryzen.

Probably a combination of incentives and stability purposes.

Incentives being NVIDIA and Intel agreeing to help pay for some validation work and support on the latest-gen chipsets and CPUs. AMD would get $$$ from both on helping them iron out any kinks between Ryzen+NVIDIA and Intel+Radeon, as well as whatever $$$ for support (especially if Windows or a BIOS update breaks something).

Stability would be validating down the product stack and ensuring that as many combos as possible does NOT result in an issue. Going by the wording, it sounds like NVIDIA and Intel are also limiting SAM to newer components first, although NVIDIA mentioned they would like to bring the feature as far back as the 900 series.

Personally, AMD should at least validate down to Ryzen 3000/4000, 400 series Chipset, and Polaris 400/500. That would cover a sizable portion of their product stack and also provide a bit of a boost to their long-running GPU lines. Moreso since they were producing Polaris until recently (using up their GloFo agreements), and those have been pretty solid starter GPUs. Ideally, they should validate all the way back to Ryzen 1000 and 300-series chipsets, but I could see where they might not want to touch the 300-series motherboards more due to mostly being PCIe 2.0 limited and BIOS limitations (not to mention; would also have to provide semi-official Ryzen 5000 support if they actively update 300-series chipset BIOS instead of leaving it entirely to the mobo vendors to deal with). If they can at least validate all the way back to the Ryzen 2000 series and the 1600 AF and 1400 AF, that would be a great value proposition.

 

[Gomez Addams]

I'd have to imagine that, if 'doable', it could be done by paying appropriate licensing fees that would necessarily increase cost of Radeon GPU's that implement it, similar to SLI on motherboards and G-Sync on monitors. I'd much rather AMD implement something of their own that relies more on open standards.

As I'm understanding it, the thing about SAM is it is just an implementation of an open standard built into PCIE specificantions and doesn't require licensing a proprietary innovation. This is similar to FreeSync that relies on open display interface standards in the HDMI spec.

That's right and it (Resizable BAR Capability) has been part of the specification since v2.0, 2008.

 

[Strontium]

One has to wonder if this is just a Windows problem? Linux has had vendor neutral Resizable BAR support since 2017.

Sounds like the platform and gpu drivers on windows just never bothered to implement it until AMD did it. And now everyone's like "we can do that too". Well you had many years so why haven't you already?

 

[TechLurker]

One has to wonder if this is just a Windows problem? Linux has had vendor neutral Resizable BAR support since 2017.

Sounds like the platform and gpu drivers on windows just never bothered to implement it until AMD did it. And now everyone's like "we can do that too". Well you had many years so why haven't you already?

Probably was never a real reason to until now. Even some Linux users said its use is purely situational. Another possible reason is cost, in terms of validation and continued support. Support and maintenance of Resizable BAR drivers are on AMD, Intel, and NVIDIA. Microsoft doesn't maintain the feature-set in Windows natively the way Linux distros directly manage it as part of the core OS.

 

[noko]

Any word on TRX40 support and Threadripper? Their HEDT line and not a word, seems rather disappointing, are we suppose to wait until TR has Zen 3 and pay way over $1000 to have this feature???