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Ask HN: Do you think Photonic Tensor Cores will replace GPUs in the future?

6 pointsby Gooblebrai3 months ago

4 comments

talldayo3 months ago
Probably not, Nvidia seems to have cracked the code with streaming multiprocessors augmented with ordinary tensor-optimized acceleration hardware.<p>For photonic tensor cores to take off, unprecedented manufacturing advances would be required. To replace GPUs entirely would require some form of raster graphics acceleration, which doesn&#x27;t seem like a great fit for photonic hardware.
mikewarot3 months ago
I think isolinear core is the way to go. A homogeneous cartesian array of cells that can either do a 4 x 4LUT worth of compute OR be used as 64 bits of FIFO or RAM depending on individual cell configuration. All at 10 Ghz clock rates.
ktallett3 months ago
Photonic systems are hard to make and scale, the research is ongoing but it isn&#x27;t there yet in any aspect so possibly one day however that depends on how the other technology advances as well.
ai-christianson3 months ago
If we stick to large transformer models for long enough and things stabilize, I could see app-specific chips getting traction.