On Apr 22, 2011, at 3:44 PM, Gaurish Telang wrote:
> I would like to know how well PETSc works with GPU's and the kind of
> Speed-ups one can get if one uses PETSc along with GPU's.
>
> Has it been used for scientific studies so far?
>
> [ I think this bit of information (
> http://www.mcs.anl.gov/petsc/petsc-as/documentation/faq.html#gpus ) has been
> that way for a long time, and hence the above question.
>
> This 2010 article( http://www.mcs.anl.gov/petsc/petsc-2/features/gpus.pdf )
> does n
> ot mention any comparative studies of the preliminary implementation of PETSc
> for use with GPU's with other software libraries. ]
>
There are no such studies. PETSc uses the CUSP and THRUST libraries of
Nvidia on the GPU therefor the performance will be the same as using CUSP and
THRUST directly or of any other library that uses CUSP and THRUST. Just like
with regular CPUs the performance of sparse matrix iterative methods (floating
point speedwise) is determined by the hardware so there won't be much
difference between different libraries that do the "right thing".
If you are trying to decide between two packages to use for solving some
algebraic systems you need to compare them yourself, you cannot rely on what
people say. If you are deciding between using a package and doing it yourself
you might as well use the package since you can always add whatever custom
stuff yourself if you think it is better, so there is really no downside to
using a package.
Barry
> Sincere thanks,
>
> Gaurish
