bit-tech.net

AMD releases OpenCL SDK

Published on 7th August 2009 by Gareth Halfacree

The latest beta of the Stream SDK introduces support for the OpenCL specification, making it easer for developers to support GPGPU operation.

Note: This article states that the latest version of Stream SDK includes support for GPU acceleration in OpenCL, which is incorrect and was an error that wasn't picked up before publication. Please see the following article which is an addendum to the original article you see below.

ATI Stream SDK 2.0 beta 2 lacks OpenCL GPU support

- Tim

If you're a programmer with an ATI graphics card, you'll be pleased to hear that the latest beta of AMD's Stream SDK 2.0 package features the company's first publicly released OpenCL development tools.

As reported over on V3.co.uk, the beta package builds on the already-released Stream SDK 1.4 by adding OpenCL support in Windows XP, Vista, and Linux - officially openSUSE 11.0 or higher and Ubuntu 8.04 or higher, but others should be unofficially supported.

The introduction of OpenCL support into the Stream SDK promises to make the development of GPU accelerated and multi-threaded applications easier, allowing programmers to create cross-platform applications with ease.

Although this is the first version of the Stream SDK to introduce support for the OpenCL standard, it's far from the first application to make use of it in order to offload intensive processing tasks: since the Khronos Group unveiled version 1.0 of the specification late last year several technologies have been ported to utilise it, including accelerated versions of the Havok physics engine and the promise of HD upscaling for your DVDs.

In order to ensure the adherence to specification of this latest beta, AMD has sent the conformance logs to the Khronos Group for validation. Once received, programmers should be able to start using the beta without the fear that some mis-implemented part of the OpenCL specification will throw them off course.

Do you believe that the future of computing lies on the GPU, or does the CPU simply need to get more efficient? Share your thoughts over in the forums.

12 Comments

Discuss in the forums Reply

HourBeforeDawn 7th August 2009, 09:05

Woot awesome, cant wait to see what people come up with ^^

Motoko 7th August 2009, 10:03

Hopefully CoreAVC can use this to implement hardware acceleration for video files. fingers cross.

[USRF]Obiwan 7th August 2009, 10:08

Why don't some smart programmers use the SDK to make it cuda compatible. Instead of rewriting the cuda apps to run an a ATI GPU?

Denis_iii 7th August 2009, 10:50

why don't some smart coders make an opensource version so things aren't split up between cuda and stream? isn't M$ doing something like that with Directx11

Paradigm Shifter 7th August 2009, 11:40

Would be neat if Stanford used this to make ATi GPUs more competitive in folding again.

Also want a PC capable of upscaling as well as my PS3.

KoenVdd 7th August 2009, 14:08

Be carefull, this release still only supports OpenCL on the CPU. If you look at the "what's new" on the product page, it only mentions OpenCL for CPU, which is how other sites are reporting it.

HourBeforeDawn 7th August 2009, 16:49

Quote:

Originally Posted by Denis_iii
why don't some smart coders make an opensource version so things aren't split up between cuda and stream? isn't M$ doing something like that with Directx11

well on the physics side of things, I know thats what MS is doing with DirectX 11 and same goes with OpenCL which will be nice as it will work with both manufactures.

Chocobollz 7th August 2009, 21:35

Quote:

Originally Posted by [USRF
Obiwan]Why don't some smart programmers use the SDK to make it cuda compatible. Instead of rewriting the cuda apps to run an a ATI GPU?

Or maybe nVidia should just throw CUDA out of the window and start supporting OpenCL or DX11 Compute Shader as a standard. That would make everyone's lifes easier (I think :P). On topic, I think this is a good move by AMD. They haven't get the market trust back again but at least they're on the right track now. Hopefully more and more peoples will consider to buy AMD's products again (including me :-)

Elton 7th August 2009, 21:47

There's only one thing I'm still perplexed about....WHY ISN'T AMD improving steam?

This is a good step though.

HourBeforeDawn 7th August 2009, 22:35

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chocobollz
Or maybe nVidia should just throw CUDA out of the window and start supporting OpenCL or DX11 Compute Shader as a standard. That would make everyone's lifes easier (I think :P). On topic, I think this is a good move by AMD. They haven't get the market trust back again but at least they're on the right track now. Hopefully more and more peoples will consider to buy AMD's products again (including me :-)

+1 on throwing out Cuda and PhysX for that matter

Tim S 10th August 2009, 12:28

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chocobollz
Quote:
Originally Posted by [USRF
Obiwan]Why don't some smart programmers use the SDK to make it cuda compatible. Instead of rewriting the cuda apps to run an a ATI GPU?

Or maybe nVidia should just throw CUDA out of the window and start supporting OpenCL or DX11 Compute Shader as a standard. That would make everyone's lifes easier (I think :P). On topic, I think this is a good move by AMD. They haven't get the market trust back again but at least they're on the right track now. Hopefully more and more peoples will consider to buy AMD's products again (including me :-)

Nvidia does support OpenCL - drivers are here: http://www.nvidia.com/object/cuda_opencl.html

Tim S 10th August 2009, 15:57

I happened to be away on compassionate leave on Friday and, as a result, a factual error crept into this article - I keep right up to speed on the latest developments in GPU technology and GPU computing, so I would have proofread or edited this article had I been at work. ATI Stream SDK 2.0 beta 2 does not support GPU acceleration in OpenCL, as was suggested in this article. I have written a supplementary article to this one, detailing AMD's plans for GPU-accelerated OpenCL support in Stream SDK: http://www.bit-tech.net/news/hardware/2009/08/10/ati-stream-sdk-v2b2-gpu-support/1