Title: Simulation-based evaluation of the Imagine stream processor with scientific programs

Authors: Yonggang Che; Chuanfu Xu; Pingjing Lu; Zhenghua Wang

Addresses: National Laboratory for Parallel and Distributed Processing, School of Computer, National University of Defense Technology, Changsha 410073, Hunan, China. ' National Laboratory for Parallel and Distributed Processing, School of Computer, National University of Defense Technology, Changsha 410073, Hunan, China. ' National Laboratory for Parallel and Distributed Processing, School of Computer, National University of Defense Technology, Changsha 410073, Hunan, China. ' National Laboratory for Parallel and Distributed Processing, School of Computer, National University of Defense Technology, Changsha 410073, Hunan, China

Abstract: This paper evaluates the performance and efficiency of Imagine stream processor for scientific programs. It classifies scientific programs into three classes based on their computation to memory access ratios. Typical programs are selected and measured on a simulated Imagine and two general-purpose processors. Comparative analysis is made with special attentions on the computational efficiency, power efficiency and performance bottleneck. The results show that programs in Class 1 attain high performance and high computational efficiency on Imagine. Their performance is only restricted by limited ILP and load imbalance across ALUs. Programs in Class 2 attain moderate performance but non-satisfactory computational efficiency on Imagine due to limited LRF and SRF reuse. Programs in Class 3 attain extremely low performance on Imagine because most of the execution time is spent on DRAM accesses. The estimated power efficiency on Imagine is excellent except for programs in Class 3.

Keywords: Imagine stream processor; high performance computing; program classification; computational efficiency; power efficiency; performance bottleneck; simulation.

DOI: 10.1504/IJHPCN.2012.046385

International Journal of High Performance Computing and Networking, 2012 Vol.7 No.2, pp.99 - 110

Published online: 30 Aug 2014 *

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