AMD Fusion ‘11 Summit attracts ARM, Microsoft - heterogeneous computing & OpenCL

BSN interviewed John Taylor, Director of Client Product and Software Marketing at AMD, regarding the upcoming Fusion Developer Summit to be held June 13-16, 2011 at the Meydenbauer Center in Bellevue, Washington.

Both Microsoft and Arm will be giving keynotes at the event.  ARM is going to reiterate their commitment to OpenCL with their own Mali series GPU, tying nicely to AMD’s Fusion APUs, i.e. Ontario (9W) and Zacate (18W) and upcoming Llano APUs (up to 95W). 

Also noteworthy from the interview:

With Fusion architecture, CPU (ok, APU) is getting a driver update each and every month for the first time in history of the silicon. The company insists on a vision that by making a continuous Catalyst driver updates for the Ontario/Zacate/Llano APUs, the CPU and GPU parts will be constantly updated with application profiles and API updates. As a result, users of AMD APUs should experience smoother application performance as the time passes by.

Do note that with the Fusion strategy, AMD is no longer just following computing standards, but rather setting them in silicon with smart adjustments. A good example for that is the upcoming C-60 APU that gives you up to 33% higher performance in typical CPU tasks or a massive 43% performance boost in DirectX / OpenGL / OpenCL - all while staying in the same power envelope (9W).

Check John Taylor’s blog for more details on who is speaking.