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It's been a while since I've done my writeup on memory hierarchy back in... 2017? Wow time flies by fast. A lot has changed since then: I've gotten a Master's degree, gotten a job as a R&D compiler engineer, and I've learned a lot more about hardware and software in general. And I'm still bored so here I am. Alright, onwards to the topic at hand. Some of us have probably heard of, or seen marketing on some CPU's, regarding features like AVX (Advanced Vector eXtension), SSE (Streaming SIMD Extensions), MMX (Multi-Media eXtension) and such. These can all be categorized into what's called SIMD Extensions. Extension in this context refers to extra instructions and features added to the CPU that is separate from the main instruction set (x86, ARM, etc). SIMD: What is it? It stands for Single Instruction, Multiple Data, and units inside the processors doing this are sometimes referred to as vector processor/co-processors. SIMD instructions operate on vector registers (See below for explanation if you don't know what that is), and they can hold multiple pieces of data at once. Think of a vector as just a one-dimensional array of data. For example, if the vector length is 128-bits, it can hold 4x single precision float values (fp32), 2x double precision float values (fp64), 16x int8's, etc. SIMD instructions would take these vector registers and operate on all of them in a single instruction. (Single-value registers/instructions are referred to as Scalar register/instructions). Vector register sizes range between 128-bits to 2048-bits for ARM SVE (Scalable Vector Extension) (Although nobody that I know of was crazy enough to implement anything that big... yet), AVX2 uses 256-bit vector registers, and AVX-512 uses 512-bits. So, the more data you process at once, the faster a program can run! Registers: Did you know? HOWEVER Before you get too excited, SIMD is not being used for many, many, many programs. Most of the programs we use daily does not utilize SIMD instructions, or their usage does not gain a noticeable speed increase. Why? Well, as always, it comes down to software. For one, in order to use SIMD instructions, there are often times restrictions on the layout of the data in memory. Sometimes, in order to get the data in the format the vector processors can handle, you're better off using scalar operations anyway. Secondly, not all programs can benefit from vectorization. Sometimes you just need to do calculations with a single value. Sometimes your values need different operations (e.g. adding one, subtracting another). If you can't consistently fill up your vector registers, they're not worth the trouble. Finally, in order to use SIMD instructions, the programmer often times need to embed SIMD instructions into the program they're writing directly. This is similar to embedding assembly code (basically "human readable" machine code) directly into C. It's also very hardware specific, older processors may only support MMX, or SSE... or maybe AVX-2. But typically only server parts have support for AVX-512. So what are they used for? On the consumer side, SIMD is typically used for multimedia - software video encoding/decoding (Hence the Multi Media eXtension). Also, in recent years - AI. Some neural networks, for example, are not large enough to warrant transferring data to the GPU to process (remember, getting data to and from GPU takes time), and they are often times handled by the CPU, utilizing SIMD instructions. By the way: Also, SIMD is an essential part to HPC (High performance computing, basically supercomputers) applications. For example, the processor making up the fastest supercomputer in the world (last I checked), was the A64FX, powering Japan's Fugaku supercomputer. These are ARM processors with SVE, with a vector length of 512-bits. So that's about it. That's all I can come up regarding SIMD without going too much into the details... This lockdown is making me spend my time on things like this :v

Hello all, I have a Asus RTX 2060 that faulted on me after only 1 year. It was a good card and I'd like to donate it to learn what happened. I've heard of baking, but I'd rather let the experts kill it for science than me because I'm stupid. Lol please someone get in contact with me, if you fix it it's yours!

So am looking for a study partner(s) to study with for the comptia A+, I am looking to take my Cert In mid-January. I have current gone over the material and am looking to help fill in my weak spots and get prepared for the exam. I am looking for a study partner that would like to meet up online in some chat room (voice or video cam). I like to meet up once a week for 2 -3 hours to quiz each other with home brewed or googled questions applying to the A+. I also open to other forms of studying. I am in the Eastern time zone ( UTC -5), depending on how many people are really interested we can go from there on setting up a weekly time slot/schedule we aim for doing the study sessions.

It's very educational, so watch the whole thing.

So I want to build a PC for my niece and nephew, they are aged 12 and 8 respectively. I figured out what sorta hardware to use given my budget and I thing I nailed this part down to the sweet spot My problem is that I do not want just to give them a blank box capable of gaming and browsing etc. This is going to be their first computer (they used computers but for example their fathers etc) I can not make one for each because I am budget limited but I would like at least to make this one as fun exciting and educational as possible. But I dont have the slightest idea on how to start.... I mean is the best one can do to add a bunch of educational software (in that case which do you consider as the "best" from you experience) Or are there any desktop mods or scripts that can transform their experience and show them the ropes on computing (like for example the kano kit ) Generally advice me with whatever you think will be useful to make this first computer a memorable experience for the children both in terms of fun but also in educational value. And if you dont have time to explain how you would set up such a thing at least copy paste some links with useful material anything is welcomed! I thank you all in advance.

Hello everybody! I have ended the life of a EVGA 04G-P4-3975-KR 970 SSC ACX 2.0+ card & I'm coming to ask you guys for help. Obviously I've done something wrong & I'd like your input so the mistake can be avoided in the future. Hopefully this thread will not only help me out but save some other people from these troubles in the future. To start out I want to say I've been running these amazing bios from over on the Overclock.net forums for three months with constant everyday use. I ran this card at 1532 core & 7906 memory with no problems! I never adjusted the power via sliders or anything else once the modified bios were put in place, I just used EVGA's PrecisionX 16 software to modify the speeds & run a more aggressive fan profile. I had tested this card at higher speeds via AIDA64 Extreme, 3DMark Pro, Cinebench 64, & Valley Benchmark where it did fine. I bumped it down to those speeds for a little bit of safety instead of putting it on the very edge all the time. At absolute worse it would get to 80C with the fans at 100% sounding like a jet was taking off in my office. (though it never downclocked) Skip forward a couple of months & I was really tired of the noise. Specifically when I was doing video editing, the scrubbing would make those fans rev up and down enough to make you pull your hair out. Or even while streaming on Twitch, no matter how good of a audio filter you setup the noise could become a problem at times. Wanting to solve two problems at once I figured I could help protect the long term life of the card & bring it's noise down by installing an AIO water setup on it. I have alot of NZXT products in my build so I figured I would stay with what's worked so far & purchased a Kraken X31, the G10 mounting kit, some Noctua NT-H1 paste, & 16 additional copper heatsinks. I was worried there was a lot of this card that needed cooling that the fan included in the G10 kit wasn't going to adequately take care of. I have a ton of air flow in my case so I thought with some well placed heat sinks I wouldn't have any issues keeping this card nice and quiet while it screamed on those modified bios. So I put everything together & it worked great for a while. I wanted to see how it would handle maximum stress so I fired up every benchmark I could. This card would never get over 55C, it was rock solid & finally silent. I was in heaven for about an hour. I tested some additional overclocks just for grins. The card would bench at 1600mhz core & 8,000mhz memory but after a while would start to stutter. I kinda laughed that even on water that was probably pushing it to far so I backed it down to 1550 on the core & everything was fine. I mean that's only 18mhz faster then I had it running on air for months. I really wasn't concerned one bit since this wasn't about getting it faster. I had a bunch of work to get done so I just let it run endless benchmarks in the background to see how it was going to handle the new setup. About 45 minutes into this I got a business call that took me away from my desk for about 20 mins & being naive or just really dumb I didn't for a second think to turn off my stress tests. I came back to a black screen, the system was still on but there was absolutely no video response. From that moment on this card was officially dead. I tried separate PCI Express slots, I ran completely different cables from different ports off my PSU, I took the card out & put it in another system all together. Then I took an old Quadro FX 3450/4000 SDI card I had laying around & tested everything. My system was fine, I couldn't find any damage to anything but the 970. No matter where I tried to run this card, the systems would never power on for more then a split second. I mean you could push the power button & watch the system fans just twitch once not even really move. That was the fate as I tested it over and over. I removed all my mods off the card completely, reinstalled the default stock cooling system, & well you guessed it, obviously still dead. I got a magnifying glass out just to see if there was any sign of physical abuse on the card, like I nicked something during the mod or I don't know, just if there was any sign of what had happen. Nada, card looks great. I'm truly baffled as to what went wrong. I have speculated that a few of the tiniest chips I couldn't fit additional heatsinks on failed when they overheated. I'm also rolling the idea around in my head that I should have tried to install the X31 on top of the secondary plate that covered all the chipsets / memory instead of putting on all the copper heatsinks myself. I'm really not sure, I've highlighted the spots that didn't get new heatsinks in the pictures below. So I've got another of the exact same card coming. It'll be here Monday. Hopefully with all of your help I can install this X31/G10 on it & not ruin another $350 card. The sticky pads that came on the copper heatsinks have got to be dry by now & I didn't order any permanent bonding compounds yet as I wanted to hear what you all had to say before going down that route again. I watched a bunch of videos of people doing this same mod & clearly I've screwed up somewhere. ALL ADVICE IS WELCOME. Please use my mistakes as an educational grounds to improve your own future builds. Pictures in the spoiler box below: Thanks in advance, 'Gobby

Looking for recommendations for educational and/or wholesome games or otherwise interactive media for 5/6 year olds. I haven't the slightest idea where to begin. I somewhat recall something like turtle academy when I was in elementary school rocking the schools 286 5.25" floppy 10" CRT with maybe 8 whole colours and no HDD. Though I think its a bit advanced for my niece at the moment (next month maybe different, her braincase is starting to explode). And yes I'm asking mostly because I'd be okay with being the kewl uncle that gets left in peace when the 3ft mobile noise maker gets dropped off to wreak havoc and spread germs at my place. PC preferred. phone & tablet apps too I guess, but...I'm not keen on sharing those toys...

Awesome News is Awesome... Autodesk today announced it’s making its suite of of apps free for students and teachers worldwide. According to Autodesk, the new access should allow more than 680 million people from over 800,000 schools and 188 countries have access to the software at no cost. As of today the design-minded outfit is offering its wares, AutoCAD and Fusion 360, for education use worldwide. This is the follow up to the announcement of free software for academic institutions in the United States earlier this year as part of President Obama’s ConnectED initiative, Autodesk has gradually expanded free access to its leading design software to academic institutions across Asia Pacific and Europe. the access is meant for educational purposes only no commercial usage allowed. Autodesk is the leader in 3D design, engineering, and entertainment software , Now it's also helping schools move to the cloud by providing academic institutions with its full suite of next generation cloud-based design products, cloud services such as the A360 collaboration platform, as well as maintenance subscription for free. To access the free software you need to request free educational access to Autodesk through their site : http://www.autodesk.com/education. News Link: http://www.engadget.com/2014/12/01/autodesk-software-free-education/ Pretty swell news since the company decided to now open up the software up for worldwide acees for free, Post Your thoughts on this down beloooooooooooww

Story from /. Just thought it was interesting and the people of this section of the forum would find it informative/educational. I am not into programming/CS yet, but I might be one day. I will bookmark this video so it is more relevant to me then.