Intel Core i9 12900K "Alder Lake" AVX-512 On Linux

[phoronix]

Phoronix: Intel Core i9 12900K "Alder Lake" AVX-512 On Linux

While it was initially communicated by Intel that Alder Lake's Golden Cove P-Cores has AVX-512 "fused off", that has turned out not to be the case at least with the initial batch of processors and current BIOS/firmware configurations. If disabling the power-efficient Gracemont E-Cores, it's possible to enable AVX-512 and make use of it. Here are some initial AVX-512 benchmarks in such a configuration under Linux with the Core i9 12900K.

https://www.phoronix.com/vr.php?view=30664

[stormcrow]

In other news, and not necessarily a bad thing if you're anti-DRM like many people are: Alder Lake breaks DRM schemes. Personally I think it's a good thing, but it's not enough to keep people from buying DRM games anyway.

[avem]

In other news, and not necessarily a bad thing if you're anti-DRM like many people are: Alder Lake breaks DRM schemes. Personally I think it's a good thing, but it's not enough to keep people from buying DRM games anyway.

Alder Lake doesn't break anything, it's a usual x86-64 CPU, it's just Denuvo which was never coded with heterogeneous architectures in mind. Denuvo will fix it, don't worry.

As for DRM schemes being good or bad, the jury is still out. People do like to get stuff for free when possible and DRM allows publishers to stay profitable.

I guess a much better idea would be to create a law which mandates the removal of DRM for old/unsupported software. That would be nice.

[commodore256]

I'm not a fan of the benchmark testing methodology, the only benchmark I see is in a benchmark that's a waste of time for CPUs, mining.

Are there any AVX-512 optimized libraries that are worth running on the CPU that could be tested? I mean Intel has resources, couldn't they optimize open source libraries to make AVX-512 benchmarks look better? Like G'Mic or h265 encoding or something?

[pegasus]

There are plenty, look at their mkl for example.

[programmerjake]

i'm hoping intel gets linux to support running programs on systems with heterogenous ISA support, so AVX512 can be enabled simultaneously to the E cores being enabled.

That linux support would also be handy for Libre-SOC since we want to have Libre-SOC cores be usable together with Power9 cores without having to disable all of Libre-SOC's extensions since Power9 doesn't implement them.

[avem]

I'm not a fan of the benchmark testing methodology, the only benchmark I see is in a benchmark that's a waste of time for CPUs, mining.

Are there any AVX-512 optimized libraries that are worth running on the CPU that could be tested? I mean Intel has resources, couldn't they optimize open source libraries to make AVX-512 benchmarks look better? Like G'Mic or h265 encoding or something?

I've heard an opinion, which I can simply relay as it is as I barely understand anything, but people said that AVX512 is better suited to run on a GPU, not a CPU and implementing AVX512 on a CPU is a waste of sand.

[pipe13]

I'm not a fan of the benchmark testing methodology, the only benchmark I see is in a benchmark that's a waste of time for CPUs, mining.

Are there any AVX-512 optimized libraries that are worth running on the CPU that could be tested? I mean Intel has resources, couldn't they optimize open source libraries to make AVX-512 benchmarks look better? Like G'Mic or h265 encoding or something?

As pegasus suggests, intel mkl is a good place to start. Its OneAPI implementation comes stock with a variety of purpose-built low-level libs, and may be configured to load your runtime preference:

ls /opt/intel/oneapi/mkl/latest/lib/intel64/libmkl*avx
/opt/intel/oneapi/mkl/latest/lib/intel64/libmkl_avx2.so.1
/opt/intel/oneapi/mkl/latest/lib/intel64/libmkl_avx512_mic.so.1
/opt/intel/oneapi/mkl/latest/lib/intel64/libmkl_avx512.so.1
/opt/intel/oneapi/mkl/latest/lib/intel64/libmkl_avx.so.1
/opt/intel/oneapi/mkl/latest/lib/intel64/libmkl_vml_avx2.so.1
/opt/intel/oneapi/mkl/latest/lib/intel64/libmkl_vml_avx512_mic.so.1
/opt/intel/oneapi/mkl/latest/lib/intel64/libmkl_vml_avx512.so.1
/opt/intel/oneapi/mkl/latest/lib/intel64/libmkl_vml_avx.so.1

Give Michael some time. Mkl includes the standard BLAS gemm() routines, so he'll fersure get around to it. Meantime I'm rofl wondering how he tumbled to this one at all.

[perpetually high]

I was seriously debating between the new 12600K vs the 5800X (thanks again for those benchmarks Michael) but to me the 5800X won in the end. (especially for getting it at $299, that's a flat out steal).

The DRM issue with 50+ games not working and that silly "Scroll Lock toggle" workaround, not to mention the extremely high prices for medium-range motherboards and lack of availability for DDR5, lack of use for PCIE5, etc. How could you tote best gaming platform when you can't play many, many popular titles? To me, Alder Lake isn't mature enough to take the plunge. Rather jump on AM4 and get a 5800X at a solid price with a high-end motherboard and DDR4-4000.

Both platforms will likely have one more upgrade path each, but I have no issue maxing out DDR4 tech and waiting for DDR5 to mature / calm down, etc. I'm pretty excited. All the parts are here. Reading the manual right now. Gigabyte X570S AORUS Master. No more active cooling. It's an incredible motherboard, very impressed. Benchmarks to come this week.

edit: I previously said I was gonna go with ECC memory - Crucial DDR4-2666 (overclocked to 3200, verify errors with edac-util) but then I thought about it, I'm leaving a lot of performance on the table not getting very fast DDR4 ram (specifically, 3600+, more specifically 4000 to match with an Infinity Fabric of 2GHz). Previously I was intimidated by all the new AMD lingo, but it's slowly becoming a little familiar. Alder Lake doesn't provide any of that, but it does have its own new tech with P and E cores, but again, still immature. I don't want those growing pains but both are different and great in their own ways. (AVX512 being another obvious win for Intel here)

[avem]

I was seriously debating between the new 12600K vs the 5800X (thanks again for those benchmarks Michael) but to me the 5800X won in the end. (especially for getting it at $299, that's a flat out steal).

If not for Intel your shiny 5800X would have cost you $450. It's been recently discounted to something like ~$390 but it's still far above what you've just paid.

It would be great if people did not forget the value of healthy competition and stopped praising one company over another one. Praise products and their performance/features to value ratio.