GPUVolt: Modeling and Characterizing Voltage Noise in Gpu Architectures

Citation:

J. Leng, Y. Zu, M. Rhu, M. Gupta, and V. J. Reddi, “GPUVolt: Modeling and Characterizing Voltage Noise in Gpu Architectures,” in Proceedings of the International Symposium on Low Power Electronics and Design (ISLPED), 2014, pp. 141–146.
Paper1.19 MB

Abstract:

Voltage noise is a major obstacle in improving processor energy eciency because it necessitates large operating voltage guardbands that increase overall power consumption and limit peak performance. Identifying the leading root causes of voltage noise is essential to minimize the unnecessary guardband and maximize the overall energy eciency. We provide the first-ever modeling and characterization of voltage noise in GPUs based on a new simulation infrastructure called GPUVolt. Using it, we identify the key intracore microarchitectural components (e.g., the register file and special functional units) that significantly impact the GPU’s voltage noise. We also demonstrate that intercore-aligned microarchitectural activity detrimentally impacts the chipwide worst-case voltage droops. On the basis of these findings, we propose a combined register-file and execution-unit throttling mechanism that smooths GPU voltage noise and reduces the guardband requirement by as much as 29%.

Categories and Subject Descriptors

C.4 [Performance of Systems]: Modeling techniques, Reliability, availability, and serviceability

Keywords

di/dt, inductive noise, GPU architecture, GPU reliability

Last updated on 05/31/2019