SCANZONE
04.01.16 | ISSUE 38
As 2016 kicks off NVIDIA has rolled out three new GPUs, a version of the GTX 980 for gaming laptops and two new Tesla GPUs for servers. We’ve also got news on a great free game bundle from AMD. Read on to find out more.
1. New and improved 3XS system support
In December we’ve made massive changes to the support department for our 3XS systems. Recognising that our quality of service did not match our award-winning systems we’ve restructured the department and doubled the number of staff. This will enable us to provide superior service, answering queries quicker and reducing the turnaround time on system repairs.
We’ve also developed a Windows application that is now being deployed on all new system orders. The 3XS application has shortcuts to diagnostic tools and our contact details. The 3XS Support application can be found running in the System Tray in the bottom right corner of the Task Bar with a ‘3XS’ icon – simply right click on the icon to open the menu then left click on the option you want.
2. GeForce GTX 980 now available in laptops
Earlier this year NVIDIA announced that it would be unleashing a version of the incredibly popular GTX 980 GPU for laptops. Compared to the existing GTX 980M, the new GTX 980 for laptops is a real monster, with 2048 cores running at up 1064MHz and 7GHz GDDR5 versus 1536 cores running at 1038MHz with 5GHz GDDR5.
As the GTX 980 for laptops is more power hungry than the GTX 980M it isn’t available in any thin and light chassis, but the first laptop it’s available in, the LG17 Carbon Extreme G-Sync 3XS is still much thinner and nearly 1kg lighter than a SLI laptop. As its name suggests this new laptop also features G-Sync technology, so the refresh rate is synchronised with the frame rate to minimise tearing and stuttering.
You can configure your own LG17 Carbon Extreme G-Sync with GeForce GTX 980 graphics, with prices starting at £1679 inc VAT.
3. Accelerated virtual desktops with Tesla M60
NVIDIA has also added two cards to the Tesla stable this month. The first card, the M60 is passively cooled card is designed for rackmount servers and features two GPUs to accelerate virtualised desktops using the NVIDIA Grid framework.
Each GPU on the M60 has 2048 cores and 8GB of GDDR5, giving it far more processing power than earlier cards such as the Grid K2 which had two GPUs each with 1536 cores and 8GB of GDDR5. As with previous cards, the Tesla M60 can be configured either for compute or virtualised graphics, supporting up to 32 users depending on the level of performance their virtual desktop requires. The Tesla M60 is available in Scan 3XS Grid servers for virtualised graphics.
4. Accelerated Deep Learning with Tesla M40
In last month’s Scanzone we revealed that Scan had developed Europe’s only NVIDIA-certified Deep Learning system, the DL G10, which is powered by four GeForce GTX Titan X GPUs. However, while Titan X GPUs provide a very cost-effective way to explore and learn about Deep Learning, to scale out your code to the datacentre you really need a Tesla GPU with ECC memory.
Previously the best GPU-accelerator for Deep Learning was the Tesla K80, but this month is now joined by a new card, the Tesla M40. The new M40 is a passively-cooled card designed to be installed in high airflow servers, packing in 3072 cores with 12GB of GDDR5 memory. The M40 will soon be available across the range of Scan 3XS Deep Learning servers.
5. Play Star Wars Battlefront for free with Radeon R9 Fury and Fury X
Last month AMD started a promo where anybody buying a Radeon R9 Fury graphics card received a free copy of the online shooter Star Wars Battlefront. This month, the promo has been expanded to AMD’s flagship super-fast graphics card the Radeon R9 Fury X.