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Silicon Graphics Boosts Visual Workstation Performance with Optimized SIMD Instructions

Strategic Insights

— 2 min read

Silicon Graphics, in collaboration with Intel, has unveiled a significant enhancement to its visual workstations. By leveraging the new SIMD (Streaming Single Instruction, Multiple Data) instructions in Intel's Pentium III and Pentium III Xeon processors, Silicon Graphics has optimized its visual workstations to deliver exceptional performance in demanding computing tasks such as 3D graphics, video, and audio. This partnership aims to further push the boundaries of visual computing capabilities, offering professionals unparalleled graphics and media performance.

Key Takeaways:

  • The new Intel Pentium III and Pentium III Xeon processors feature over 70 new instructions, including SIMD operations, which enhance visual computing performance.
  • Silicon Graphics has optimized its 320 visual workstation architecture to take advantage of the new SIMD instruction set, resulting in improved performance for graphics applications.
  • With Intel's improved floating-point registers, graphics applications on the Silicon Graphics 320 workstation experience an immediate improvement.
  • The balanced design of Silicon Graphics' Integrated Visual Computing (IVC) architecture efficiently harnesses the power of Intel processors for geometry-based operations, resulting in a significant graphics performance improvement.
  • The Silicon Graphics 320 visual workstation showed a 15 to 30 percent benchmark improvement in most GLPerf and ViewPerf dataset benchmarks when using an Intel Pentium III 450MHz processor compared to an Intel Pentium II 450MHz processor.
  • The Pentium III 500MHz processor delivered an additional 10 percent performance on top of the 15 to 30 percent improvement.
  • The Silicon Graphics 540 visual workstation, shipping in the second quarter of 1999, will support both Intel Pentium III Xeon 500MHz and 550 MHz processors.
  • The standard configuration for a Silicon Graphics 320 with an Intel Pentium III 450MHz processor includes IVC architecture with the Cobalt graphics chipset, 128MB SDRAM memory (expandable to 1GB), 6.4GB E-IDE drive (optional Ultra2 SCSI available), 10/100 Fast Ethernet, audio and video I/O, and Windows NT 4.0.

Statistics:

  • The new SIMD instructions in Intel's Pentium III and Pentium III Xeon processors enhance visual computing performance.
  • The Silicon Graphics 320 visual workstation exhibits a 15 to 30 percent benchmark improvement in most GLPerf and ViewPerf dataset benchmarks using an Intel Pentium III 450MHz processor.
  • The Pentium III 500MHz processor delivers an additional 10 percent performance on top of the 15 to 30 percent improvement.
  • The Silicon Graphics 540 visual workstation starts at $5,995 and will support both Intel Pentium III Xeon 500MHz and 550 MHz processors.

Sources:

  • Silicon Graphics, Inc. (NYSE: SGI) - [https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/silicon-graphics-increases-performance-leadership-of-visual-workstations-by-optimizing-for-new-simd-instructions-in-intel-pentium-iii-and-pentium-iii-xeon-processors-300006161.html](https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/silicon-graphics-increases-performance-leadership-of-visual-workstations-by-optimizing-for-new-simd-instructions-in-intel-pentium-iii-and-pentium-iii-xeon-processors-300006161.html)
  • Anand Chandrasekher, general manager, Intel workstation products division, quote from the Silicon Graphics press release.
  • Murali Dharan, vice president marketing, Workstation Division, Silicon Graphics, quote from the Silicon Graphics press release.

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