Speed, power and cost implications for GPU acceleration of Computational Fluid Dynamics on HPC systems

Fuente: arXiv
Gespeichert in:
Bibliographische Detailangaben
Hauptverfasser: Cooper-Baldock, Zachary, Almirall, Brenda Vara, Inthavong, Kiao
Format: Preprint
Veröffentlicht: 2024
Schlagworte:
Online-Zugang:
Tags: Tag hinzufügen
Keine Tags, Fügen Sie den ersten Tag hinzu!
_version_ 1866916191088410624
author Cooper-Baldock, Zachary
Almirall, Brenda Vara
Inthavong, Kiao
author_facet Cooper-Baldock, Zachary
Almirall, Brenda Vara
Inthavong, Kiao
contents Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) is the simulation of fluid flow undertaken with the use of computational hardware. The underlying equations are computationally challenging to solve and necessitate high performance computing (HPC) to resolve in a practical timeframe when a reasonable level of fidelity is required. The simulations are memory intensive, having previously been limited to central processing unit (CPU) solvers, as graphics processing unit (GPU) video random access memory (VRAM) was insufficient. However, with recent developments in GPU design and increases to VRAM, GPU acceleration of CPU solved workflows is now possible. At HPC scale however, many operational details are still unknown. This paper utilizes ANSYS Fluent, a leading commercial code in CFD, to investigate the compute speed, power consumption and service unit (SU) cost considerations for the GPU acceleration of CFD workflows on HPC architectures. To provide a comprehensive analysis, different CPU architectures, and GPUs have been assessed. It is seen that GPU compute speed is faster, however, the initialisation speed, power and cost performance is less clear cut. Whilst the larger A100 cards perform well with respect to power consumption, this is not observed for the V100 cards. In situations where more than one GPU is required, their adoption may not be beneficial from a power or cost perspective.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2404_02482
institution arXiv
publishDate 2024
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Speed, power and cost implications for GPU acceleration of Computational Fluid Dynamics on HPC systems
Cooper-Baldock, Zachary
Almirall, Brenda Vara
Inthavong, Kiao
Distributed, Parallel, and Cluster Computing
Numerical Analysis
Performance
J.2.9; C.1.4; C.4; G.1.3
Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) is the simulation of fluid flow undertaken with the use of computational hardware. The underlying equations are computationally challenging to solve and necessitate high performance computing (HPC) to resolve in a practical timeframe when a reasonable level of fidelity is required. The simulations are memory intensive, having previously been limited to central processing unit (CPU) solvers, as graphics processing unit (GPU) video random access memory (VRAM) was insufficient. However, with recent developments in GPU design and increases to VRAM, GPU acceleration of CPU solved workflows is now possible. At HPC scale however, many operational details are still unknown. This paper utilizes ANSYS Fluent, a leading commercial code in CFD, to investigate the compute speed, power consumption and service unit (SU) cost considerations for the GPU acceleration of CFD workflows on HPC architectures. To provide a comprehensive analysis, different CPU architectures, and GPUs have been assessed. It is seen that GPU compute speed is faster, however, the initialisation speed, power and cost performance is less clear cut. Whilst the larger A100 cards perform well with respect to power consumption, this is not observed for the V100 cards. In situations where more than one GPU is required, their adoption may not be beneficial from a power or cost perspective.
title Speed, power and cost implications for GPU acceleration of Computational Fluid Dynamics on HPC systems
topic Distributed, Parallel, and Cluster Computing
Numerical Analysis
Performance
J.2.9; C.1.4; C.4; G.1.3
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2404.02482