The Hydra 100 from Lucid Technologies turns two or more graphics adapters into
a single, cooperative graphics compute engine. It starts as a basic PCI Express switch,
allowing any kind of device to be plugged in downstream. But it shows its multifaceted personality
when GPUs such as those from NVidia and AMD/ATI are downstream.
Its RISC engine makes multiple graphics boards appear as a single, more powerful device,
distributing graphics operations among boards through sophisticated load-leveling tasks. It can
also merge information computed on different boards, allowing frame rendering to be distributed
while a single board delivers the results without the external linkage typically found on
competing scalable link interface (SLI) solutions, which tend to be vendor-specific while requiring
matching boards.
This solution can blend
compatible boards from
the same vendor, assuming
that the vendorâ??s universal
Windows device driver supports
them all. This capacity
highlights two featuresâ??the
ability to upgrade a system by adding a new board, and the ability for a
system that's equipped with the Hydra 100
to handle boards from both major vendors
since systems typically will be tuned for one
or the other.
The Hydra 100 offers opportunities to
embedded designers who want to provide a
scalable solution that exceeds a single GPU.
It also will enable designs that start with
lower-performance, less costly platforms
while supporting incremental performance
increases.
LUCID TECHNOLOGIES •
www.lucidlogix.com
See Asssociated Figure