The Industry’s First High-Performance x86 SoC with Server-class CPUs and Integrated AI Coprocessor Technology

Centaur’s microprocessor-design technology includes both a NEW high-performance x86 core AND the industry’s FIRST integrated AI Coprocessor for x86 systems. The x86 microprocessor cores deliver high instructions/clock (IPC) for server-class applications and support the latest x86 extensions such as AVX 512 and new instructions for fast transfer of AI data. The AI Coprocessor is a clean-sheet processor designed to deliver high performance and efficiency on deep-learning applications, freeing up the x86 cores for general-purpose computing. Both the x86 and AI Coprocessor technologies have now been proven in silicon using a new scalable SoC platform with eight x86 cores and an AI Coprocessor able to compute 20 trillion AI operations/sec with 20 terabytes/sec memory bandwidth. This SoC architecture requires less than 195mm² in TSMC 16nm and provides an extensible platform with 44 PCIe lanes and 4 channels of PC3200 DDR4.

Centaur demonstrated its new technology in a reference system running at 2.5GHz. This system was used to submit official, audited (Preview) scores to MLPerf¹ and showed that Centaur’s AI Coprocessor can classify an image in less than 330 microseconds while providing inference throughput equivalent to 23 high-end CPU cores from other x86 vendors². Since Centaur’s technology is fully compatible with standard PCs and servers, the integrated AI Coprocessor can be augmented with off-chip GPUs or other AI accelerators for system-level scability.