Nvidia has introduced an A100 accelerator built on a 7nm GPU Ampere GA100 as a solution with 40 GB of HBM memory. It was available both in the form of a module (TDP 400 watts) and in the form of a PCIe version (TDP 250 watts). There was some confusion at the time, as Nvidia had originally announced that the PCIe version would be 10-50% slower, and after publishing this information in the media, it corrected its statement to 10-33%.
Half a year later, last season before Christmas, it announced the preparation of an 80GB variant, but only for the modular version (SXM4). In addition to higher capacity, less than a third faster HBM2E (3.2 GHz instead of 2.43 GHz) was used. In the near future, the PCIe variant will also be equipped with 80 GB capacity.
This portfolio enrichment can be a preparation for a competitive AMD Instinct MI200 with a GPU Aldebaran, which is to be released in the second half of this year and equipped with up to 128 GB HBM2E.
It is not yet known exactly when the release will take place. This applies to both the Instinct MI200 and the Nvidia A100 80GB PCIe. With regard to the publication of the existence of the 80GB card in the Nvidia documentation, it can be expected that it could appear already in the summer, while the new generation from AMD will probably arrive later, probably in the autumn.
updates: Nvidia has officially announced the “A100 80GB PCIE” on the ISC 2021, the start date of the sale has not yet been confirmed:
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