How to confirm whether my CPU support VNNI or not?

[qyzhang]

Hi experts,

I have one Cascade Lake sever and run AI inference(INT8 precision) tasks with intel-tensorflow. According to Introduction to Intel® Deep Learning Boost on Second Generation Intel® Xeon® Scalable Processors, VNNI can speed up computing very much. And I do saw the time cost decreasing against another machine. Because there is more than one difference between the two machine, I wanna confirm whether my server support VNNI at first.

I have tried finding the answer through google and become more confusing now...

From the wiki of avx512vnni, looks Cascade server has it but I can't find AVX512VNNI in /proc/cpuinfo.

From Deep learning at scale using distributed frameworks, I see below info:

Ice Lake and future microarchitectures will have AVX512_VNNI

Seems Cascade lake has VNNI, but it should be VPDPBUSD in functional. Ice lake will have the instruction named AVX512_VNNI, right?

Could somebody help? Thanks.

[AlHill]

What is the model number of your processor?

Doc

[qyzhang]

Thanks for your help, below is my CPU model name:​

Model name:      Intel(R) Xeon(R) Platinum 8255C CPU @ 2.50GHz

[Emeth_O_Intel]

Hello qyzhang,

Thank you for contacting Intel Xeon Support.

I was reviewing your thread and it is correct the instruction AVX512 VNNI is supported in Cascade Lake (server) and Ice Lake (client).

Could you please provide us more details about your Intel Processor? If it is possible to provide us more details about this project you are planning to achieve as well.

We will be waiting for your outcome in order to proceed with the next step.

Best regards,

Emeth O.

Intel Server Specialist.

[qyzhang]

Thanks Emeth,

1. My CPU model name is Intel(R) Xeon(R) Platinum 8255C CPU @ 2.50GHz
2. I'm trying the Intel model zoo to get a basic benchmark profiling result. After make clear the perf keypoint, I will go on to optimize my own models.

[Emeth_O_Intel · Accepted solution]

Hello qyzhang,

I was doing some research and the Intel(R) Xeon(R) Platinum 8255C CPU @ 2.50GHz belongs to the Cascade Lake Microarchitectures specifically with the Intel Xeon Platinum 8200 Family. So, this processor supports Intel® Deep Learning Boost (Intel® DL Boost) which it is a new set of embedded processor technologies designed to accelerate AI deep learning use cases. It extends Intel AVX-512 with a new Vector Neural Network Instruction (VNNI) that significantly increases deep learning inference performance over previous generations.

Please let me know if you have more questions and I will be more than happy to assist you.

Best regards,

Emeth O.

Intel Server Specialist.

[Emeth_O_Intel]

Hello qyzhang,

I would like to know if you have more questions? If so, please let me know and I will be more than happy to assist you.

Have a wonderful day.

Best regards,

Emeth O.

Intel Server Specialist.

[Emeth_O_Intel]

Hello qyzhang,

I would like to know if the information provided helps you to have a better idea of your concern.

Please let me know if you would like to proceed with the closing of this thread or if you still have some questions and I will be more than happy to assist you.

Best regards,

Emeth O.

Intel Server Specialist.

[qyzhang]

Thanks Emeth, it's ok to close this thread.​

[Sgodsell]

Instead of AVX512_VNNI, on Linux it shows up as avx_vnni under /proc/cpuinfo

cat /proc/cpuinfo