An engineer who builds GPU ‘from scratch’ in two weeks finds out that the process is ridiculously hard

The GPU design will get a physical form via the Tiny Tapeout project

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Published onMay 4, 2024

published onMay 4, 2024

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A self-taught hardware engineer who builds a GPU from scratch found out that the process is much more complex and incredibly hard. Notably, he went on to create a complete CPU after investing his time learning the fundamentals of central processing architecture.

Well, designing a basic CPU is possible if one has the right tools, abundant knowledge, and patience. Although, the CPU might not match the standards of processors currently available in the market.

But surely, one can make it. What about GPUs, though? Both aren’t similar after all despite sharing a lot of common aspects.

A self-taught hardware engineer builds GPU from scratch but says it was way harder than he expected

Well, a self-taught hardware engineer tried building a GPU from scratch. Encouraged by the success of building a CPU, the self-taught hardware engineer tried his luck with GPU this time around.

Despite sharing a lot of commonalities, GPUs are way different in how they manage threads as well as memory usage. He went on to realize that building a GPU from scratch wasn’t child’s play. Rather, it was incredibly tougher than he expected.

Tom’s Hardware whichfirst reported this newsadds that Twitter/X user@MajumdarAdamwho is a hardware engineer has been sharing his progress building a GPU from scratch.

The tweet embedded below shows the flow of work the engineer did throughout his journey to build a GPU from scratch. Since it was astart-from-scratchproject, he had to acquire lots of knowledge before taking the first step.

I’ve spent the past ~2 weeks building a GPU from scratch with no prior experience. It was way harder than I expected.Progress tracker in thread (coolest stuff at the end)?pic.twitter.com/VDJHnaIheb

Tom’s Hardware earlier shared the engineer’s concern about GPUs being a relatively tough field of study. All because of the dominance of proprietary tech. Sadly, his predictions came true. He felt that building a GPU from scratch with no prior experience was more hard than he expected.

Hard work paid off as he completed building the GPU by fixing several issues with the help of others

The publication explains that Majumdar wasn’t aiming for a ‘graphics’ CPU. In fact, he was building a GPGPU.PC Gamerfurther explains GPGPU in simple words. It says a general-purpose parallel computing systemincludes a triangle setup, TMUs, ROPs, or any number of fixed function circuits that are usually in graphics cards’ chips.

Ultimately, the engineer’s hard work paid off, as the GPU design he built worked post resolving several issues with the help of others. His basic GPU design was able to run a small number of instructions and could perform some matrix calculations in software simulation.

Let’s not forget that Majumdar’s CPU and GPU design will be given a physical form via theTiny Tapeoutproject. If you are interested and want to know more about his homemade GPU design, you can head to his Twitter handle or go through the dedicatedTiny-GPU GitHubpage.

Notably, the GPU isn’t available to the public, so if you looking for one to aid your video editing capabilities,check this guide. Those looking for CPUs can jump tothis page. We have listed some of the top CPU-related roundups in there.

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An engineer who builds GPU ‘from scratch’ in two weeks finds out that the process is ridiculously hard#

A self-taught hardware engineer builds GPU from scratch but says it was way harder than he expected#

Hard work paid off as he completed building the GPU by fixing several issues with the help of others#

With KB5043178 to Release Preview Channel, Microsoft advises Windows 11 users to plug in when the battery is low

Copilot in Outlook will generate personalized themes for you to customize the app

Microsoft will raise the price of its 365 Suite to include AI capabilities

Death Stranding Director’s Cut is now Xbox X|S at a huge discount

Outlook will let users create custom account icons so they can tell their accounts apart easier

An engineer who builds GPU ‘from scratch’ in two weeks finds out that the process is ridiculously hard

A self-taught hardware engineer builds GPU from scratch but says it was way harder than he expected

Hard work paid off as he completed building the GPU by fixing several issues with the help of others