AMD tools ease heterogeneous architecture design

AMD releases the APP SDK 2.8 and the CodeXL unified tool suite. The releases are said to provide tools and resources that will speed design of applications using the company's accelerated processing units (APUs) and graphics processing units (GPUs). These include code samples, white papers, libraries and tools to leverage the processing power of heterogeneous compute with OpenCL, C++, DirectCompute and more.

The APP SDK 2.8 delivers up to 2.3x faster performance on average in nine key benchmarks compared to the APP SDK 2.7. It includes a preview version of AMD's new open source C++ template library, codename "Bolt," which is aimed at making it easier to use the inherent performance and power efficiency of heterogeneous computing while reducing lines of code with a single code path for GPU and CPU programming. Bolt is a productivity-oriented development environment. It lets developers improve performance on today's heterogeneous compute platforms, and can help increase performance and reduce power consumption with the exact same code on future Heterogeneous System Architecture (HSA) compliant platforms.

The CodeXL tool suite ushers software developers and ISVs into a new arena of parallel programming. It harnesses the compute power of AMD's CPUs, GPUs and APUs across an array of computing platforms. The tool offers comprehensive GPU debugging, GPU and CPU profiling, static OpenCL kernel analysis and a stand-alone user interface on Windows and Linux for enhanced accessibility and navigation. As a result, developers can bring to life solutions with amazingly fast run-times, long battery life and smooth playback for leading software applications.