As previously reported by Thomhardhardr, the Larabi prototype, apparently the only active graphics card in the Intel hybrid graphics series in the world, sold for $ 5,234 on eBay in France.
According to Digital Trends, the model is said to be in operational mode, which was confirmed by a screenshot showing the boot screen. However, the Larabi dealer stated that there was no driver for it. Another image on the product listing page shows why this product is an engineering prototype made by Intel that is used by the company for indoor use.
Given the fact that Larabi may be the only operational hybrid graphics card in the world, one wonders why its price was not higher. The description of this product states:
If you are a serious collector, this product will probably be your only chance to get this piece of history.
It is unknown at this time what he will do after leaving the post.
The first news about Larabi Valley was published in 2008. The name of this valley product was actually the code name of a versatile computing chip on graphics processing units (GPGPUs). This silicon can effectively process the tasks normally performed by a CPU.
Intel basically wanted to create a board that offers performance beyond the graphics performance of video games. Given this fact, Larabi could do things like real-time beam tracking and regular shadow mapping; A feature that standard GPUs could not do at the time.
As the PC gamer points out, Larabi is powered by 32 quad-core multicore cores, a 512-bit vector processing unit, and a 1024-bit (512-bit, 212-bit) memory bus required to connect to the system.
Tomzaharward shows how Larabi architecture was built; This architecture can allow the GPU to even run the operating system. However, the graphics performance of this product was lower than what was seen in other cards of that time. Intel finally decided in 2009 to cancel the launch of Larabi as a graphics card.
Tom Forsyth, a senior Larabi designer, said he is asked about the Larabi project almost regularly. He says that almost every month someone asks him what happened to Larrabe and why the project failed. Forsythe said in its explanation:
I try to explain to people that Larabi was not only a failure, but a great success. Introduced in 2010, the Intel MIC multiprocessor architecture incorporates some of the technologies on the Larabi board. Xeon Phi x86 processors are based on the Intel MIC architecture.
Intel’s next discrete graphics product, the Arc Alchemist, will be released in 2022. The company has high hopes for its future graphics card and is working to make millions of Arc series GPUs available to PC gamers every year.
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