Intel 12th Generation Core blocks the AVX-512 instruction set: small cores are no longer allowed to be turned off

Intel seems to be about to make a somewhat surprising decision to disable 12th Generation Core's support for the AVX-512 instruction set altogether.

It is reported that AVX-512 is also AVX3, that is, "advanced vector extension", the first generation of AVX appeared in Sandy Bridge ii generation Core, the second generation AVX2 was born in 2011 fourth generation Core (Haswell), the latest third generation was released in 2013, the earliest for the Xeon product line, has been delegated to the 11th generation Core Rocket Lake.

In simple terms, the AVX-512 contains a series of instructions that can accelerate workloads, including scientific simulation, financial analysis, artificial intelligence, deep learning, 3D modeling, audio and video processors, encryption and decryption, data compression, and more.

Although it is assumed that Alder Lake supports AVX-512, and users have found that it is possible to disable the E core in the BIOS to enable AXV-512, Intel said that this will bring unknown errors and completely block AVX-512 in the BIOS through microcode updates.

The obvious reason is that the 12th generation Core Alder Lake uses a hybrid architecture, and the small core (E core) Gracemont does not support AVX-512, which is difficult for Intel to accept for this instruction set to shut down the E core.

The reason why it is weird is that IgorLabs tests have found that the energy efficiency of the 12th-generation Core big-core Golden Cove is even higher than that of avX2 after opening the AVX-512, which is very different from the 11th generation of Core, whose AVX-512 is simply electric tiger. In addition, the PS3 emulator RPCS3 official also recently suggested on the social platform that 12th generation Core users turn off the E core and open the P core AVX512 instruction set, which can greatly increase the game frame rate.

A reasonable explanation should be that although AVX-512 does have bonuses in some scenarios after it is turned on, the price is to sacrifice the E core, and in Intel's view, there are more workloads that require the participation of P core + E core, which is not worth the loss.

Obviously, if your current motherboard BIOS can still open avx-512 and know how to control, it is still a matter of postponing the upgrade of the BIOS.