Is larq supported on x86 based CPUs?

[gj-raza]

Can larq compute engine run models on x86 (say intel cpus) cpus or is it exclusive for ARM based cpus

[Tombana]

Hi @gj-raza,
Larq Compute Engine can run on any platform, including x86 cpus. However, optimized implementations are only provided for ARM Cortex-A systems (and ARM Cortex-M in a private fork). When you run Larq Compute Engine on x86, it will fall back to slower code and not use SIMD vector instructions, for example.

[jneeven]

(see also #607 (comment))

[gj-raza]

So does it mean that it wont also use AVX2/AVX512 SIMD instructions supported on x86 CPUs?

[Tombana]

Correct.

[gj-raza]

Got it. Thanks.

[Tombana]

To clarify: we don't have explicit assembly code or intrinsics to use such SIMD instructions on x86. It can still happen that the compiler that is very smart and uses them.