TPU v4: An Optically Reconfigurable Supercomputer for Machine Learning with Hardware Support for Embeddings

Understand

In response to innovations in machine learning (ML) models, production workloads changed radically and rapidly.

• TPU v4 is the fifth Google domain specific architecture (DSA) and its third supercomputer for such ML models.
• Optical circuit switches (OCSes) dynamically reconfigure its interconnect topology to improve scale, availability, utilization, modularity, deployment, security, power, and performance; users can pick a twisted 3D torus topology if desired.
• Much cheaper, lower power, and faster than Infiniband, OCSes and underlying optical components are <5% of system cost and <3% of system power.