How do you know if your cpu is equal to your gpu?

[crem]

One (more) way to get "fair" configuration both to GPU and CPU-based engines, and to pick a balanced consumer PC.

For what "balanced" is, one can use sites like https://www.logicalincrements.com/ which provide good balanced configurations for different budgets.
It's not optimized for chess, and nobody can say it's deliberately biased towards Lc0 or SF.

It's just good recommended configuration (maybe a bit "gaming"-biased), I always just picked a line from that table and bought parts without any research and was always happy with the result.

[jp]

One (more) way to get "fair" configuration both to GPU and CPU-based engines, and to pick a balanced consumer PC.

For what "balanced" is, one can use sites like https://www.logicalincrements.com/ which provide good balanced configurations for different budgets.

Yes. One could also look at standard off-the-shelf configurations computer manufacturers offer.

I think it'll be very split into gaming vs. non-gaming machines, though.

I'm looking now at a very expensive laptop line and it doesn't offer any option for other than Integrated Intel UHD Graphics Card. The even more expensive gaming laptop brand has i7-9750H and GTX 1660 Ti.

[jp]

I think price is the best measure. The total should also include RAM cost

GPUs might use more energy over time, so the energy cost would eventually catch up to anything and would make the GPU non-cost effective no matter what.

we get 365.25*24*0.13*0.28 = $319/year. Still, worth a consideration.

If you want to go down the economics path, it should subtract what would be spent anyway. Most people in wealthy countries might already have a computer with a fast multi-core CPU for general purposes, but only gamers might have more than a very minimal GPU, possibly just integrated. I'm guessing the overlap between people into gaming and people into computer chess is not large.

[mmt]

If you want to go down the economics path, it should subtract what would be spent anyway. Most people in wealthy countries might already have a computer with a fast multi-core CPU for general purposes, but only gamers might have more than a very minimal GPU, possibly just integrated. I'm guessing the overlap between people into gaming and people into computer chess is not large.

You could argue that most non-gamers won't have more than a basic CPU because it's not really needed for anything they might do. They don't need more than maybe 4 cores. And for many people adding a graphics card is too hard, so the decision will only come into play when buying a new PC. People who are into computer chess will all know about LC0 because of its great results so they will consider buying a graphics card for their new rig.

[jp]

You could argue that most non-gamers won't have more than a basic CPU because it's not really needed for anything they might do. They don't need more than maybe 4 cores. And for many people adding a graphics card is too hard, so the decision will only come into play when buying a new PC. People who are into computer chess will all know about LC0 because of its great results so they will consider buying a graphics card for their new rig.

People into computer chess will consider a graphics card only because of NN engines, so it's an extra cost. They won't need the graphics card for anything else.

It's true that most non-gamers won't have high-spec machines, but a basic CPU is still multicore. Look at the CPU & GPU in standard configs main computer manufacturers offer (a version of crem's suggestion above).

e.g. random mainstream budget desktop: 9th Gen Intel® Core™ i5 9400 (6-Core, 9MB Cache, up to 4.1GHz with Intel® Turbo Boost Technology); Intel UHD Graphics 630 with shared graphics memory.

I don't know anything about the Intel UHD Graphics 630, but I doubt it'd make Leela fans happy.

Even on the expensive gaming laptop, how does i7-9750H stack up against GTX 1660 Ti?

[mmt]

I'm not convinced that people into computer chess who buy desktops don't play any video games. Most people can just use a laptop for most of their needs and it won't have a fast CPU with many cores. They can optionally plug-in a bigger monitor, mouse, or better keyboard and get pretty much the full desktop experience.

Even if desktop users don't play games, they may want to try VR or use Photoshop or Premiere to edit photos and videos faster or try learning ML. And being able to play with NN programs seems like a good reason to spend a bit more - they are new and exciting.

The cost of getting an Nvidia GPU doesn't have to be a big expense. For example https://www.dell.com/en-us/shop/deals/x ... vmstcs002s. It's not going to be very fast but the CPU is not very fast either at this price point.

[jp]

The cost of getting an Nvidia GPU doesn't have to be a big expense. For example https://www.dell.com/en-us/shop/deals/x ... vmstcs002s. It's not going to be very fast but the CPU is not very fast either at this price point.

Yes, this is fine, so in this example we have: 9th Gen Intel® Core™ i5 9400 (6-Core, 9MB Cache, up to 4.1GHz with Intel® Turbo Boost Technology); NVIDIA® GeForce® GT 1030 2GB GDDR5.

What sort of numbers would we get from SF on the i5 9400, and from Lc on the GT1030?

Even if desktop users don't play games, they may want to try VR or use Photoshop or Premiere to edit photos and videos faster or try learning ML. And being able to play with NN programs seems like a good reason to spend a bit more - they are new and exciting.

I'm not saying that they couldn't cook up some other uses, if they already have the extra hardware, or that they should never spend the extra money. (I'm sure if I fly to the Swiss Alps to ski, I can also find other pleasant tourist activities to do while I'm there.) I'm just saying that if you want to go on economics to determine the matchups, it should be the extra costs you count, and what's "extra" is a lot different for gaming and non-gaming.

[mmt]

I'm just saying that if you want to go on economics to determine the matchups, it should be the extra costs you count, and what's "extra" is a lot different for gaming and non-gaming.

One other big group I forgot to mention: kids (or grandkids) of computer chess users. They will want a fast graphics card if they want to use the computer to play.

[Ovyron]

One other big group I forgot to mention: kids (or grandkids) of computer chess users. They will want a fast graphics card if they want to use the computer to play.

I'd rather teach them about how to make better use of what they already have, and about the diminishing results of chess (double your hardware speed and get only 1 depth more in the same time, that barely makes a difference), and the draws one can get with 10 year old hardware against Leela on fastest GPUs.

Computer chess users want faster hardware because of bad education by their parents on a time computers weren't even mainstream, so teaching their kids (or grandkids) now "you need better hardware" instead of "you can do the same with slower hardware" is a disservice to them.

[mmt]

I'd rather teach them about how to make better use of what they already have, and about the diminishing results of chess (double your hardware speed and get only 1 depth more in the same time, that barely makes a difference), and the draws one can get with 10 year old hardware against Leela on fastest GPUs.

That's kind of my point - additional CPU cores will do little for most users but a fast GPU will make a big difference in games and VR for desktops. 35% of total U.S. population plays games on a PC https://www.pcgamesn.com/pc-gamers-vs-c ... rs-numbers. Some may play browser games only, so let's say 25%. But an average household in the U.S. is 2.6 people, so the percentage of PCs being used for games is high. There are many fewer users who have any use for more than 4 cores.