When models get too large for a single GPU, simply stacking layers vertically (Pipeline Parallelism) isn't always the answer. Sometimes, you need to slice the matrices themselves.
My latest guide breaks down the hardware mechanics of Tensor Parallelism (TP). We look at how to shard individual operations across devices to make a cluster function as one massive accelerator.
This isn't high-level theory—it is a look at the bare metal implementation.
Here is what is covered in the deep dive:
The Strategies: Column vs. Row Parallelism We analyze how to split weight matrices (W) and inputs (X).
Column-Linear: Splits weights by columns. Requires an All-Gather to reconstruct the output. Row-Linear: Splits weights by rows. Requires an All-Reduce to sum partial results. The "Megatron-LM" Optimization Efficiency comes from minimizing communication. By sandwiching the non-linearity (GeLU) between a Column-Parallel layer and a Row-Parallel layer, we can skip synchronization entirely during the activation phase. This cuts communication events by 50% per block.
The Hardware Reality: The Bandwidth Wall In TP, the dist.all_reduce operation sits on the critical path. The CUDA cores effectively stall while waiting for the ring-reduce to finish.
Intra-Node: Works well because NVLink provides enough bandwidth to hide this latency. Inter-Node: Fails at scale. Standard networking (Ethernet/InfiniBand) is too slow for the high-frequency syncs required by TP. The article includes a raw PyTorch implementation using torch.distributed primitives to show exactly where the data moves and where the bottlenecks sit.
Running large language models efficiently is more than just raw GPU power. The latest guide breaks down the essential math to determine if your LLM workload is compute-bound or memory-bound.
We apply these principles to a real-world example: Qwen's 32B parameter model on the new NVIDIA RTX PRO 6000 Blackwell Edition.
In this guide, you will learn how to:
Calculate your GPU's operational intensity (Ops:Byte Ratio) Determine your model's arithmetic intensity Identify whether your workload is memory-bound or compute-bound
Precision is very important in AI as it shapes how accurate and efficient models are. It controls how finely numbers are represented, approximating real-world values with formats like fixed-point and floating-point. A recent BF16 → FP16 study renewed attention to precision impact. Here are the main precision types used in AI, from full precision for training to ultra-low precision for inference:
1. FP32 (Float32): Standard full-precision float used in most training: 1 sign bit, 8 exponent bits, 23 mantissa bits. Default for backward-compatible training and baseline numerical stability
2. FP16 (Float16) → https://arxiv.org/abs/2305.10947v6 Half-precision float. It balances accuracy and efficiency. 1 sign bit, 5 exponent bits, 10 mantissa bits. Common on NVIDIA Tensor Cores and mixed-precision setups. There’s now a new wave of using it in reinforcement learning: https://www.turingpost.com/p/fp16
While LLMs are getting a lot of attention, I believe in the power of narrow AI/ML to solve everyday problems.
That's why I've created "Obesity Risk Predictor", a tool designed to be a preventive measure, helping to identify health risks based on lifestyle habits.
It’s a clear example of AI/ML built for a specific and impactful task.
The gradio app lets you compare the performance of three different models (Random Forest, LightGBM, and XGBoost) on the same dataset.