GPU Network router delivers breakthrough performance

We've been covering GPU's for some time. They are turning up in all sorts of interesting high performance areas. In a new twist, researchers in South Korea have now built a GPU based networking router that can transmit and interrogate data at record speeds.

“We started with the humble goal of being the first to get a PC router to 10 gigabytes per second, but we pushed it to 40,” says Sue Moon, leader of the lab in which the research was conducted. Her students Sangjin Han and Keon Jang developed software called PacketShader that made this possible. PacketShader uses a computer's graphics processing unit (GPU) to help process packets of data sent across a network.

While GPU based routers are wasted doing direct packet forwarding, their real potential kicks in where the data should be encrypted. In combination with software routing, GPUs would allow for easier experimentation with new protocols that are not used in todays products.