Computing device, computing system, and optical module

Abstract

The invention provides a computing device. The computing device comprises a PCB (Printed Circuit Board), a computing chip and one or more optical modules, the computing chip is arranged on the PCB and comprises one or more input and output high-speed interfaces. Each input / output high-speed interface has one or more input high-speed ports and one or more output high-speed ports. Each output high-speed port performs parallel-serial conversion on a parallel signal in the computing chip to output a first electric signal, and each input high-speed port performs serial-parallel conversion on a received second electric signal serving as a high-speed serial signal. The one or more optical modules are arranged on the PCB, and each port in the electric input and output interface of each optical module is electrically connected with the corresponding input or output high-speed port in the computing chip through wires in the PCB. Each optical module converts the received first electrical signal into a first optical signal and converts the received second optical signal into a second electrical signal.

Description

Technical Field

[0001] The present disclosure relates to the fields of communication and computing, and in particular to a computing device, a computing system, and an optical module used for the computing device and the computing system. Background Art

[0002] As AI accelerators continue to gain computing power through various process iterations and chip architecture innovations, the interconnection bandwidth between AI accelerators is also growing. According to data from artificial intelligence research company OpenAI, the growth rate of AI model computing has far exceeded the growth rate of computing hardware computing power.

[0003] AI accelerator interconnection network has become the key to improving overall computing capabilities. The Open Compute Project (OCP) has launched a universal OCP Accelerator Module (OAM), which has been adopted by leading GPU vendors. The current mainstream universal OCP accelerator module communication is usually in the form of point-to-point interconnection between 8 computing devices through PCB traces (such as Figure 1 As shown in FIG. 1 , computing devices generally need to use a long range (LR) SerDes interface similar to CEI (Common Electrical I / O) due to the need to use longer PCB wiring.

[0004] For example, for Figure 1 In the fully connected, each SerDes interface needs to access a specific single computing device, which reduces the bandwidth between each pair of computing devices. Figure 1 In the case where the 8 computing chips are fully interconnected as shown, 7 SerDes high-speed interfaces need to be set on each computing chip. The transmission bandwidth of each SerDes high-speed interface is 1 / 7 of the I / O bandwidth of the computing chip 300, that is, the bandwidth transmitted from the first computing chip to any other technical chip will be 1 / 7 of the I / O bandwidth of the computing chip 300, and 100% IO bandwidth transmission cannot be achieved. In addition, this fixed wiring method is not conducive to flexible bandwidth configuration.

[0005] In addition, due to the limitation of transmission distance on PCB board, the computing scale of a single computing node is generally limited to 8 computing devices.

[0006] In addition, since the response of the electrical channel will decay as the signal rate increases, higher-speed interfaces often involve more complex architectures and circuit designs, which introduce latency costs, consume more power, and occupy a larger chip area, which in turn limits the chip I / O bandwidth. In addition, longer metal wiring distances will further increase circuit losses and limit the interconnection distance between AI accelerators. Summary of the invention

[0007] It is beneficial to use optical interconnects to achieve data transmission between various computing devices or AI accelerators. Compared with electrical interconnects, the loss of optical channels remains unchanged at different frequencies, and the loss value is very small, so optical interconnects can support longer transmission distances. Optical modules combined with optical switching can make the bandwidth within and between computing devices more uniform, which is conducive to the realization of large-scale computing systems.

[0008] Therefore, in order to solve the above problems, the present disclosure proposes various modules, devices and systems that can use optical interconnection to achieve large-scale computing.

[0009] The present disclosure provides a computing device on one hand. The computing device includes: a PCB board; a computing chip arranged on the PCB board, the computing chip including one or more input-output high-speed interfaces, wherein each input-output high-speed interface has one or more input high-speed ports and one or more output high-speed ports, each output high-speed port performs parallel-to-serial conversion on a parallel signal in the computing chip to output a first electrical signal, and each input high-speed port performs serial-to-parallel conversion on a second electrical signal received as a high-speed serial signal; and one or more optical modules arranged on the PCB board, each optical module including an electrical input-output interface and an optical input-output interface, the electrical input-output interface including at least one electrical input port and at least one electrical output port, and the optical input-output port including at least one optical input port and at least one optical output port. Each of the at least one electrical input port is electrically connected to a corresponding one of the one or more output high-speed ports through wiring in the PCB board, each of the at least one electrical output port is electrically connected to a corresponding one of the one or more input high-speed ports through wiring in the PCB board, and each optical module converts the first electrical signal received from each of the at least one electrical input port into a first optical signal output from one of the at least one optical output ports, and converts the second optical signal received from each of the at least one optical input port into the second electrical signal and outputs the second electrical signal.

[0010] In some embodiments, the number of output high-speed ports of the computing chip is equal to the total number of electrical input ports of the one or more optical modules, and the number of input high-speed ports of the computing chip is equal to the total number of electrical output ports of the one or more optical modules.

[0011] In some embodiments, the computing device further includes at least one high bandwidth memory (HBM) unit, the at least one HBM unit and the computing chip are packaged on a substrate, and the substrate is arranged on the PCB board.

[0012] In some embodiments, the at least one HBM unit and the computing chip are packaged on the substrate through an interposer.

[0013] In some embodiments, the computing chip is an artificial intelligence chip.

[0014] Another aspect of the present disclosure provides a computing system. The computing system includes: a plurality of computing devices as described above; and at least one optical switch. Each computing device and at least some of the at least one optical switch are optically interconnected through the corresponding optical module in each computing device. At least some of the computing devices in the plurality of computing devices are optically interconnected through the at least one optical switch.

[0015] In some embodiments, the at least one optical switch is capable of reconfiguring optical links between the plurality of computing devices so that any two computing devices among the plurality of computing devices can communicate with each other.

[0016] In some embodiments, the at least one optical switch is capable of establishing optical links between all optical modules in the first computing device and optical modules in the second computing device, so that the first computing device communicates with the second computing device.

[0017] In some embodiments, the at least one optical switch is capable of establishing an optical link between some optical modules in the first computing device and an optical module in the second computing device, and establishing an optical link between the remaining optical modules in the first computing device and an optical module in a third computing device, so that the first computing device can communicate with the second computing device and the third computing device simultaneously.

[0018] On the other hand, the present disclosure provides an optical module, including: an electrical input and output interface; an optical input and output interface; a light emitting unit, used to convert an input electrical signal received from the electrical input and output interface into an output optical signal; a light receiving unit, used to convert an input optical signal received from the optical input and output interface into an output electrical signal; and a control unit, used to control the light emitting unit to convert the input electrical signal into the output optical signal, and to control the light receiving unit to convert the input optical signal into the output electrical signal, wherein the optical module does not perform communication protocol conversion processing on the input electrical signal and the output electrical signal.

[0019] In some embodiments, the light emitting unit includes a light emitter and a driver, and wherein the light emitter is a directly modulated laser, and the control unit controls the intensity of the light signal emitted by the light emitting unit by controlling the electrical signal provided by the driver to form the output light signal.

[0020] In some embodiments, the light emitting unit includes a light emitter and a driver, and the light emitter is an externally modulated laser, and the light emitting unit also includes a modulator, and the control unit modulates the light received from the light emitter by controlling the electrical signal input to the modulator to form the output light signal. BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

[0021] Figure 1 A schematic diagram showing point-to-point full interconnection between multiple computing devices in a traditional computing system through PCB wiring is shown.

[0022] Figure 2A-2B A schematic diagram showing an example configuration of a computing device according to an embodiment of the present disclosure.

[0023] Figure 3A-3B A schematic diagram showing another example configuration of a computing device according to an embodiment of the present disclosure.

[0024] Figures 4A-4C A schematic diagram showing an example configuration of a computing system according to an embodiment of the present disclosure is shown.

[0025] Figures 5A-5C A schematic diagram showing an example configuration of an optical module according to an embodiment of the present disclosure. DETAILED DESCRIPTION

[0026] Embodiments of the present disclosure will be described in more detail below with reference to the accompanying drawings. Although some embodiments of the present disclosure are shown in the accompanying drawings, it should be understood that the present disclosure should not be interpreted as being limited to the embodiments described herein, but rather, these embodiments are provided to provide a more thorough and complete understanding of the present disclosure. It should be understood that the drawings and embodiments of the present disclosure are only for exemplary purposes and are not intended to limit the scope of protection of the present disclosure.

[0027] It should be noted that the various parts or components described in the various embodiments of the present disclosure are merely illustrative. In some cases, some of the parts or components may be omitted, or replaced with other parts or components having the same or similar functions, or additional parts or components may be added.

[0028] In addition, the various parts or components that are separated or combined with each other in various embodiments of the present disclosure are only for the convenience of description, which does not mean that they are physically separated or combined with each other, nor does it mean that such separation or combination is necessary. Those skilled in the art can arbitrarily split or combine the various parts or components according to actual needs.

[0029] Without departing from the inventive concept of the present disclosure, any modifications or combinations described above fall within the protection scope of the present disclosure.

[0030] In order to solve the various problems caused by the electrical interconnection of computing devices through PCB wiring in traditional designs, the present disclosure proposes a computing device with a new direct-drive optical module. In the computing device, the optical module is arranged on the same PCB board with the computing chip in an on-board manner, and the direct-drive optical module is directly connected to the high-speed interface of the computing chip without any conversion of the physical layer and the protocol layer.

[0031] Since there is no conversion at the protocol layer and physical layer, the delay required for communication will be greatly reduced. In addition, the transmission bandwidth of the computing chip can be flexibly configured in combination with the optical switch, so that the transmission bandwidth is no longer restricted by various protocols.

[0032] This new type of onboard direct-drive optical module does not require a retimer, and the number of ports and channels of the optical module can match the number of ports in the I / O high-speed interface of the computing chip. By directly connecting the computing chip and the onboard direct-drive optical module, the high-speed electrical signal on the computing chip can be directly transmitted to the onboard direct-drive optical module and then converted to electro-optical / photoelectrical through the components in the onboard direct-drive optical module.

[0033] Figure 2A-2B FIG. 2 is a schematic diagram showing an example configuration of a computing device 2000 according to an embodiment of the present disclosure. Figure 2A A top view of an example configuration of the computing device 2000 is shown, and Figure 2B A cross-sectional view of an example configuration of the computing device 2000 is shown.

[0034] like Figure 2A As shown in FIG. 2B , the computing device 2000 includes one or more optical modules 100 and a computing chip 300 . The one or more optical modules 100 and the computing chip 300 are arranged in the same PCB board 500 .

[0035] Each optical module 100 includes an electrical input / output interface and an optical input / output interface. The electrical input / output interface (e.g., the interface connected to the wiring 304) includes at least one electrical input port and at least one electrical output port, or may be collectively referred to as an electrical input / output port. The optical input / output interface (e.g., the interface connected to the optical fiber 200) includes at least one optical input port and at least one optical output port, or may be collectively referred to as an optical input / output port. For simplicity, Figure 2A Further details and specific numbers of the various ports of the optical module 100 are not shown in detail.

[0036] The computing chip 300 and each optical module 300 are arranged on the same PCB board 500, and the computing chip 300 includes one or more input and output high-speed interfaces (for example, long-distance SerDes interfaces). Each input and output high-speed interface has one or more input high-speed ports and one or more output high-speed ports. For simplicity, Figure 2A Only four input and output high-speed interfaces (e.g., interfaces connected to wiring 304) of the computing chip 300 are exemplarily shown, and a port (not shown) in each input and output high-speed interface is respectively connected to a corresponding port in the electrical input and output interface of each optical module 100. Optionally, the computing chip 300 can be mounted on the PCB board 500 through the substrate 400.

[0037] In some embodiments, the computing chip 300 may be an artificial intelligence chip, for example, including but not limited to a graphics processing unit (GPU), a neural network processor (NPU), a tensor processing unit (TPU), an intelligent processing unit (IPU), a deep learning processor (DPU), etc.

[0038] It should be noted that the four input and output high-speed interfaces of the computing chip 300 shown above correspond to four optical modules only for the convenience of description. In practical applications, any number of input and output high-speed interfaces can be configured for the computing chip 300 according to specific needs, and any number of input high-speed ports and output high-speed ports can be configured for each input and output high-speed interface.

[0039] In the present disclosure, each high-speed output port of the computing chip 300 performs parallel-to-serial conversion on the parallel signals in the computing chip 300 to output a first electrical signal (not shown in the figure), and the first electrical signal is provided to the corresponding electrical input port of the corresponding optical module 100 for photoelectric conversion. The parallel-to-serial conversion operation can be performed, for example, by a serializer (SERializer circuit in a SerDes interface), so that multiple low-speed parallel signals in the computing chip 300 can be converted into high-speed serial signals.

[0040] In addition, each input high-speed port of the computing chip 300 performs serial-to-parallel conversion (not shown in the figure) on the second electrical signal received from the optical module 100 as a high-speed serial signal, thereby reconverting the high-speed serial signal into a low-speed parallel signal for use by the computing chip 300. The serial-to-parallel conversion operation can be performed, for example, by a deserializer (DESerializer circuit in a SerDes interface), so that the high-speed serial signal in the computing chip 300 can be converted into a low-speed parallel signal.

[0041] Each of the at least one electrical input port of each optical module 100 is electrically connected to one of the one or more output high-speed ports of the computing chip 300 through the wiring 304 in the PCB board 500, and each of the at least one electrical output port of each optical module 100 is electrically connected to one of the one or more input high-speed ports of the computing chip 300 through the wiring 304 in the PCB board 500.

[0042] That is, the high-speed serial signal (e.g., the first electrical signal described above) output from the electrical chip 300 is provided to the electrical input port of the optical module 100 through the wiring 304 in the PCB board 500. Similarly, the high-speed serial signal (e.g., the second electrical signal described above) output from the electrical output port of the optical module 100 is also provided to the electrical chip 300 through the wiring 304 in the PCB board 500.

[0043] It should be noted that the wiring 304 in the PCB board 500 is a general term for the electrical connection wiring between the optical module 100 and the computing chip 300, and is not intended to represent a specific wiring.

[0044] Functionally, each optical module 100 is used to perform electrical-optical conversion and optical-electrical conversion.

[0045] For example, the optical module 100 converts the first electrical signal received from each of the at least one electrical input port into a first optical signal output from one of the at least one optical output port. The first electrical signal is a high-speed serial electrical signal that the computing chip 300 directly transmits to the optical module 100 through the wiring 304 in the PCB board 500.

[0046] In addition, each optical module 100 also converts the second optical signal received from each of the at least one optical input port into a second electrical signal and outputs the second electrical signal. The second electrical signal is also a high-speed serial electrical signal, which is provided to the computing chip 300 through the wiring 304 in the PCB board 500, and then is converted into a multi-channel parallel signal through the input high-speed port of the computing chip 300 for further calculation or other processing by the computing chip 300.

[0047] For example, the optical module 100 may functionally include an optical emitting unit, an optical receiving unit, and a control unit. The optical emitting unit is used to convert a received electrical signal into an optical signal, and the optical receiving unit is used to convert a received optical signal into an electrical signal. The function of the control unit is to control the operation of the optical emitting unit and the optical receiving unit. For example, the control unit may control the optical emitting unit to convert an electrical signal into an optical signal, and control the optical receiving unit to convert an optical signal into an electrical signal.

[0048] More details about the optical module 100 will be described later in conjunction with the attached Figures 5A-5C Further description is given.

[0049] It should be noted that the input and output signals of each optical module 100 adopt the protocol of the computing chip 300. That is, the computing chip 300 and each optical module 100 do not perform communication protocol conversion processing on the input and output electrical signals thereof.

[0050] That is, the first electrical signal is an electrical signal obtained by performing parallel-to-serial conversion on an electrical signal that complies with its own protocol and is directly obtained from the computing process of the computing chip 300, and is directly output from the output high-speed port of the computing chip 300. The first electrical signal is then provided to the electrical input port of the optical module 100 through the wiring 304 in the PCB board 500, and the computing chip 300 does not need to perform any physical layer and protocol layer (for example, PCIe protocol, Ethernet protocol, etc.) conversion on the first electrical signal and directly outputs it.

[0051] Similarly, after the optical module 100 receives the first electrical signal at the corresponding electrical input port, it does not perform any physical layer and protocol layer (for example, PCIe protocol, Ethernet protocol, etc.) conversion on the first electrical signal, but directly performs electrical-to-optical conversion on the first electrical signal, thereby outputting the converted first optical signal at the corresponding optical output port.

[0052] Similarly, after converting the second optical signal received from the optical input port into a second electrical signal, the optical module 100 does not perform any physical layer and protocol layer conversion on the second electrical signal, but directly outputs the second electrical signal through the electrical output port of the optical module 100, and the directly output second electrical signal is transmitted through the wiring 304 in the PCB board 500 and provided to the corresponding input high-speed port of the computing chip 300.

[0053] After receiving the second electrical signal at the corresponding input high-speed port, the computing chip 300 performs no physical layer and protocol layer conversion on the second electrical signal except for the serial-to-parallel conversion as described above.

[0054] In other words, the electrical signals in the optical module 100 (including the first input electrical signal and the second output electrical signal) and the electrical signals input or output by the computing chip 300 (including the first output electrical signal and the second input electrical signal) are all electrical signals of the same computing chip's own protocol, and they have not been converted by the physical interface of various standard protocols (e.g., PCIe physical interface) or network card (e.g., Ethernet card) at any end, nor have they been subjected to various data encapsulation, conversion, and other operations of the protocol layer at any end. In other words, the signals between the optical module 100 and the computing chip 300 are transparent to each other, and without considering the inherent transmission loss or signal micro-deformation, the electrical signals provided to and received by the optical module 100 and the computing chip 300 are consistent in terms of bandwidth and transmission rate.

[0055] Through this direct and transparent transmission of electrical signals based on PCB wiring, the delay required for data transmission between the computing chip 300 and the optical module 100 will be greatly reduced. In addition, through reasonable wiring, the loss and noise of the PCB wiring 304 can be minimized, thereby further ensuring the signal-to-noise ratio requirements of the computing device.

[0056] At the same time, due to the direct and transparent transmission of electrical signals, there is no need to configure a traditional retimer on the optical module 100 to recover the clock, nor is there a need to configure a traditional analog-to-digital converter ADC or digital-to-analog converter DAC in the optical module 100 to further convert the input or output electrical signals. In addition, because the computing chips 300 are directly connected through the optical module 100, the computing chips 300's own protocol is used, and there is no need to transmit control signals, which greatly simplifies the design of the computing device and the optical module 100.

[0057] In addition, since no protocol conversion is introduced, the transmission bandwidth of the computing chip 300 can be flexibly configured in combination with an optical switch, and the number of optical modules 100 or the number of signal channels in a single optical module 100 can be adaptively designed according to the transmission bandwidth and number of channels of the computing chip 300, so that the number of ports or the number of channels in the input and output high-speed interfaces of the computing chip 300 can be matched (i.e., equal) with the number of electrical ports or the number of channels of one or more optical modules 300, respectively, thereby achieving a more compact packaging structure.

[0058] For example, in some embodiments, the number of output high-speed ports of the computing chip 300 can be equal to the total number of electrical input ports of one or more optical modules 100, and the number of input high-speed ports of the computing chip 300 can be equal to the total number of electrical output ports of one or more optical modules 100.

[0059] Assume that each input and output high-speed interface of the computing chip 300 has 8 input high-speed ports and 8 output high-speed ports. If the total input or output bandwidth of the computing chip 300 is 400Gb / s, this means that the computing chip can transmit 400G bits of data per second. In addition, assume that the computing chip 300 is configured with a total of 4 input and output high-speed interfaces, and the total bandwidth of 400Gb / s will be evenly distributed to the 4 input and output high-speed interfaces.

[0060] In this case, four optical modules 100 may be configured for the computing chip 300 and each optical module has eight electrical input ports and eight electrical output ports. The electrical input ports of the optical modules 100 are connected one-to-one with the output high-speed ports of the computing chip 300, and the electrical output ports of the optical modules 100 are connected one-to-one with the input high-speed ports of the computing chip 300, so each optical module 100 can perform electrical-optical conversion or optical-electrical conversion on 100Gb / s data.

[0061] Alternatively, assuming that each input and output high-speed interface of the computing chip 300 has 4 input high-speed ports and 4 output high-speed ports, and the computing chip 300 is configured with a total of 8 input and output high-speed interfaces, the total bandwidth of the computing chip will be evenly distributed to the 8 input and output high-speed interfaces. In this case, 8 optical modules 100 can be configured for the computing chip 300 and each optical module has 4 electrical input ports and 4 electrical output ports.

[0062] Alternatively, assuming that each input and output high-speed interface of the computing chip 300 has 16 input high-speed ports and 16 output high-speed ports, and the computing chip 300 is configured with 2 input and output high-speed interfaces in total, the total bandwidth of the computing chip will be evenly distributed to the 2 input and output high-speed interfaces. In this case, 2 optical modules 100 can be configured for the computing chip 300, and each optical module has 16 electrical input ports and 16 electrical output ports.

[0063] In the above example, the total number of output high-speed ports (8x4) of the computing chip 300 and the total number of electrical input ports (8x4) of the four optical modules 100 are equal and correspond one to one. Similarly, the total number of input high-speed ports (8x4) of the computing chip 300 and the total number of electrical output ports (8x4) of the four optical modules 100 are also equal and correspond one to one. This makes it possible to adaptively design the number of ports of the optical module 100 to match the number of ports of the computing chip, avoid the existence of some idle or redundant ports, and thus reduce the overall size of the optical module.

[0064] It should be noted that the number of input high-speed ports or output high-speed ports of the computing chip 300 mentioned above refers to the number of high-speed ports connected to the optical module 100. This does not mean that the computing chip 300 only includes input or output high-speed ports connected to the optical module 100 and excludes other types of high-speed ports. In actual applications, input or output high-speed ports for other purposes may also exist in the computing chip 300.

[0065] An embodiment of a computing device 2000 including a computing chip 300 and one or more optical modules 100 is introduced above.

[0066] In some embodiments, the computing device proposed in the present disclosure may also include other elements and components. Figure 3A-3B A schematic diagram showing an example configuration of a computing device 3000 according to an embodiment of the present disclosure is shown.

[0067] like Figure 3A or as shown in 3B, except Figure 2A-2B In addition to the computing chip 300 and one or more optical modules 100 shown, the computing device 3000 also includes at least one high bandwidth memory (HBM) unit 302. For example, the HBM unit can cooperate with the computing chip 300 to perform various cache or storage functions.

[0068] In some embodiments, the plurality of HBM units 302 may be disposed on the substrate 400 together with the computing chip 300. Optionally, the plurality of HBM units are disposed on the substrate 400 and located on both sides of the computing chip 300.

[0069] Optionally, multiple HBM units 302 and computing chips 300 may be packaged on a substrate 400 through an interposer 303, and the substrate 400 is arranged on a PCB board 500, such as Figure 3B shown.

[0070] The interposer 303 may be a transfer board having various wiring and conductive structures, which may provide an electrical connection path between the plurality of HBM units 302 arranged thereon and the computing chip 300 .

[0071] Other details of computing device 3000 and Figure 2A-2B The computing device 2000 is similar to that in the embodiment and will not be described in detail here.

[0072] Based on the various computing devices described above, the present disclosure also proposes a computing system including the various computing devices.

[0073] Since in the various computing devices described above, the optical signal obtained by the electrical-to-optical conversion of the onboard direct-drive optical module can be directly connected to the onboard direct-drive optical module of another computing device through optical fiber transmission, or can be connected to the onboard direct-drive optical module of another computing device through an optical switch port, reconstruction of the optical path between different computing devices can be easily achieved.

[0074] In this configuration of reconfigurable optical paths, high-speed electrical signals on a computing chip in one computing device can reach computing chips in other computing devices with minimal delay because they do not pass through any electrical switches.

[0075] Based on this configuration, multiple computing devices can be interconnected through a series of onboard direct-drive optical modules and a series of optical switches for all-optical switching and reconfigurable full connectivity, avoiding Figure 1 The dilution of transmission bandwidth by point-to-point interconnect based on PBC wiring shown can be used to accelerate artificial intelligence computing.

[0076] In addition, since both onboard direct-drive optical modules and optical switches have the advantages of protocol transparency and low latency, fully reconfigurable interconnection between computing devices can achieve the goals of long distance, high bandwidth and low latency.

[0077] Figures 4A-4C A schematic diagram showing an example configuration of a computing system 4000 according to an embodiment of the present disclosure is shown.

[0078] like Figures 4A-4C As shown, the computing system 4000 includes a plurality of computing devices ( 1000 - 1 , 1000 - 2 , 1000 - 3 , . . . , 1000 -N) as described above and at least one optical switch 600 .

[0079] At least one optical switch 600 can control the optical path based on different physical principles, including piezoelectric, micro-electromechanical, electro-optical, etc. For example, each optical switch 600 can be composed of a series of free space optical components or a series of integrated optical components.

[0080] As shown in the figure, each computing device (1000-1, 1000-2, 1000-3, ..., or 1000-N) is optically interconnected with at least part of at least one optical switch 600 through the corresponding optical module 100 in each computing device (for example, through optical fiber 200).

[0081] In such a configuration, at least some of the multiple computing devices can be optically interconnected through corresponding optical switches.

[0082] In some embodiments, at least one optical switch 600 is capable of reconfiguring optical links between multiple computing devices (1000-1, 1000-2, 1000-3, ..., 1000-N) to enable communication between any two computing devices among the multiple computing devices.

[0083] For example, the various computing devices (1000-1, 1000-2, 1000-3, ..., 1000-N) shown in the figure can rearrange the bandwidth transmission path through the optical path switching in the optical switch 600 to achieve fully reconfigurable full interconnection between each other.

[0084] Assume that the computing system 4000 includes 8 computing devices (i.e., N=8), and each computing device is provided with 4 high-speed interfaces, such as optical input and output interfaces of 4 optical modules. In this case, the optical paths between the 8 computing devices can be reconstructed through one or more (4 in the example of the present invention) optical switches 600, and the data output by the 4 high-speed interfaces of each computing device can be arranged through the corresponding optical switches so that all the data output by the 4 high-speed interfaces are transmitted to the target computing device. Alternatively, each computing device can receive all output data from the target computing device. Therefore, the transmission bandwidth of each computing device in the architecture can be 100% of the I / O bandwidth of the computing chip 300 in the computing device.

[0085] For example, Figure 4B A schematic diagram showing full interconnection between the first computing device 1000 - 1 and the second computing device 1000 - 2 is shown.

[0086] As shown in the figure, each computing device includes a computing chip 300 and four corresponding optical modules 100. The first optical switch in at least one optical switch 600 can establish an optical link between the first optical module in the first computing device 1000-1 and the first optical module in the second computing device 1000-2, the second optical switch can establish an optical link between the second optical module in the first computing device 1000-1 and the second optical module in the second computing device 1000-2, the third optical switch can establish an optical link between the third optical module in the first computing device 1000-1 and the third optical module in the second computing device 1000-2, and the fourth optical switch can establish an optical link between the fourth optical module in the first computing device 1000-1 and the fourth optical module in the second computing device 1000-2, and the black dotted arrows in the figure represent the reconstructed optical links between the optical modules. For example, the establishment of the optical link can be achieved by changing the arrangement of the optical elements in each optical switch (for example, changing the angle of the reflector) to achieve the establishment of the target optical link.

[0087] In this case, an optical link is established between the optical input and output interfaces of all optical modules in the first computing device 1000-1 and the optical input and output interfaces of all optical modules in the second computing device 1000-2, so that the first computing device 1000-1 can communicate with the second computing device 1000-2.

[0088] Assuming that the total input / output bandwidth of the computing chip 300 of the first computing device 1000-1 and the second computing device 1000-2 is 400Gb / s, the above configuration can be used to allocate a data bandwidth of 100Gb / s to each optical module 100. When an optical link is established between the optical input and output interfaces of all optical modules in the first computing device 1000-1 and the optical input and output interfaces of all optical modules in the second computing device 1000-2, so that the first computing device 1000-1 can communicate with the second computing device 1000-2, the total communication bandwidth between the first computing device 1000-1 and the second computing device 1000-2 will be 400Gb / s, that is, 100% of the I / O bandwidth of the computing chip 300 in the computing device.

[0089] As mentioned earlier, Figure 1 In the case where the eight computing devices shown are fully interconnected using PCB wiring, seven high-speed interfaces are provided on each computing device, and the transmission bandwidth of each high-speed interface is 1 / 7 of the I / O bandwidth of the computing chip 300 of the computing device, that is, the bandwidth transmitted from the first computing device to any other computing device is 1 / 7 of the I / O bandwidth of the computing chip 300. That is, the bandwidth transmitted from the first computing device to any other computing device is 1 / 7 of the I / O bandwidth of the computing chip 300.

[0090] In contrast, the optical interconnection solution proposed in the present disclosure can achieve a bandwidth of 100% of the I / O bandwidth of the computing chip 300 transmitted from the first computing device to any other computing device.

[0091] Figure 4B This is an example of fully interconnecting the first computing device 1000-1 and the second computing device 1000-2 to achieve 100% bandwidth communication. In some other examples, the first computing device 1000-1 and the second computing device 1000-2 do not need to be fully interconnected, but can be partially interconnected to achieve more flexible bandwidth configuration.

[0092] For example, Figure 4C A schematic diagram showing partial interconnection between a first computing device 1000 - 1 and a second computing device 1000 - 2 is shown.

[0093] As shown in the figure, Figure 4A Similarly, each computing device includes a computing chip 300 and four corresponding optical modules 100. A first optical switch in at least one optical switch 600 establishes an optical link between a first optical module in the first computing device 1000-1 and a first optical module in the second computing device 1000-2, and a second optical switch establishes an optical link between a second optical module in the first computing device 1000-1 and a second optical module in the second computing device 1000-2, as indicated by black dashed arrows.

[0094] and Figure 4B The difference is that in Figure 4C In the embodiment, the third optical switch establishes an optical link between the third optical module in the first computing device 1000-1 and the third optical module in the third computing device 1000-3, instead of establishing an optical link between the third optical module in the first computing device 1000-1 and the third optical module in the second computing device 1000-2, and the fourth optical switch establishes an optical link between the fourth optical module in the first computing device 1000-1 and the fourth optical module in the third computing device 1000-3, instead of establishing an optical link between the fourth optical module in the first computing device 1000-1 and the fourth optical module in the second computing device 1000-2.

[0095] In this way, the first computing device 1000-1 and the second computing device 1000-2 can communicate only through part of the bandwidth, for example, through the part of the bandwidth allocated to the first and second optical modules, which accounts for 50% of the I / O bandwidth of the computing chip 300. At the same time, the first computing device 1000-1 and the third computing device 1000-3 can communicate through the remaining part of the bandwidth, for example, through the part of the bandwidth allocated to the third and fourth optical modules, which is also 50% of the I / O bandwidth of the computing chip 300.

[0096] This flexible reconstruction method can enable the first computing device 1000-1 to communicate with the second computing device 1000-2 and the third computing device 1000-3 at the same time, increasing the flexibility and freedom of the computing system.

[0097] It should be noted that Figures 4A-4C Although it is shown that Figure 3A-3B A similar computing device 3000 is shown in FIG. 3 , which is merely exemplary. Figure 2A-2B The computing device 2000 and its various variations described in Figures 4A-4C The computing system.

[0098] In addition, the number of optical modules in the computing device, the number of computing devices in the computing system, and the number of optical switches in the computing system shown in the above examples are merely exemplary and not limiting.

[0099] Figures 4A-4C In the computing system, computing chips are interconnected through the above optical modules and optical switches, breaking through the distance limitation of PCB wiring interconnection and the number limitation of computing chips, so that the interconnected computing chips in the computing system can be arbitrarily configured as needed.

[0100] The optical module disclosed in the present invention can directly convert the electrical signal output by the computing chip into an optical signal, and can also directly transmit the converted electrical signal to the computing chip without protocol conversion, which greatly reduces the delay of the system. Since the electrical signal processed by the computing chip is transmitted to the optical module for electro-optical conversion, then transmitted to another optical module for photoelectric conversion and the obtained electrical signal is transmitted to another computing chip for signal processing, the whole process does not require protocol conversion. Therefore, in the process of point-to-point communication between different computing chips, there is no need to control the transmission of signals, which greatly simplifies the design of the computing system.

[0101] Those skilled in the art can easily think of other similar arrangements without departing from the design concepts of the present disclosure. For example, more (e.g., 5, 6 or more) or fewer (e.g., 1, 2, or 3) optical modules can be set in the computing device, and more (e.g., 9, 10 or more) or fewer (e.g., 7, 6 or less) computing devices or optical switches can be arranged in the computing system.

[0102] The following will be combined with the attached Figures 5A to 5C An embodiment of the optical module 100 used in a computing device or a computing system as described above is described.

[0103] Figure 5A FIG. 1 is a schematic diagram showing the overall configuration of an optical module 100 according to an embodiment of the present disclosure.

[0104] like Figure 5A As shown, the optical module 100 functionally includes an electrical input / output interface EI / O, an optical input / output interface OI / O, an optical transmitting unit 101 , an optical receiving unit 102 , and a control unit 103 .

[0105] The optical transmitting unit 101 may also be referred to as a TX unit, and is used to convert an input electrical signal 110 received from the electrical input / output interface EI / O into an output optical signal 120 , that is, to perform electrical-to-optical conversion (also referred to as EO conversion).

[0106] The optical receiving unit 102 may also be referred to as an RX unit, and is used to convert an input optical signal 210 received from the optical input / output interface OI / O into an output electrical signal 220, that is, perform optical-to-electrical conversion (also referred to as OE conversion).

[0107] The control unit 103 may be any form of controller or microcontroller, and is used to control the optical emitting unit 101 to perform EO conversion from the input electrical signal 110 to the output optical signal 120. Similarly, the control unit 103 may also control the optical receiving unit 102 to perform OE conversion from the input optical signal 210 to the output electrical signal 220.

[0108] As mentioned above, the optical module proposed in the present disclosure does not perform communication protocol conversion processing on the input electrical signal and the output electrical signal.

[0109] That is to say, after the optical module 100 receives the input electrical signal 110 at the electrical input / output interface EI / O, it does not perform any physical layer and protocol layer conversion on the input electrical signal 110, but directly performs electrical-to-optical conversion on the input electrical signal 110, thereby outputting the converted output optical signal 120 in the corresponding optical input / output interface OI / O.

[0110] Similarly, after converting the input optical signal 210 received from the optical input / output interface OI / O into the output electrical signal 220 , the optical module 100 does not perform any physical layer and protocol layer conversion on the output electrical signal 220 , but directly outputs it through the electrical input / output interface EI / O of the optical module 100 .

[0111] For example, the optical module 100 does not include a physical interface of any standard protocol (e.g., a PCIe physical interface), nor does it perform data encapsulation / decapsulation, conversion, and other operations of various protocol layers on the input electrical signal 110 or the output electrical signal 220, but only performs electrical-to-optical conversion or optical-to-electrical conversion on the signal.

[0112] In some embodiments, in the direction of EO conversion, the input electrical signal 110 may be an electrical signal from an external device, using the external device's own protocol without protocol conversion, for example, an electrical signal from any device such as an external computing device, storage device, communication device, etc. In addition, the electrical signal 220 output from the optical module 100 may be provided to the same external device.

[0113] Converting the received input electrical signal 110 into the output optical signal 120 as described above actually means loading the information carried by the input electrical signal 110 onto the output optical signal 120 in a modulated manner.

[0114] Accordingly, in the direction of OE conversion, the input optical signal 210 may also be an optical signal from an external device. In addition, the optical signal 120 output from the optical module 100 may also be provided to the same external device.

[0115] The external device may, for example, provide the input optical signal 210 to the optical module 100 via an optical fiber, and the input optical signal 210 may carry specific information (e.g., "information A"). In other words, the input optical signal 210 may carry "information A" via a certain modulation technique. The optical receiving unit 102 in the optical module 100 performs OE conversion on such an optical signal carrying "information A" to obtain an electrical signal carrying the same "information A". Such an output electrical signal may then be provided to an external device such as the above, for example, the computing chip described above.

[0116] The following will be combined Figures 5B to 5C Some examples of the internal configuration of the optical module proposed in the present disclosure without performing communication protocol conversion are described.

[0117] Figure 5B FIG. 1 shows a structural diagram of an example of an optical module 100 according to an embodiment of the present disclosure. It should be noted that: Figure 5B The optical module 100 shown can be viewed as Figure 5A A more detailed embodiment of the light module 100 is shown.

[0118] For example, Figure 5A The light emitting unit 101 shown in FIG. 1 may include Figure 5B The optical transmitter 101A and the driver 101 - 2 are shown. The driver 101 - 2 is used to drive the optical transmitter 101A to transmit an optical signal as an output optical signal 120 .

[0119] In addition, if Figure 5A The light receiving unit 102 shown in FIG. 1 may include Figure 5BThe optical detector 102 - 1 and the amplifier 102 - 2 are shown. The optical detector 102 - 1 can convert the detected input optical signal 210 into an electrical signal, and the amplifier 102 - 2 can further amplify the converted electrical signal and then output the amplified electrical signal as an output electrical signal 220 .

[0120] Figure 5B The illustrated optical transmitter 101A is a "directly modulated" optical transmitter, which may be, for example, a directly modulated vertical cavity surface laser (VCSEL) or a distributed feedback (DFB) laser.

[0121] The so-called "direct modulation" means that the control unit 103 can control the electrical signal provided by the driver 101-2 to the optical transmitter 101A according to the input electrical signal 110, thereby controlling the intensity of the optical signal emitted by the optical transmitter 101A, without using other modulators to load or modulate the information in the electrical signal into the emitted optical signal.

[0122] For example, the control unit 103 can directly control the magnitude of the current provided by the driver 101-2 according to the amplitude of the logic levels "1" and "0" of the input electrical signal 110, so that the intensity of the light emitted by the light emitter 101A can be linearly or substantially linearly related to the amplitude of the input current.

[0123] Optionally, the optical transmitter in the optical module of the present disclosure may also be an "external modulation" optical transmitter. As the name implies, an "external modulation" optical transmitter means that the optical transmitter itself cannot modulate light, but needs to rely on external equipment to modulate light.

[0124] Figure 5C FIG. 1 is a schematic diagram showing another example of the optical module 100 according to an embodiment of the present disclosure. Figure 5C In the embodiment, the optical transmitter 101B is, for example, an externally modulated laser, and in addition to the driver 101-2 and the optical transmitter 101B, Figure 5A The optical transmission unit 101 shown further needs to include a modulator 101 - 3 .

[0125] In this case, the optical transmitter 101B is in a stable light-emitting state and emits light with a uniform intensity. The light emitted by the optical transmitter 101B is provided to the modulator 101-3, and the control unit 103 can control the electrical signal input to the modulator 101-3 through the driver 101-2, thereby modulating the amplitude, phase and other characteristics of the light received from the optical transmitter 101B, so as to modulate the information carried in the input electrical signal 110 onto the light to form the output optical signal 120.

[0126] Typical examples of the modulator 101 - 3 include integrated photonic modulators based on silicon, indium phosphide, thin-film lithium niobate or polymer, and the structure may be a micro-ring modulator, a Mach-Zehnder modulator or an electro-absorption modulator.

[0127] For example, in the case where the modulator 101-3 is an electro-absorption modulator, the control unit 103 can control the switch of the modulator 101-3 through the driver 101-2 to make it absorb or not absorb light, thereby absorbing the light emitted by the optical transmitter 101B (for example, corresponding to the output logic "0"), or not absorbing the light emitted by the optical transmitter 101B (for example, corresponding to the output logic "1"). In this way, the intensity and phase of the final output light can be controlled, so that information can be modulated or loaded onto the output optical signal 120.

[0128] It should be noted that the modulation formats of the logic levels "1" and "0" of the input electrical signal 110 mentioned above are merely exemplary and not limiting. In practice, the input electrical signal 110 may have any suitable modulation format.

[0129] also, Figure 5B-5C The driver 101 - 2 , the photodetector 102 - 1 , and the amplifier 102 - 2 shown in FIG. 1 may be implemented using any suitable components in the art.

[0130] For example, the driver 101-2 can be implemented by a circuit composed of various electronic components such as transistors, resistors, capacitors, etc. For example, the light detector 102-1 can be various types of photodiodes with various sensitivities, such as a photomultiplier tube (PMT), an avalanche photodiode (APD), a silicon photomultiplier tube (SiPM), etc. In addition, the amplifier 102-2 can be a traditional transimpedance amplifier (TIA), or various types of amplifiers based on similar principles or other principles, which will not be elaborated in detail here.

[0131] In addition, it should be noted that the optical module proposed in the present disclosure that does not perform communication protocol conversion does not include a traditional retimer, a traditional analog-to-digital converter ADC or a digital-to-analog converter DAC. This is because the optical module proposed in the present disclosure only performs transparent electrical-to-optical conversion on the input electrical signal, and only performs transparent optical-to-electrical conversion on the input optical signal. The so-called transparency means that there is no need to recover the clock processing of the signal before and after the conversion, nor is there any need to perform digital-to-analog or analog-to-digital conversion processing on the signal before and after the conversion, that is, the input signal and the output signal are only different in form (electrical signal form or optical signal form), and no other conversion processing is performed to adapt it to the target protocol or format.

[0132] The optical module 100 proposed in the present disclosure does not include a processing channel for low-speed sideband control signals, that is, only a conversion channel for high-speed data signals is provided, but does not include a conversion channel corresponding to the low-speed sideband control signals, which also greatly simplifies the design of the optical module 100.

[0133] The above about Figures 2A to 4C The various features of the optical module 100 described in the computing device and computing system are also applicable to FIG. 5A to FIG. 5C The optical module in the

[0134] In the above description, the embodiments of the present disclosure have been described in conjunction with the accompanying drawings. It should be understood that the above embodiments are merely illustrative, and those skilled in the art should understand that the combination of the constituent elements and processes of the present embodiments can be modified in various ways, and such modifications also fall within the scope of the present disclosure.

Claims

1. A computing device, comprising: PCB board; A computing chip is arranged on the PCB board, the computing chip includes one or more input and output high-speed interfaces, wherein each input and output high-speed interface has one or more input high-speed ports and one or more output high-speed ports, each of the output high-speed ports performs parallel-to-serial conversion on a parallel signal in the computing chip to output a first electrical signal, and each input high-speed port performs serial-to-parallel conversion on a second electrical signal received as a high-speed serial signal; as well as One or more optical modules are arranged on the PCB board, each optical module includes an electrical input and output interface and an optical input and output interface, the electrical input and output interface includes at least one electrical input port and at least one electrical output port, the optical input and output port includes at least one optical input port and at least one optical output port, wherein Each of the at least one electrical input port is electrically connected to a corresponding one of the one or more output high-speed ports through wiring in the PCB board, Each of the at least one electrical output port is electrically connected to a corresponding one of the one or more input high-speed ports through wiring in the PCB board, Each optical module converts the first electrical signal received from each of the at least one electrical input port into a first optical signal output from one of the at least one optical output port, and converts the second optical signal received from each of the at least one optical input port into the second electrical signal and outputs the second electrical signal.

2. The computing device of claim 1, wherein: The number of output high-speed ports of the computing chip is equal to the total number of electrical input ports of the one or more optical modules, and the number of input high-speed ports of the computing chip is equal to the total number of electrical output ports of the one or more optical modules.

3. The computing device as described in claim 1 or 2 further includes at least one high bandwidth memory (HBM) unit, wherein the at least one HBM unit and the computing chip are packaged on a substrate, and the substrate is arranged on the PCB board.

4. The computing device of claim 3, wherein: The at least one HBM unit and the computing chip are packaged on the substrate through an interposer.

5. The computing device of claim 1, wherein: The computing chip is an artificial intelligence chip.

6. A computing system comprising: A plurality of computing devices as claimed in any one of claims 1 to 5; as well as at least one optical switch, Each computing device and at least part of the at least one optical switch are optically interconnected via an optical module corresponding to each computing device; and At least some of the plurality of computing devices are optically interconnected via the at least one optical switch.

7. The computing system of claim 6, wherein: The at least one optical switch is capable of reconfiguring the optical links between the plurality of computing devices so that any two computing devices among the plurality of computing devices can communicate with each other.

8. The computing system of claim 6 or 7, wherein: The at least one optical switch is capable of establishing optical links between all optical modules in the first computing device and optical modules in the second computing device, so that the first computing device communicates with the second computing device.

9. The computing system of claim 6 or 7, wherein: The at least one optical switch is capable of establishing an optical link between some optical modules in the first computing device and the optical modules in the second computing device, and establishing an optical link between the remaining optical modules in the first computing device and the optical modules in the third computing device, so that the first computing device communicates with the second computing device and the third computing device simultaneously.

10. An optical module, comprising: Electrical input and output interface; Optical input and output interface; an optical emitting unit, for converting an input electrical signal received from the electrical input / output interface into an output optical signal; An optical receiving unit, used to convert an input optical signal received from the optical input and output interface into an output electrical signal; as well as a control unit, configured to control the light emitting unit to convert the input electrical signal into the output optical signal, and control the light receiving unit to convert the input optical signal into the output electrical signal, The optical module does not perform communication protocol conversion processing on the input electrical signal and the output electrical signal.

11. The optical module according to claim 10, wherein: The light emitting unit includes a light emitter and a driver, and Wherein, the optical transmitter is a directly modulated laser, and the control unit controls the intensity of the optical signal emitted by the optical transmitter unit by controlling the electrical signal provided by the driver to form the output optical signal.

12. The optical module according to claim 10, wherein: The light emitting unit includes a light emitter and a driver, and The optical transmitter is an externally modulated laser, and the optical transmission unit further comprises a modulator, The control unit modulates the light received from the optical transmitter by controlling the electrical signal input to the modulator to form the output optical signal.

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