Technology:Windows 7 - enabling massive parallelism to the masses

• Windows 7, One Step Closer - Windows Partner Blog - The Windows Blog

• ...the first Windows operating system to treat the graphics processing unit (GPU) as a real peer to the CPU...
  
  
• The model for The Windows 7 PC is to use a CPU and GPU together in a heterogeneous computing platform. Previously, GPUs were almost exclusively limited to rendering and accelerating graphics and video. With the introduction of Windows 7, the GPU and CPU will exist in a co-processing environment where each can handle the computing task they are best suited for. The CPU is exceptionally good at performing sequential calculations, I/O, and program flow, whereas the GPU is perfectly suited for performing massive parallel calculations. With the introduction of DirectX Compute in Windows 7, Microsoft is really opening up the immense parallel computing horsepower of the GPU natively right in the operating system.
  
  
• Parallel programming is the next big thing for the world of computing – it has started already. DirectX Compute will accelerate this discontinuity by enabling massive parallelism to the masses. What we are talking about is co-processing— essentially using the right tool for the job.