How can I enable my MacBook Pro GPU optimization for theano?

Question

• MacBook Pro (Retina, 13-inch, Mid 2014)
• OS X Yosemite 10.10.3
• Intel Iris 1536MB

Installing Theano shows I need CUDA, but I do not have NVIDIA, that means I can never enable GPU optimization?

Answer 1

You are correct: an NVIDIA graphics processor is currently required to enable Theano's GPU operation. However, that does not prevent you from running Theano -- it works just fine on the CPU.

Theano's current GPU implementation is based on CUDA and thus requires an NVIDIA GPU. A new implementation based on OpenCL is in development which should enable operation on non-NVIDIA GPUs, but this implementation is incomplete and not yet practically useful.

The CPU implementation will work fine. In many ways it is easier to use than the GPU implementation and, if you use OpenMP, can still perform reasonably well by utilizing many CPU cores.