Nvidia says its new supercomputer will enable the highest level of automated driving

Nvidia, one of the world’s best known manufacturers of computer graphics cards,

announced a new, more powerful computing platform for use in autonomous vehicles. The company claims its new system, codenamed Pegasus, can be used to power Level 5, fully driverless cars without steering wheels, pedals, or mirrors. The new iteration of the GPU maker’s Drive PX platform will deliver over 320 trillion operations per second, which amounts to more than 10 times its predecessor’s processing power. Pegasus will be marketed to the hundreds of automakers and tech companies that are currently developing self-driving cars starting the second half of 2018, the company says. NVIDIA’S PROMISE OF LEVEL 5 AUTONOMY SHOULDN’T BE TAKEN LIGHTLY. Nvidia’s promise of Level 5 autonomy shouldn’t be taken lightly. Most automakers and tech companies speak carefully about the levels of autonomy, avoiding claims on which they may not ultimately be able to deliver. Nothing on the road today that’s commercially available is higher than a Level 2. Audi says its new A8 sedan is Level 3 autonomous — but we have to take the company’s word for it because present regulations won’t allow the German automaker to turn it on. Most car companies have said they will probably skip Level 3 and 4 because it’s too dangerous, and go right to Level 5. So for Nvidia to state definitively it can deliver the highest level of autonomous driving starting next year is pretty staggering — and maybe a little bit reckless. Presently, self-driving cars that don’t require any human intervention are only theoretical. This vision of the future, where the vehicle can handle every task in all possible conditions, is the one that is most appealing to futurists and tech evangelists. But it will take years, if not decades, before our roads and rules catch up to robotic cars that can roam freely without limitations.                                                                    https://www.theverge.com/2017/10/10/16449416/nvidia-pegasus-self-driving-car-ai-robotaxi