Using Ollama to Serve Quantized Models from a GPU Container

Deploying large language models poses challenges due to their significant size and memory needs, but Ollama, an open-source LLM server, offers a solution by enabling the running of quantized models on modest GPUs, making powerful AI models more accessible. Ollama supports models in the GGUF format, which reduces memory usage significantly while maintaining performance, allowing larger models to operate on single-GPU setups. It simplifies the process by managing model serving details, freeing up GPU memory when models are idle, and providing a straightforward interface and API to run and manage language models locally or in any environment. The use of Docker facilitates Ollama's deployment on GPU machines, and cloud providers like Runpod can be utilized to scale hardware resources as needed. Quantized models slightly reduce precision but offer a balance between quality, speed, and memory usage, making them efficient for many applications. The document also discusses best practices for using Ollama, including model selection, performance tuning, and integration with applications via its API, while highlighting the cost-effectiveness of using cloud services like Runpod for GPU resources.