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Maximal Initial Learning Rates in Deep ReLU Networks
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Measured effects reported in the paper
| What was changed | Where | Measured | Effect |
|---|---|---|---|
| Use a sufficiently large width-to-depth ratio and train the input layer at a relatively small learning rate | Constant-width fully connected ReLU networks · MNIST and CIFAR-10 | maximal initial learning rate η* scaling with depth × width | Helped |
| Train the input layer at the same learning rate as the other layers (ablation) | Constant-width fully connected ReLU networks · CIFAR-10 and MNIST | linearity of η* versus depth × width | Hurt |
| Freeze the input layer at initialization (ablation) | Constant-width fully connected ReLU networks · Not specified | η* power-law trend | No clear effect |
| Increase the threshold accuracy (ablation) | Constant-width fully connected ReLU networks with sufficiently large width/depth · MNIST | maximal initial learning rate η* | No clear effect |
| Increase the threshold accuracy (ablation) | Constant-width fully connected ReLU networks with smaller width/depth · MNIST | maximal initial learning rate η* | Hurt |
| Use NTK parametrization instead of Kaiming initialization (ablation) | Fully connected ReLU networks · CIFAR-10 | relationship between 2/λ₁ and η* | Mixed |
| Use LeCun initialization instead of Kaiming initialization (ablation) | Fully connected ReLU networks · Initialization sharpness | sharpness λ₁ scaling with depth | Mixed |
| Train at η* rather than use a well-tuned constant learning rate (ablation) | ResNet-20 · Not specified | performance | Hurt |
| Use a learning-rate scheduler with η* (ablation) | ResNet-20 · Not specified | performance | Helped |
| Train with η* rather than a smaller fixed learning rate | Fully connected networks · CIFAR-10 validation | accuracy | Mixed |
| Apply the condition η ≤ 2/λ₁ as a necessary constraint at initialization | Kaiming-initialized fully connected ReLU networks · MNIST and CIFAR-10 | ability to reach threshold accuracy | Hurt |
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