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Or build it like the Fastra II, but using low-end GPUs. They crammed 13 GPUs into one system.

Why not build a Fastra 2 clone? 6000 EUR for 12TFlops.

Here's UAntwerp's subjects for year ("deel") 1-3:

http://www.ua.ac.be/main.aspx?c=.OOD2011&n=94160

In Dutch, but 95% readable to English speakers. ("gegevens"=data, "uitbating"=operating, "inleiding"=introduction)

I'm studying law in Belgium and there's lots of general education subjects, but that makes sense for law.

Your very post contradicts itself, it's a marvel.

First you say heavy computation is being pushed to GPU, allowing CPUs to be less powerful and less power-hungry, and then you write that now small, less powerful are becoming a lot more so and simultaneously more power-hungry.

The reality is that GPU programming is tough, specific and cannot replace general computing. Think of a GPU as becoming the FPU of yesteryear. Sure every processor is going to have one, sure it's going to be useful, but no it will not displace everything.

6-8 GPU computers have existed for a while now, since 4-way SLI with dual-GPU card : here is an example.

• Maeseele, P. (2011) On News Media and Democratic Debate: Framing Agricultural Biotechnology in Northern Belgium. International Communication Gazette 73 (1-2): 83-105.
• Maeseele, P. (2010) Science journalism and social debate on modernization risks. Interview by Filippo Bonaventura. Journal of Science Communication 9 (4): C02.

"unless something dramatic changes in factoring" Something like using ATI and NVIDIA GPU's to accelerate factoring? something dramatic like that? http://eecm.cr.yp.to/pc109-20090901.pdf If you take the latest in CPU/Multi GPU configurations; and build around the idea of operating them for this purpose, i think RSA-1024 could be cracked in a similar amount of time. Far less than 10 or 5 years. Their paper doesn't make any references at all to GPU accelerated factoring, it's not even on their radar. http://fastra2.ua.ac.be/

Nice try at humor. But as almost always with these types of multi-processor machines, it runs Linux.

The main post does not contain a direct link to the project webpage: http://fastra.ua.ac.be/, which contains a lot more info and explanations.

I love this picture: http://fastra.ua.ac.be/en/images.html

Between the massive brick of GPUs and the massive CPU heatsink/fan, you can't see the mobo at all.

Zodra hij contact maakt met de prooi, doet de vis zijn bek herhaaldelijk open en dicht tot het insect stevig tussen zijn kaken vastgeklemd zit. De typische zuigbeweging van in het water komt ook op het land van pas, hier om grotere prooien gemakkelijker naar binnen te werken.

Dit -voor een vis- merkwaardige gedrag kan licht werpen op de evolutie van water- naar landdier en op de ingrijpende lichamelijke aanpassingen die daarvoor nodig waren.

As soon it contacts the prey, the fish opens and closes its mouth repeatedly until the insect is locked fermly between its jaws. The typical suction-movement from in the water comes handy on the land, here to work bigger prey inside more easily.

This -for a fish- weird behaviour can shed light on the evolution from water- to landanimals and on the serious adjustments which were required for this.

It sounds in the journal as they are able to feed on the land, with the help of their longer and flexible spine. So the movement of the head is required to feed on the land. (the article states "without it they'd just push their prey over the ground and it would be impossible to eat it.")

I did a little search on Google to look for the system my university uses in its library, and found an interesting listing.

However, it seems to contain only commercial software (the one the guys here use, Aleph, is the first in the list), but you may find some interesting things if you browse the links (I didn't take the time for that).