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A Supercomputing Cluster For FPS Gaming
Paul E writes: " An atlanta company seems to have developed (modified?) a linux clustering platform that is very conducive to FPS games. These guys apparently have built a cluster that will be pushing 2 TerraFlops, which would easily put it between Blue Pacific and Blue Mountain . Interesting that the same time the .mil starts making FPS's, FPS platforms are outperforming some of the top defense labs."
that they'll still try and overclock it?
What about a boewulf cluster of playstation 2s?
:-)
...a beowulf cluster of -
Ah crap, it really is useless now. I've lost my purpose in life! *sobs*
I'm the stranger...posting to
"Terra" means terrestrial
"Tera" means 10^12
At first I thought they had the client partof Q3A or UT or whatever other FPS running on a cluster of computers (along the lines of those x nodes control the graphics, those y nodes control the physics, etc.). But after readding their FAQ, the're only hosting servers on a farm of servers. It's a lot less appealing that way.
TerrorFlops?
TERAFLOPS!
That was classic intercourse!
Heres a link to the marines making marine doom: here.
They haven't built a gaming supercomputer...they have only created a linux server farm for hosting gaming servers. Just like Verio hosting web sites, but for game servers instead.
Whoopdeedoo.....
I'm out of my mind right now, but feel free to leave a message.....
I think they should run somthing on it like Doom1. They could have half of the world playing at once.
Hacker Media
the military has been using simulations for a long time now. it's how most 3D environment work got developed in the 70s and 80s.
-
Yikes is all i can say :)
"Each node consists of custom built rack-mounted dual AMD MP 2000 Linux systems. The Jupiter Cluster(TM) will be able to operate at 2 Tflops at each location and will be featured on the Top 500 list of the world's fastest supercomputers. "
with 500 location gameing will rule the world, and we'll all be a part of that matrix...
n/t
The don't seem to be hosting any blizzard games. I wonder if that's got anything to do with the latest round of lawsuits. If that is the case, it makes me wonder whose server programs they're using to host the other games... I've seen downloadable servers for a lot of these. Or are the gaming companies supplying the code? If it's not coming from the gaming companies, how are they going to keep from getting sued when people play with warezed copies? Just curious.
At last, something that can run Unreal 2 at a decent speed...
How soon before soldiers are hunkered in deep bunkers directing bots on the battlefield?
"Academicians are more likely to share each other's toothbrush than each other's nomenclature."
Cohen
As a gamer from the 80s, that comment really threw me...
Let's NOT imagine a Beowulf cluster of these!
--Metrollica
I see that their "new, innovative" design is patent pending. It appears that they are using a design that is already being used by many universities throughout the world.
Its called:
Beowulf Clusters and Grid Computing(globus, sge, etc).
Does anyone think that once they have this patent, that they will try to get royalties from companies/people already using the exact "new innovative" design that has been in use for 4-5 years now?
Just wondering what other people think.
The military's new FPS is called America's Army, and was showcased just recently at e3. What's really interesting is that apparently it's free! Here's the blurb where I got my info from:
4. Americas Army
Seriously, who better to make a military squad based shooter than the fucking military? This game not only looked good but it had the features to back it up. Finally a game gives you the opportunity to use silent hand commands to communicate with your team. Realistic objectives, weapons, movement, and locations, everything in this game is as real as you can get. Each weapon operates just as it would in real life. Stand to close to a flash back and say good buy to your hearing for while. Shoot to many of your teammates and end up in jail. Try and use a sniper rifle without going prone and watch as your view bobs up and down with your breathing. You also get twenty some odd maps with expansive real world environments and kick ass objectives. Oh and then there's the fact that it's FREE!
from Penny Arcade (original article)
c-hack.com |
Now they'll be able to do a fully realistic military sim!
You'll spend two years digging really high polygon ditches, then get shipped to the asscrack of the world to perform a police action, and after two months of dysentary and grinding boredom, an extremely well rendered twelve year old kid will crack your skull with a well aimed rock.
Abort / Retry / Get a clue.
(Seriously, I love FPS's, but as games. Please let's not mention .mil and realistic in the same context as games)
If you were blocking sigs, you wouldn't have to read this.
Just ask the Slashdot editors about that one! Use anon proxy though and under no circumstances give them your name, address or phone number. They're just too keen on demonstrating the boyful cluster.
I still can't believe that they fucking cancelled that show!
Linux is fucking cool! Wow, it is cool. I wish I could use an operating system that requires you to have sex with men in order to use it. Eating poop from Ronald McDonald's asshole is cool, for a few minutes. But you people have been pushing this crap since the early 90's. The 90's are over. Move on and stop being fags with tiny balls. Here's what you'll want to do:
1. Grab your testicles.
2. Pull, HARD
3. Don't stop pulling until your balls are stretched to a size 300% greater than they currently are.
4. Install Windows and wait for the pussy to come to you!
You Linux-donkeys are all welcome!
Imagine a MOSIX cluster of these!!
Ouch! That hurt but...now that I have Win98 (first edition) installed, I can't get the bitches off my dick. It's great! Thank you so much!! I have long been a Linux faggot but now, after taking your message of ball-stretching to heart, have been able to realize that Linux is gay and Windows rules! Excuse me, I am now going to create a website using Frontpage about my experiences and share it with the world using IIS (the web server of straight people!)
I wouldn't mind serving under her...
Fuck that shit! I like my tiny balls and will not stretch them in any manner. I realize that you're probably right and I won't get laid running Linux but maybe I don't want to! I fill my time with other pursuits. I mean, Tux Racer never gets old. It's so much fun! (What I wouldn't give to fuck that penguin...)
gimme!! :)
it would be nice if the posters of these far afield technical articals put a little explination of what these things are.....what is fsp? and are we expected to know what it is? Will we be tested on this later
hook
- IP ban
You lost the eurovision song contest!
You lost the eurovision song contest! You only got a measly 7 points!
Please!
Go to their site and "order" a server. Most games are limited to only 32 players - not exactly a "supercomputing" breakthrough...
Playstation 3 aims to do this using Grid technologies. Here's the scoop along with IBM's efforts.
Here is the site... and the flash intro.
--Players--
"LAAAAG"
"laggy map"
"crap server".
--Server Admin--
"No lag here"
----- Whats wrong with this picture? http://www.revoh.org:1234/whatswrong
Wow! I wonder where that Terraflop will bring these guys! Is that some kind of new scale for supercomputers: Measure how many "terra"'s they power? (The earth had 1 Terraflop in Douglas Adam's books).
OT??
The story even talks about military made FPSs!
Just to put things in perspective. Pacific Blue
is an antique and dog slow and is now two generations/iterations behind the current facilities at the national labs.
Is this the promised end? Or image of that horror? KING LEAR
If what I see is true - that is one awesome deal. Kick ass 12 player UT server for $35/month, no bandwidth restrictions. Too good to be true. What am I missing here?
D.
I really feel sorry for the investors of this company. There is absolutely no value for this what so ever. Sure games are fun but is it worth $50 million dollars of corporate or even investor sponsored money? If its not to make more money then at least it should be used for valueable research like protein folding or climate simulations. If you want to play games then go spend your own money and play them but not others.
http://saveie6.com/
since i learned of clustering about 3 years ago my dream wear games on clusters.... its really a great time to be a geek
The Government contributing to the open source movement? What a beautiful county we may soon live in...
When I was a grad student, I spent some time working on a force feedback system for one of the Army's distributed VR combat systems.
.. they would just be properties of the object .. I proposed that they use VRML or something like that to allow the objects to describe themselves..
The system itself was sort of cool -- all sorts of different vehicles / soldiers could interact within the world. I remember that there was a serious lack of standards due to all of the proprietary BS -- so if you didn't have the various servers synched up with each other's databases, your A-10 might look like a flying tank!
I also remember that the "clients" were Indigo Impacts (the purple ones) -- at the time, these boxes provided the most bang for the buck in terms of high end 3D processing -- the next best thing were the Onyx (sp?) which were $500K - $1M. I remember being really disappointed with the quality / FPS of the simulations compared to what quake would do on my Riva 128 card (if my memory serves)..
I know that the Quake engine had its share of cheats that allowed it to gain the performance advantages it did, but I thought it was funny that a $2K PC was seriously outperforming a $40K workstation.
I remember writing a proposal for a better version of the system that would be java based where each of the vehicles would be an object/thread running in the environment (i.e. like those old programming contests where everyone would write C code that would fight each other). That way you could program intelligence into the vehicles and just pass the object around -- no need to have huge synchronized databases describing the vehicles properties
Evolution: love it or leave it
The Jupiter Cluster(TM) will be able to operate at 200 Gflops and will be featured on the October Top 500 Supercomputer list of the world's fastest supercomputers
um, an order of magnitude off...
If she floats, she's a witch.
do anything USEFUL with their computers anymore?
Great concept. I'll have to try to get one, although my military service lies far behind me.
Here you go
I dunno, man.. I kinda like sucking dick.
As long as the actual computer cluster is named the WOPR.
How about a nice game of chess?
Warning! Keep Out of Eyes! Wash Out with Water! Don't Drink Soap! Dilute! Dilute!
IMO, FPS games are the least creative thing you can possibly develop on a computer these days. The genre has been totally overexplored. Anything you could classify as a "First Person Shooter" has already been done -- just a glorified CPU exerciser. No creativity is needed (and none is being used) generating new versions of this tired, overused and completely uninspired form of gameplay. Please, Big Game Developers, find something new to develop. I beg you.
will know that a cluster cannot simply make FPS games faster. The bandwidth between cluster nodes is far too low(aka loosely coupled) for the amount of graphic information a game needs to push per frame(many GB/s) Game programmers have a hard enough time trying to move data over the slooowwww AGP bus, and now ppl wanna move data over a network? No wonder everyone is moving to programmable GPU+multimegabyte(64mb+) cards! All the 'majic' happens at the vid card...screw the CPU and the slow bus!
That you *know* about.
prior art you fucking fool.
Whats needed now are full body suits and stripper MODs...heh heh... FPS=First Person Stripper...
If Mr. Edison had thought smarter he wouldn't sweat as much. --Nikola Tesla
I doubt the interconnection network is as good as the one of true supercomputers. So 200 Tflops would be the theoretical peak power ; in practice, on Linpack benchmarks, (even if they tend to be embarrasingly parallel nowadays with the amount of memory available on each node, the size of the problem being free) since I suppose there is only a fast ethernet on not-too-expensive switches to link everything together, I doubt they could get more than 1 Tflops in sustained double precision performance on Linpack.
Google passes Turing test : see my journal
I got confused about the 34 part too, though. but after some google searching, I found some things (including a wierdly titled Salvation army page... Anyone care to explain the 34 here?).. but max age for ROTC is 30, but " waiverable to age 34 in certain circumstances"...
most importantly, apparently the max age for enlisting in the army is 34 years old, according to this table (incidentally, it's the same for the navy, but 27 for the AF and Coast guard and 28 for the Marine Corps [a.k.a. Uncle Sam's Misguided Children]/USMC)
I don't know squat about clustering, but wouldn't such a thing introduce a fair bit of latency into the system ? You'd basically be tossing pixels left and right, with a bit of state information every few milliseconds. FPS trigger-twitch deathmatches usually rely on low-low latency, where even adding as little as 10ms into the bag would result in a misfire.
For networking we don't notice, but turn it into a real-time pixel-precise moving target, and you're jumping into a big tub of clustered trouble.
-Billco, Fnarg.com