Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

Supercomputer Breaks the $100/GFLOPS Barrier

Posted by CowboyNeal on from the new-kid-in-town dept.

Hank Dietz writes "At the University of Kentucky, KASY0, a Linux cluster of 128+4 AMD Athlon XP 2600+ nodes, achieved 471 GFLOPS on 32-bit HPL. At a cost of less than $39,500, that makes it the first supercomputer to break $100/GFLOPS. It also is the new record holder for POV-Ray 3.5 render speed. The reason this 'Beowulf' is so cost-effective is a new network architecture that achieves high performance using standard hardware: the asymmetric Sparse Flat Neighborhood Network (SFNN)." Because this was a university project, KASY0 was assembled entirely by unversity students, which while being a source of cheap labor, is also a good way to get a lot of students of involved in a great project.

6 of 281 comments (clear)

  1. Wow! by fryguy451 · · Score: 5, Funny

    Imagine a Beowu... errr... Oh..

  2. Let the Beowulf cluster jokes begin! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Note to moderators, Beowulf cluster jokes CANNOT be offtopic.

    Imagine a Beowulf cluster of Beowulf cluster jokes!

  3. Let's not get too excited.... by CGP314 · · Score: 5, Funny

    Supercomputer Breaks the $100/GFLOPS Barrier

    Not after you factor in the SCO license fees.

  4. Students as Slave Labor by gremlin_591002 · · Score: 5, Funny

    Ponders while there are not University students pictures in the National Geographic Article on Slavery....

  5. So much power... by krahd · · Score: 5, Funny

    and it still can't run Doom III at a decent rate.

    --krahd

    mod me up, scottie!

    --
    mod me up scottie!
  6. Here is the bill! by borgdows · · Score: 5, Funny

    Dear customer,

    At the cheap introductory price of 699$ for 80 lines of code in the Linux kernel, it will cost you 8,377,500$ by kernel since we have discovered that in fact 1000000 lines of SCO IP were copied into Linux.

    Designation .. Price .. Qty .. Total
    Linux kernel .. 8,377,500$ .. 128 .. 1,118,400,000$

    So you must pay us only 1,118,400,000$, and in my kind almighty I will offer you a discount of 118,400,000$ so you only have to pay ONE BILLION DOLLAR if you pay before tomorrow!

    Please send you creditcard number at darl@sco.com

    Sincerely yours,

    -- Darl Mac Bride