Slashdot Mirror
Virginia Tech Upgrade: PowerMac G5 to Xserve G5
An anonymous reader writes "Virginia Tech officially announced that they will be migrating their G5 Supercomputer from PowerMac G5s to Xserves.
According to the article, the Xserve G5s will reduce power consumption, heat production and decrease the system size by a factor of three. The pricing of the upgrade is still being determined, and according to Srinidhi Varadarajan, they are working on getting "very good homes" for the PowerMac G5s which will be replaced."
*looks under desk*.. I'm sure I could find room for, oooh... a couple of hundred..
Does anyone know what the university got in return for allowing Apple to film the installation and staff for the Xserve promotional videos? A reduced price upgrade may have been part of the initial agreement
they are working on getting "very good homes" for the PowerMac G5s which will be replaced.
Can EBay be slashdotted? I guess we'll find out now!
I am a viral sig. Please copy me and help me spread. Thank you.
Is it like adopt a G5 day down at VT? Is there a background check or can I just pick up my tower and beat it to death once I walk outside with it?
To adopt one of those adorable little...
Heh.
Screw it, just gimme a G5!
Shinma
I'll volunteer to provide a good home for one of those spare G5s. I know, it's a selfless act, but what can I say? I can't just stand idly by while distributed supercomputer nodes go homeless.
When it was first rumored that VT might replace its G5 boxes with Xserves, a friend of mine shared the idea that the pulled machines should be resold to the public, with some indication that they had been part of the cluster, perhaps a plaque or laser engraving noting that they had been included in the VT supercomputer. I bet those things would be bid up sky-high on eBay!
Blogging Weight Loss, Distance Education, and more at verlin.com
why not have a few more Xserves, I mean they already have the infrastructure for that much heat/power/room, so why don't they supersize the Big Mac?
Bob
Now for all those people who droned on and on about how foolish VTech were for not getting stripped down boxes, here's the reason.
Quantum materiae materietur marmota monax si marmota monax materiam possit materiari?
would be to reward some VT Computer Science majors.
get an A in any programming class, take home a G5.
Bob
It really amazes me that VT can afford to waste so much money on a super-computer. Really, could they have not waited the 4 months to get their brand new shiney G5 based super-computer and not wasted so much money on all those G5 towers?
I mean sure they can use them in computer labs and such but it still seems like a waste in the current education environment of tight budgets and program cutting.
All Im saying is that this money probably could have been put to better use else where than getting VT their brand new toy "right now" instead of waiting 4 whole months to get the hardware they really needed for the project.
"We Don't Need No Truthless Heros!" - Project 86
Imagine a beowulf cluster of th-- oh wait. DAMNIT!
--
The last digit of pi is four.
when i heard about this the first thing i thought was "they just it up and running and now they are doing an upgrade?" i'm not in the cluster world does this happen often? does anyone else think that it came too soon? Or is apple giving them another deep discount to keep an Mac based computer #3 on the supercomputer chart?
I would like to let V. Tech know that I am more than willing to accept some of those poor, forgotten G5's into my loving home.
There, they can spend the day happily puttering away in my new (soon-to-be) G5 cluster, working merrily at finding ways to improve the human condition, advancing understanding of the universal truths, and produce superior pr0n...
Whew! This water sure is cold!
Not a G5 expert here...
I wonder if there is a processing gain acievable by doing this or of the motivation is purely power dissipation and space. If so, at the end of the day it seems like the power bill delta over the usable life of the computer wouldn't make the expense of the upgrade worthwhile (especially considering VT has an on campus power plant of their own). Wouldn't it make more sense to wait around for the 'next best thing' instead of the same thing in a different package? If it ain't broke, why fix it?
But I guess they want a super-computer the football team can be proud of...
I want what their eBay user ID is....
1
668.5
Trust me, the university is not letting anything out of their hands that can't be obsoleted first. It's a state school so they have a pecking order. My first bet is a large majority ends up at the Empo' followed by professors (who are also looking to build a smaller farm), faculty, staff, other state schools, and if we are so fortunate (and this is really a long shot) you can scoop one auctioned[PURCH].
This is really amazing to me. They spend a chunk of coin
on the system, barely get it up and running, don't actually use it for anything, and then run out and upgrade it 4 months later. Sounds like a typical home computer geek!
But really, shouldn't somebody be better managing the money
there and saying 'hey go do something worthwhile with your new toy, then ask for more money'?
How is this Insightful? The Lead in stated the reasons as a less power consumption, less room needed, and less heat produced. Last I checked trying to save money on Electricity, Cooling and Floor space was simple good use of students tuition dollars.
Or a supercomputer that the football team can spell. "G5" is shorter than "Pentium".
--- Ban humanity.
+4 Interesting?!? Did any of you moderators actually read more than 2 lines. +4 Funny maybe...
If I seem short sighted, it is because I stand on the shoulders of midgets
"No offense, but after running thermal dynamics equations, your, how do you call it, 'leet' Photoshops skills are somewhat beneath me. I'm looking for something that will stretch my thinking, not bore me to tears. I don't think I'm right for you. Perhaps a Blueberry iMac would be more your speed. Yes, a beige G3 with 64 megs of ram and os 8.1 should handle your AOL sessions just fine. I'll continue my search. Thanks for your time."
I wonder if the lower power PowerPC 970FX used in the Xserve has superior performance to the ordinary 970 used in the PowerMac G5...
;-)
It would also be interesting to know if the 970FX has suitable energy saving modes and a low enough power consumption to be used in a G5 PowerBook
It may seem like a waste to upgrade a system only four months old, but the reduced power consumption will save some dollars in the long term. By ditching the towers, they also save a boatload of space...
Where they can use some some of that extra money to purchase more nodes...
To put in all that extra space...
How many more nodes would it take to surpass number 2 on the list? Or possibly give number 1 a run for its money?
I think VT may be on to something here.
I like big butts and I cannot lie.
They can toss them about the network and use them as a distributed compile/render/$distributed_task farm.
Absolutely an impressive school. 10 years ago, they were a joke. Now they built a national reputation via their football team, so people have heard of them, and projects like this put them on the map. When I looked at schools, they never entered the equation. If I was looking at engineering schools today, I'm sure that I would end up applying there.
This is a school with great self promotion and is going to go places. Unlike places like MIT, they don't sit on their Laurels, they are exploding.
I expect that in 20 years, they'll be considered one of the elite engineering schools. Kinda neat to have your college degree appreciate in value because the school gets better. I can't imagine that you don't get a decent engineering education at any engineering focused school, and this research project is a brilliant PR stunt.
Alex
Some people are like "Why would they upgrade from dual 2 Ghz G5 desktops, to dual 2 Ghz G5 rackmount servers??"
They won't be dual 2 Ghz G5 rackmount servers.. VTech is going to do the same thing they did when the G5's were released.. get first dibs on new inventory as soon as the new rackmount servers are released - the new 2.3Ghz rackmount servers.
Apple knows what's in it's product pipeline, and I guarantee you that they are in talks with Virginia Tech about offering their new xserves that are *yet* to be announced. You honestly think that Virgina Tech had no idea about the nee G5's prior to Steve Job's and his keynote? They are planning on upgrading their supercomputer, and they are going to be making it FASTER, and Cooler (bad pun.. I know)
Apple's marketing line is going to be: "Look, Look Not only is the 3rd fastest computer on earth powered by our G5's, but it also is run on our new XServes.. You need mission critical hardware? No problem. We build supercomputers!"
-Buddha wears grass shoes
I mean really, for a community that mothballs GFX 5900's because the 5950s came out...do we have to ask?
Impressive use of obfuscation there, first and last paragraph look on-topic, but the rest is US patent-office bait!
This was *more* than worth it for Virginia Tech, academically, scientifically, and economically.
They spent $5M to instantly catapult themselves to the forefront of high performance computing, which was successful. Now they're replacing the entire cluster with ECC on the cheap, and will be doing real work with it in no time. This is a coup for VT, plain and simple. No one will be #3 again on the Top 500 list for anything close to $5M anytime in the foreseeable future. (The Top 10 will soon be populated with even more $100M+ clusters.) Virginia Tech's gamble will pay off many more times over for Virginia Tech, the people of Virginia, and the federal taxpayers who helped pay for it. As you claim to be a professor (which I doubt), it surprises me that you're too dense to realize that. Remind me to steer clear of your "classes".
They became the #3 most powerful supercomputer site in the world, #2 in the US, and #1 in education - and the first academic site to break 10Tflops - for a pittance, and in accordance with all rules set forth by the Top 500 organization - and now can attract much more grant money to do even more research and become an even bigger contributor, instead of taking years and millions more dollars to do it.
The Top 500 list has always been about hype! Wake up! Bravo to Virginia Tech. The only "pity" here is that you're so ignorant and shortsighted.
...how loud the Xserves are compared to the G5's? I can't imagine the decibels in a room full of them. One thing they don't mention in the article, and possibly another reason to upgrade to the Xserves, is the use of the Server Manager software. This software doesn't work on the PowerMac G5's because it doesn't have the sensors built in that the Xserves do. Not being that keen on cluster arrangements, I wonder if they have another product in place now that does the same thing with the PowerMacs?
Money not found! A)bort, R)etry, D)eclare Bankruptcy
joe, shmoe - from the middle of nowhere
where is it, where is the code, joe!? - for this 'apt-get-expose' or 'apt-get-osx' or the hyped up 'win-apt-get'..
Stop beeing a SCO, and tell us, be precise - mkay
I don't claim I know more than I know, and if you know you know more than I know, then by all means, let me know.
...for about 10 minutes.
right, so their system went online in November last year. so that's what - a 3 month old super computer being replaced by pretty much the same thing just to save on space and energyrequirements.
i mean surely they have enough space at the moment, otherwise their existing cluster wouldn't exist. so why not just scale it up using the Xserves rather than losing money on an investment that is so young???
It looks as if our hopes are dashed. Hi, That statement on Reuters should have read "found new homes" not "finding" Regards, Srinidhi Dr. Srinidhi Varadarajan Director, Terascale Computing Facility Virginia Tech -----Original Message----- To: Srinidhi Varadarajan Subject: Request for information regarding liquidation of the G5's Greetings Mr. Varadarajan, I am sure my email is only one of a slew of letters to grace your inbox following the press release (http://biz.yahoo.com/rc/040126/tech_virginiatech_ apple_1.html). I
sincerely hope this letter is no intrusion. I am writing in hopes of
obtaining enough information to keep up to speed with VT's liquidation
of System X. Hopefully, there will be an opportunity for myself and
others like me to finally purchase a G5 without breaking the bank!
Any leads you could give me would be greatly appreciated.
Thank you for your time,
Dylan Baxter
Computers are like air conditioners - they stop working properly if you
open Windows.
You'd think that someone could have predicted this back when the Big Mac was first being hyped. I just overestimated the longevity by a month. My bad.
Correct me if I am wrong, but I thought that Steve Job's himself had already said this in his Macworld Keynote. An excerpt from someone's notes:
Jobs talks about the G5 processor and Virginia Tech SuperComputer, who wanted "the first" 1,100 dual-2GHz Power Mac G5s. ("We pissed off a few people" getting them the first ones.") Cost them only $5.2 million and sending ripples through Supercomputer world. Jobs shows Virginia Tech Supercomputer video. It uses Infiniband networking; it took less than 3 weeks to assemble. Now in the top 3 Supercomputers. First academic machine to break the 10 teraflop barrier. The entire system runs on Mac OS X. Jobs says he expects to see a few more [Supercomputers] popping up hear and there
So VT is probably going to be THE FIRST to recieve G5 Xserve's.
Gorkman
VT could come out of this with a profit!
:) There are many procedures in getting rid of equipment, and they are there for a reason.
You have never worked for the state of Virginia before
Intel is their competition!
The article says the units are 1.75" in height. (Apple says 1U - same thing). That is the same height as the Dell's 1U units (1.67" according to Dell's site).
More servers in a smaller space has a lot of economic advantages, but have you ever tried to unplug anything in the middle of a rack stacked full of 1U servers? My hands don't fit. It takes about half an hour to finagle something in or out. The real reason our jobs are going over seas isn't because labor is cheaper. It's because they need the small hands of 3rd world children to do cable management.
Dual 2Ghz XServe Cluster Node: $2499
4 GB DDR 400 ECC SDRAM: $2115
36th month Mac OS X Server Maintenance: $249
36th month AppleCare Warranty: $760
Thats 5623 per node at Edu pricing before any volume discounts. This is also without the expensive networking hardware. If you use 6000 per node X 2000 nodes, that equals a 12 million dollar upgrade.
Add that to the 1100 XServes they have and you have a whopping 6200 G5 processors.
Priceless!
It sounds as if someone has a fun budget to play with. Is the PowerMac cluster too slow already or is this just a marketing stunt?
Well, as anyone who's actually used Macs for a while knows-they hold their value much better than PCs. Given that VT bought the G5s at the educational rate to start with, they can probably sell them right now at only a very slight loss. OK, I'm sure that listing 1,100 G5s on eBay at the same time would depress the selling price, but I'm sure VT could find willing buyers. Or Apple can just take them back and sell them as "refurbished" units at a slight discount.
I'll pay one shiny penny, too.
I mod down pyramid schemes in sigs.
XServe has it, G5 doesn't.
With the release of the clustering software, when are all us Mac Zealots ;) going to get together and make the biggest, fastest (probably not fastest as bandwidth would be at issue) cluster ever?
That would be rather interesting, especially if it became self-aware and started manufacturing windows viruses. Or hot robot chicks.
Give the guy a break. Even on slashdot, not everyone knows that in clusters, size matters. Also, the Xserves are designed to be maintained in racks. Desktop boxes just take too much time to get out, take apart, reassemle, and replace. I guess they're more heat-conscious, too.
Besides, now they'll have room for a few thousand more.
To be honest, the setup was ghetto from the start. Who in their right mind would deploy full towers in racks? It is such a waste of space reserved normally for companies like Rackspace.com who used to use the metal gurillaracks and cheap ATX towers.
I asked it months ago why they didn't just get the boards + supplies and have cheap metal 3u (or maybe 2u) boxes made with proper front to back cooling (could be stamped out for $200 or less by a metal shop in qty). Similar to what hotmail uses.
If it is true that the upgrade is free, I guess it makes sense. But we all know the new Cray system (www.cray.com) will be #1 on top500, bringing the US to #1 again.
Southeastern Virginia REPRESENT!
Xserve G5 Cluster Node 2GHz DP/80GB/2xGigE/10Client
Dual 2GHz PowerPC G5
512MB DDR400 ECC SDRAM - 2x256
80GB ADM (1x80GB Serial ATA)
Mac OS X Server, 10-seat License
6-8 weeks
$2,499.00
Subtotal $2,748,900.00
Please note that your subtotal does not include sales tax or rebates.
$2,748,900.00
Apple Part Number M9215LL/A
Find out how to get your order for $91,235.99 per month*.
"Win treats sysadmins better than users. Mac treats users better than sysadmins. Linux treats everyone like sysadmins."
For those who keep wondering aloud if they'll be able to improve their ranking, due to ECC, 2.3 GHz G5s, etc...
#3: VA Tech: 10.28 TFlops
#2: Los Alamos: 13.88 TFlops
#1: EarthL 35.86 TFlops
So, even if they spent 3x as much and filled up the now 2/3 empty room *and* scaled linearly (which they won't, won't, and definitely won't), they *still* wouldn't reach #1. #2, however, might be within reach, if they go to 2.3GHz and the ECC is a huge help.
Now that they more or less know where they'll wind up and there's no point in being secretive, I'd love to see them show what one box does on its own, then 2, then 5, then 10, then 50, then 100, then 200, 500, and finally 1100.
Dear Slashdot: next time you want to mess with the site, add a rich-text editor for comments.
This is how Institutions spend money. It is based on grant money, either use it or lose it. Even though an upgrade isn't necessary, the money is there, so they have to use it.
This is a test. This is a test of the emergency sig system. This has been only a test.
Unbelievable waste of a nice computer.
Doesn't this mean that VT can no longer claim to be #3 in the rankings? The computer used to acheive it will no longer exist.
A Big Mac built with Xserves will probably be just as fast or faster, but it won't officially be #3 anymore. They'll have to wait for the next round to get ranked again.
These boxes don't need keyboard, video, and mouse hooked up, so the wiring of these boxes is significantly less complicated than their windows brethren.
A power cable, one or two network cables. USB access on the front if physical access for KVM is ever needed. Makes for far cleaner wiring.
I was going to sneak into the VT lab and steal a coupla those schweet G5s, but now that their getting rid of them, I won't need to. Hm... I wonder if I can return the tear gas.
I guess you haven't read much on the cluster.
It was originally spec'd with Dell Dual Xeon boxes, but Dell couldn't meet the timelines or the price. So they went looking and Apple promised them the first 1,100 dual 2G G5's at standard edu pricing, which allowed them to meet the deadline for the Top 500 list (making that list would get them enough grant money to pay for the cluster and the upgrade).
"You've got an invalid haircut" -Warren Zevon - Life'll Kill Ya
I've criticized the whole idea before, especially the hype around it, when I can't see any big new ideas happening.
Statements like The price of the upgrade has not yet settled on, but Varadarajan said it would be minimal compared to the cost of building a new supercomputer from scratch are just ridiculous, since why would you need to build a new multi-million supercomputer from scratch if you have never even used your brand-new "old" one? That's like saying "tearing down our just-completed new villa and building the new house another way will save us so much more compared to building the same one again the same way!"
As Pike (of UNIX fame) and -- more recently -- Jobbs have noted, there's not a lot of innovation going on anymore.
Having said this the Xserves are very nice designs, so if anywhere, the cup for cool ideas goes to industry (Apple's engineers), not academia (Virginia Tech) -- also in the second round.
Here's my proposal: Why don't the guy at VTech not build a new user interface that goes beyond the useful, but aged desktop metaphor that the Mac introduced to the masses twenty years ago? Or how about some serious study of automatic load balancing on the "old" supercomputer? They might "save even more" money by taking some time to learn from mistakes in the first round before diving blindly into the next generation of their Uber-Mac project.
(Sorry for the rant, but it seems such a waste of resources when not too far away people don't even have their jobs anymore.)
One thing about this whole Virginia Tech cluster is that the project director is Srinidhi Varadarajan, assistant professor of computer science. In most cases, assistant prof means untenured prof.
I'm not saying that assistant profs are not capable people. However, it is somewhat amazing that such a great responsibility has been undertaken/placed on an assistant prof (especially if he/she does not have tenure).
By the "guy in charge," I take it you mean Sirhindi Varadarajan. He has stated that he never used a Mac before VT bought this cluster, so your charge of his being an Apple zealot is false. Shame you can't just admit that the platform chosen was the best choice at the time, has worked out brilliantly, has changed opinions about Apple and the Mac, and is only going to get better on Xserves.
By blowing it off as Apple zealotry, you totally discount just how good the PowerPC 970 and the G5 architecture are.
Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from Macintosh...
...is my home
CAn'T CompreHend SARcaSm?
If it will be like any other upgrade on campus, a likely candidate for the G5 may be housed in The Math Emporium. Any other freshmen hokies on here going there, or perhaps reading this thread from there right now? :-)
When I first heard about this cluster I remember thinking that it didn't make much sense at first for them to use big PowerMac G5s when the Xserves seems to be a much more logical solution for such purpose(power consumtion, takes much less space, etc). So my thought is that they actually planned this already, they just wanted to make a big marketing hit with the PowerMac G5s to sell more of them, and then now they just replace them for something that makes more sense.
:)
Might be wrong, but that's just an idea.(maybe the fact that I just watched "pirates of silicon valley" makes me do a bit more thinking about Apple's marketing strategies now
Will they even be selling them?
I don't know anything about VT, but how many computer labs could benefit from new G5's?
How about other departments? Do they have a need/use for them? If nothing else, put them on faculty desktops.
Then there's always the possibility of reselling them to the current students.
I graduated from Virginia Tech in 1999. At that time, there were quite a few labs that used Macintosh systems, most notably the Math Emporium, a 217-computer lab for math classes. I also know that the English department labs used Mac systems when I was there, and I don't expect that has changed, either.
Personally, I don't expect any of the 1,100 G5 desktops will make their way back to Apple or be sold outside of the University. There are plenty of computer labs that could use the upgrades, and if there are any systems left over I'm sure a mini-cluster for testing out new software releases wouldn't be unreasonable use for a few.
Although I do like the idea of engraving the systems, like "This computer was node 243 of 1,100 in Big Mac v1." It would be something that you can show to alumni, because showing stuff like that to alumni results in additional contributions to the University.
And as others have pointed out, the graduate student labor is "free".
CT
Because the next list in June 2004, and the one after it, and the one after that, will include many new very, very expensive clusters (some $100M+) with performance far, far beyond 10Tflops.
l ist_for_CPU.gif
So, yes, someone can build a 1101-G5 cluster right now, and be faster than VT's cluster. But they won't be on any list, and they definitely won't be anywhere near #3 on the next Top 500 list. And neither will VT.
That's why the whole VT #3 thing is the coup that it is: the timing was *perfect* for them to take the #3 spot for a mere $5.2M. The PR and grants they'll get *because of* that are more than worth it. That will never happen again for anywhere near that small an amount of money anytime soon.
See some of the new clusters that will be in the Top 10 on the next list:
http://www.bayarea.net/~kins/AboutMe/GIFs/TOP500_
I can see the incoming computer science students next fall, being required to purchase a G5 on entry. I can see them recieving "gently used" refurbished machines. I can see it...
Er...
1) The original prices were standard educational discount.
2) The machine was ready at the right time because VT wanted it to be ready by then.
3) They said many times that error correcting was handled in software.
T Money
World Domination with a plastic spoon since 1984
Microsoft was right all along...
'mmmmmmmmm.... forbidden donut'
I don't know if this scales up properly, but 2.3 Ghz is 15% faster than the 2Ghz machines--x 1100, that increases their 10.3 teraflop system up to 15.45 teras, which should handily beat number 2's HP system at 13.9 teraflops. Even if it doesn't scale, it should get pretty darn close to no. 2.
Doh! That should be 11.85 T's. Still pretty fast anyways. That's what you get for being an arts major :-)
I wish I could afford to upgrade 1100 of my g5s. They are taking up so much space and power, I'd save a bundle dropping another 7.2 million on hardware. Really, how can I get that kind of funding? Seems like just yesterday they were having trouble getting peak performance from the cluster.
TallGreen CMS hosting
As has been pointed out countless times again, the cost was NOT a "mere" $5M. Their total hardware cost was ~$7M ($5.3M for the computers and memory, another $1.7M for the infiniband hardware), there was another $1M to upgrade an existing building.
"The total cost of the asset, including systems, memory, storage, primary and secondary communications fabrics, and cables is $5.2M." (Source: http://don.cc.vt.edu/tcfslides.pdf)
That $5.2M INCLUDED the Infiniband cards, switches, and cabling.
"The total cost of the asset, including systems, memory, storage, primary and secondary communications fabrics and cables is $5.2mil. Facilities upgrade was $2mil. 1mil for the upgrades, 1mil for the UPS and generators." (Source: Interview with Dr. Varadarajan)
There was then an additional $1M for "facilities upgrades", and $1M for power infrastructure.
They also had the benefit of free labour (millions of Mac zealots)
Huh? Millions of "zealots", eh?
Even if we GROSSLY overestimate labor, let's say a MILLION DOLLARS, the total cost is still $8M. So screw the free labor argument: even if they paid a MILLION DOLLARS to put it together (which is a huge, gross exaggeration), they're still much, much cheaper than anything close. Also, ANY academic institution has this same benefit.
and have not factored in the cost of power and cooling (at 2MW total power and cooling, this is a pretty significant expense, about $5,000 a day) or the support costs.
Sorry. Other clusters don't include power in their capital costs. And cooling *is* equipment included in the VT cluster. Ongoing support costs are NOT included in the costs of any of the other Top 500 clusters. The only thing different about the VT cluster was that the $5.2M figure didn't include some of the infrastructure costs other clusters have. But even the ASCI clusters are asset + infrastructure only, and do NOT include buildings, energy, or support costs. So, sorry again. And even at $7M + our imaginary labor, it's still ridiculously cheaper.
Even NCSA's new Tungsten cluster is $12M for the ASSET ALONE. That does not include building, support, infrastructure upgrades, or anything. Just the computer. And Dell installed it for free. So are they "PC zealots", since it was free labor?
They also had the benefit of free labour (millions of Mac zealots)
Actually, my understanding from the initial announcements was that most of the work (coding, LAN wiring) was done by undergraduate Hokies, in exchange for pizza and caffine while working, and of course bragging rights afterwards. The cost of a few hundred large cheese pizzas and a few hundred two-liters of Dew/Pepsi/Coke is low, compared to normal pay scale-- probably cost less than minimum wage per man-hour for VaTech.
//Information does not want to be free; it wants to breed.
Is my home good enough?
No TiVo and no caffeine make me something something...
I think you may have your facts wrong...
Apple announced the G5 base Xserve systems only a couple of weeks ago and they top out at 2GHz currently using a 90nm version of the PPC 970. They have not announced any systems based on G5s with higher clock speeds.
Can you point to documentation about systems using 2.3+ GHz G5s (PPC970/fx etc.) and when those will be available and when VTech / public will be getting them?
The main reason, so far stated, that they are swapping the systems is for space saving and power savings (electrical and cooling) thanks to the 90nm G5s being used.
Since the G5 towers were all part of a supercomputer, you can rest assured that all the wires and circuit pathways have been sufficiently burned-in. Nothing sucks more than getting a new computer and having to leave it crunching numbers for a week or more until it reaches peak performance....
They should consider reselling them to the students who volunteered their time to help set up the Supercluster. I know they already got free pizza, but a discounted G5 would probably be extremely appreciated by most of them.
"Reality is merely an illusion, albeit a very persistent one " -Albert Einstein
Give me a break. As a native Vehjenyan I'll say it, if it ain't UVa, W&M or one of the private schools, it is rapidly approaching Radford U. C'mon, it's a straight up engineering drunken jockocracy. Besides, everyone knows a Hokie is a queer chicken. ;-)
Comparing it to Windows will be a moot point, since El Dorado is going to have a 40% larger code base than XP.
And really, all Apple was doing was rebadging IBM Silicon in the first place.
'1984' evil empire indeed!
---
Can I point to irrefutable proof that Apples next speed bump for their Xserve is going to 2.3 Ghz? No. I can't say that anymore than I could have pointed to proof the the first G5 Desktop was going to come in a dual 2 Ghz model.
What I can point to however is common sense. The common sense being that apple, with the advent of it's new 90nm fab process, will most likely i increase the speed of it's xserves. It's line of G5 desktops has not increased the speed of it's fastest model since it was released.. I wager that a new speed bump will occur in the next 3-6 months.
I mean, it comes down to a simple question..Do you think that in the next 3-4 months, apple will have started production of new xserves with faster G5 cpu's? Do you think that a new xserve in 3-4 months is reasonable (6 months after when the xserves were first announced) No only is that reasonable, it makes sense, and is totally consistent with apples past marketing/production strategy of updates/speed bumps 2 times a year.
Why would VTech just spend all that money to get on the top500 list as quick as possible, and then 4 months later say that they are going to switch the whole thing over just to save electricity? It makes much more sense for them to upgrade everything to rackmount servers that save space and electricity AND are Faster.
Do you really think apple, (assuming that they plan on updating their new xserve with a speed bump half a year later) would let one of their biggest purchasers, buy over a thousand new computers to place in the first mac supercomputer
Or.. does it make sense that (assuming that they plan on updating their new xserve with a speed bump half a year later) Vtech will look at this as an opportunity to speed up their supercomputer, save electricity, and space. It is in apples best interest to discuss new product releases with Vtech, the same way they were in talks with Vtech about building a supercomputer before they ever announced the desktop G5. This is a chance for them to take on the the spot of #2 (And if everything scaled nicely, they could cociveably beat the earth simulator by packing the room with xserves at 1/3 the size of the desktop G5's)
Apple would probably tell them, "Hey, if you wait 6 months we will have faster xserves, and if you replace all the powermacs with the xserves and maybe add a couple hundred more, you will be in 2nd place on the top 500.
Or, maybe they are INCREDIBLY impatient, and need to save space, and money on cooling RIGHT NOW! And as such, can't wait a few months for faster, cooler, smaller rackmounts.
Ok then... please don't state speculation as fact like you did in your prior post.
Note that the recently announced Xserve systems are already using PPC 970s built in the 90nm process (IBM's process by the way not Apple's).
Also note that the press release states that they will be switching to the "current" Xserve systems not waiting months for a potential speed bump.
Your speculations have merit but I think the current fact go against them at this time.
In theory the now have room for another 2,000 or so Xserve systems thanks to space savings... they may speed it up that way.
The Prof is a smart guy, and I'm sure he knew before the damn thing was even built that the X serves were on the way, probably becuase Apple TOLD HIM IT WAS, and cut him a sweetheart deal for the upgrades.
This will cost me some karma, but fuck it. I have no idea how come all you naysaying negative nabobs of negitivism on this post feel the continued NEED to badmouth everything possible about this project whenever possible. THEY DID IT. It deserves respect and maybe observation to see if you can learn anything from that success.
Here's the karma killer....get ready...it's coming....
I bet if was a goddamn Linux cluster we would see 1/5th the criticism. But since Apple hardware is involved, lets fuck it up so we can feel better! Yeah! :/
As a comparison to what they are replacing (not counting extra RAM)...
....$97,588.56 per month*.
(Higher Ed. pricing)
Power Mac G5 Dual 2GHz
Unit Price: 2,673.00
Subtotal: $2,940,300.00
So they are saving some money in the deal unless Apple discounted them by not shipping with video adapters, keyboards, etc. (likely)
I went to UB right after they got the Cray Origin2000. All I ever saw anyone do with it was play a cheesy 3-D video game on it.
Even in mediocre translation, that book changed my life.
It is cowardly, and a betrayal of whatever it means to be a Jew, to act as a white man
-James Baldwin
with all those G5s without a home, and me in need of a new computer desk, I could put the new G5 on top of my new desk, composed of 20 or so G5s stacked on top one another.
-Kids in the back seat causes accidents.- -Accidents in the back seat causes kids.-
They should engrave each one with a number and put on a little plaque that says "once part of the world's 3rd fastest supercomputer."
Come on, there's collectors' item potential written all over this! With a signed letter of authencity by Srinidhi Varadarajan.
I used to work at a university... games like this were played all the time, even at private schools. At public schools the politics and funding issues are much worse since you don't really even have control of your own budget, and everything has to be approved by the state government.
-- I speak only for myself
1). 1100 dual mac with educational rabatt +3GB money extra ok. But what about the network infrastructure? Support and building? The xeon cluster everybody smashed had all this included in the price.
2). Could be or could not be....
3). Yes, their software "could do it". But as soon as possible they upgrade to ecc-ram systems. There IS NO possibility to be 100% sure your result is correct if you dont have ecc without running everything twice.
There were estimations that in the big-mac cluster, based on altitude, number of ram-chips, ram process,ect every 17h one softerror occurs. It could be everywhere. If it changes a pointer, you could trap it. What if it changes a mantissa bit of a floating point number? How would you check that? (answer is: calculate again and look if the result is different=>not good)
HI O WISE PRINCE. WHT TOOK U SO DAM LONG?
Since the Xserves take up only a 1/3 of the space. VT could pull out just a 1/3 of the PowerMacs install the Xserves and run 1100 Xserves and the 733 Power Macs that haven't been pulled out yet. Run it for a while in that configuration just to see what the score would be and then pull out the remaining Power Macs.