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Mini-ITX Clustering
NormalVisual writes "Add this cluster to the list of fun stuff you can do with those tiny little Mini-ITX motherboards. I especially like the bit about the peak 200W power dissipation. Look Ma, no fans!! You may now begin with the obligatory Beowulf comments...."
We studied 3 mini beowulf systems a while back, here at University of Central Florida, one of which was a mini-ITX beowulf. Here's some info and preliminary results: http://helios.engr.ucf.edu/beowulf/miniature.phtml
They might be on their way. Here's a 1.7 GHz Pentium M.
It's all Hood
I built a Mini-ITX based massively parallel cluster named PROTEUS. I have 12 nodes using VIA EPIA V8000, 800 MHz motherboards. The little machine is running FreeBSD 4.8, and MPICH 1.2.5.2. Troubles installing and configuring Free BSD and MPICH were few. In fact, there were no major issues with either FreeBSD or MPICH.
/usr on the controlling node via NFS, for storage and to allow for a very simple configuration. No official benchmarks have been run, but for simple computational tasks the mini cluster appears to be faster than four 2.4 GHz pentium 4 mcahines used in parallel, at a fraction of the cost and power use.
The construction is simple and inexpensive. The motherboards were stacked using threaded aluminum standoffs and then mounted on aluminum plates. Two stacks of three motherboards were assembled into each rack. Diagonal stiffeners were fabricated from aluminum angle stock to reduce flexing of the rack assembly.
The controlling node has a 160 GB ATA-133 HDD, and the computational nodes use 340 MB IBM microdrives in compact flash to IDE adapters. For file I/O, the computational nodes mount a partition on the controlling node's hard drive by means of a network file system mount point.
Each motherboard is powered by a Morex DC-DC converter, and the entire cluster is powered by a rather large 12V DC switching power supply.
With the exception of the metalwork, power wiring, and power/reset switching, everything is off the shelf.
At present, the idle power consumption is about 140 Watts (for 12 nodes) with peaks estimated at around 200 Watts. The machine runs cool and quiet. The controlling node has 256 MB RAM , and an 160 GB ATA 133 IDE hard disk drive. The computational nodes have 256 MB RAM, each and boot from 340 MB IBM microdrives by means of compact flash to IDE adapters. The computational nodes mount
Power and Cooling
Mini-ITX boards have very low power dissipation as compared to most motherboard/cpu combination in popular use today. This means that a Mini-ITX cluster with as many as 16 nodes won't need special air conditioning. Low power dissipation also means low power use, so you can use a single inexpensive UPS to provide clean AC power for the nodes.
In contrast, a 12-16 node cluster built with Intel or AMD processors will generate enough heat that you will likely need heavy duty air conditioning. Additionally, you will need adequate electrical power to deliver the 2-3 kilowatts peak load that your 12 node PC cluster will require. Plan on having higher than average utility bills if you use PC's...
Hardware Construction
The cluster is built in two nearly identical racks. Each rack has two stacks of three motherboards and dc-dc converters mounted on aluminum standoffs.
The compact flash adapters used to mount the microdrives are also in stacks of three. Each stack of boards is mounted on a 7 inch by 10 inch 0.0625 thick 6061-T6 aluminum plate as are the microdrive stacks. There are seven metal plates in all, in each rack.
The top cover plate has the mounting bracket for the 6 on/off/reset switches.
The plate below it is home to the power distribution terminal block. The power delivery cable for each rack is heavy duty 14 gauge stranded wire with pvc insulation. The power cabling from the terminal strip to each of the dc-dc converters is 18 gauge stranded pvc insulated hookup wire. The wiring for the power/reset switches is 24 gauge stranded, pvc insulated wire.
The top rack houses nodes one through six (node one is the controlling node). The bottom plate of the top rack also houses the 160 GB ATA-133 hard disk drive used by the controlling node. All other nodes make use of the IBM microdrives. Node number three has a spare compact flash adapter which can be used to duplicate microdrives for easy node maintenance.
The disk drive and power cabling to the motherboards was dressed as was sanely possible on the back panel. The liberal use of nylon cable ties helps reduce the ten
There are P4 Mini-ITX systems available: Pentium 4
But, most mini-itx systems are very small in size, and strive for quiet or silent operation. So, there are obvious problems with the P4's heat/power requirements. Perhaps a better solution is the Pentium-M in a mini-itx form factor. It has pretty good performance, at a low power/heat level: Pentium M. But, most of the Pentium-M boards are intended for industrial or OEM use, so they are hard to find in retail, and are pretty expensive.
sheesh that didn't take long.
l m l m l
I managed to get it mirrored here:
page 1:
http://www.phule.net/mirrors/mini-itx-cluster.htm
page 2:
http://www.phule.net/mirrors/mini-itx-cluster2.ht
page 3:
http://www.phule.net/mirrors/mini-itx-cluster3.ht
In Soviet Russia...michael would be rotting in Siberia!
How about Fujitsu's mini-tx form factor for the Pentium M proc. Runs passive (huge heatsink, but passive nonetheless) and uses less electrons.
Coudn;t find a link though, sorry.
Yes, I guess that most current BIOSes of the newer boards do, especially the consumer-ish stuff. We just used the stock Shuttle XPC with its FlexATX-board.
"I love my job, but I hate talking to people like you" (Freddie Mercury)
The floating point is just a convenience. Almost any algorithm can be modified to work with fixed point precision -- and without loss of performance.
Of course, many people will insist, they need FP to be able count dollars and cents -- they don't even think of counting cents (or any other fractions of the dollar) with integers, for example.
These are, usually, the same people, who have troubles defining bit...
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
A beowolf of mini-itx boards is probably the cheapest way to get bragging rights. As a practical way of fast and cheap parallel computation they are not.
However, I have purchased three (V10000 boards) thus far and intend to add more to my network as low power (as in Watts) servers.
I worked out that given the power of 10.78W (source: mini-itx.com's power comparison tool) for the V series (probably the one with the slowest CPU in the series, board only), I could save a fortune on electricity compared to a more regular computer.
The electricity company sells electricity at the rate of 0.63 ($1.18) per watt per year. Compared with a standard PC of 100W, I can regain the purchase costs (in savings) of the board and memory within two to three years.
Also, I found rack mount chassis available cheaper than one for a regular sized case. This influenced my decision a little - who doesn't want a network of rack mounted computers?
Overall, because of the low price and low power the mini-itx boards are a no brainer if and only if the CPU power of each computer isn't important.
Jonathan
There are Pentium-M boards.
I'm not aware of any Athlon-based boards, but mostly because I'm satisfied with my Via-based M10000 board.
Here is a Pentium M powered Mini-ITX board.
It's all Hood
The answer to this is...
Yes! (2) and Yes! (4)
The original links went to NASA/GSFC, but the Beowulf project central site has moved.
LO, praise of the prowess of people-kings
:)
of spear-armed Danes, in days long sped,
we have heard, and what honor the athelings won!
Oft Scyld the Scefing from squadroned foes,
from many a tribe, the mead-bench tore,
awing the earls. Since erst he lay
friendless, a foundling, fate repaid him:
for he waxed under welkin, in wealth he throve,
till before him the folk, both far and near,
who house by the whale-path, heard his mandate,
gave him gifts: a good king he!
To him an heir was afterward born,
a son in his halls, whom heaven sent
to favor the folk, feeling their woe
that erst they had lacked an earl for leader
so long a while; the Lord endowed him,
the Wielder of Wonder, with world's renown.
Famed was this Beowulf
Sample from the Project Gutenberg Text of Beowulf.
Why not do yourself a favour and download it. Classic stuff.
siggy played guitar