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SGI & NASA Build World's Fastest Supercomputer
GarethSwan writes "SGI and NASA have just rolled-out the new world number one fastest supercomputer. Its performance test (LINPACK) result of 42.7 teraflops easily outclasses the previous mark set by Japan's Earth Simulator of 35.86 teraflops AND that set by IBM's new BlueGene/L experiment of 36.01 teraflops. What's even more awesome is that each of the 20 512-processor systems run a single Linux image, AND Columbia was installed in only 15 weeks. Imagine having your own 20-machine cluster?"
Why does it take so long to build a super computer and why do they seem to be redesigned each time a new one is desired?
It's a little like how Canada's and France's nuclear power plant system are built around standardized power stations, cookie cutter if you will. The cost to reproduce a power plant is negligble compared to the initial design and implementation, so the reuse of designs makes the whole system really cheap. The drawback is that it stagnates the technology and the newest plants may not get the newest and best technology. Contrast this with the American system of designing each power plant with the latest and greatest technology. You get really great plants each time, of course, but the cost is astronomical and uneconomical.
So to, it seems with supercomputers. We never hear about how these things are thrown into mass production, only about how the latest one gets 10 more teraflops than the last and all the slashbots wonder how well Doom 3 runs on it or whether Longhorn will run at all in such an underpowered machine.
But each design of a supercomputer is a massive success of engineering skill. How much cheaper would it become if instead of redesigning the machines each time someone wants to feel more manly than the current speed champion, that the current design be rebuilt for a generation (in computer years)?
Good job NASA? Yeah I'd agree. But what about good job SGI? Why does SGI always seem to have bad marketing and not get the press/praise they deserve?
This is an SGI system. SGI has laid out plans for terascale computing (stupid marketing speak for huge ccNUMA systems) a while ago. I'm sure NASA and SGI worked together but this is essentialy an 'Extreme' version of an off-the-shelf SGI system.