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Researcher Discusses iPod Supercomputer

Posted by ScuttleMonkey on from the melts-in-your-hand-not-in-your-rack dept.

schliz writes to mention that in a recent interview with ITNews researcher John Shalf explained the purpose and some of the technical details of the newly-announced "iPod supercomputer." "Microprocessors from portable electronics like iPods could yield low-cost, low-power supercomputers for specialized scientific applications, according to computer scientist John Shalf. Along with a research team from the US Department of Energy's Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Shalf is designing a supercomputer based on low-power embedded microprocessors, which has the sole purpose of improving global climate change predictions."

5 of 108 comments (clear)

  1. Oblig. misleading title by Ethanol-fueled · · Score: 4, Insightful
    From the article:

    "Using the embedded microprocessor technology used in mobile phones, iPods and other consumer electronic devices, the boffins propose a cost-effective machine for running complex computational models."
    In other words, all be damned if they decide to implement this monstrosity using actual iPods when they could use their talent to design and build greater efficiency through Spice/HDL, manufactured boards, and a pick-and-place.

    Gee, A mesh of dedicated machines, hardcoded for more efficiency than a cluster of bloated pc's designed for MS office is actually more efficient? Geddouttahere!

    [/sarcastic rant]
  2. iPhone by Philomathie · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Excuse me if I'm wrong, but would this not be more specifically a mobile microprocessor supercomputer than an iPhone supercomputer? I mean, its not as if only the iPhone uses mobile processors.

  3. facepalm by blhack · · Score: 4, Insightful

    What the hell does this have to do with ipods? They're building a supercomputer out of low-power MIPS procs..

    embedded processors were, believe it or not, NOT invented by apple. I don't know if its true or not (i doubt it) but I've also heard that there were portable electronics BEFORE the ipod.

    This is really cool, but slashot, come-on...most of us here are geeks, we don't need to have the word "ipod" tacked onto the end to indicate that we're talking about something small.

    --
    NewslilySocial News. No lolcats allowed.
    1. Re:facepalm by Idbar · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Better yet, why do they have to talk about iPods and not cellphones. There are plenty more cellphones in the world than iPods, all of them, connected to networks. Most of them, running already Java applications. The platform is already there.

  4. Crap by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

    Yeah, 32 bit ARM processors that probably use soft float (soft float is a guess!) are the way forward in super computing. You better believe it, Ripley.