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Unboxing a Cray XC30 'Magnus' Petaflops Supercomputer

Posted by Unknown on from the need-a-review-unit dept.

Bismillah (993337) writes The Pawsey Supercomputing Centre in Australia has started unboxing and installing its new upgraded 'Magnus' supercomputer, which could become the largest such system in the southern hemisphere, with up to one petaFLOPS performance.

71 comments

  1. A picture is worth a thousand words? by eric31415927 · · Score: 1

    Where's the story?

    1. Re:A picture is worth a thousand words? by bigwheel · · Score: 2

      Here' some info. Not a lot, but better than a picture of a couple wooden boxes. http://www.ivec.org/pawsey-sup...

    2. Re:A picture is worth a thousand words? by Pascoea · · Score: 2

      A picture is worth a thousand words?

      And 12 pictures spread across 12 pages that force a complete reload between every one of them is worth three words. "Fuck you guys" comes to mind.

      Dammin that "article" was painful.

  2. Will it run DOSBox and Doom? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Just curious if it will have the performance capacity to run DOSBox and Doom or Quake?

    1. Re:Will it run DOSBox and Doom? by jandersen · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Not necessarily - the '...FLOPS' refers to FLOating Point Operations Per Second, and the hardware necessary to deal with this might conceivably not have the kind of processing capacity necessary for running DOS or Doom. It's like asking whether an aircraft carrier can sing you child to sleep; lots of power is not always relevant.

    2. Re:Will it run DOSBox and Doom? by fuzznutz · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Not necessarily - the '...FLOPS' refers to FLOating Point Operations Per Second, and the hardware necessary to deal with this might conceivably not have the kind of processing capacity necessary for running DOS or Doom. It's like asking whether an aircraft carrier can sing you child to sleep; lots of power is not always relevant.

      Good post, but bad analogy since "computers" are expected to run programs. I'd say it's more like asking whether an aircraft carrier can tow a skier. Maybe, but it won't do it well.

    3. Re:Will it run DOSBox and Doom? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

      Good post, but bad analogy since "computers" are expected to run programs. I'd say it's more like asking whether an aircraft carrier can tow a skier. Maybe, but it won't do it well.

      Well, if you use the catapult...

    4. Re:Will it run DOSBox and Doom? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Freedos for clusters.

    5. Re:Will it run DOSBox and Doom? by __aaclcg7560 · · Score: 1

      I got 500+ FPS when I ran Quake on a dual-core AMD processor and a Radeon 3870 video card. Haven't tested it since I got a quad-core AMD processor and a Radeon 6970 video card.

    6. Re:Will it run DOSBox and Doom? by jandersen · · Score: 1

      I wasn't saying that an aircraft carrier couldn't sing a lullaby - it probably has a tannoy, and it might even sing quite softly; but it can only do so by not using most of its enormous power.

  3. How come it says Xbox on one cabinet? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Oh, come on now, tell me you didn't take a second look at the pics when you saw that comment subject! How many actually went back and looked to see if one of the cabinets really did say "Xbox"?

    1. Re:How come it says Xbox on one cabinet? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I don't understand what you mean.

  4. Bitcoin! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    I wonder how many bitcoins you can mine with it.

    1. Re:Bitcoin! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Not even one! The Bitcoin network makes it look like a grain of sand on a beach.

  5. Ode to past: "Imagine a Beowolf..." by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Old timers...how many here could remember a time when "imagine a Beowolf cluster of these machines" would have been a "normal" post on /.

  6. Old School by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    That's what I like to see, a computer taking a whole room like in the old days!

    It's too bad that punk 'iVec' had to tag it with graffiti!

    1. Re:Old School by sillybilly · · Score: 0

      What the hell are they gonna compute on it? The weather more accurately? Or Pi to a few more gazillion decimal places? How about create an artificial intelligence smarter than a human in it, that designs an even smarter core, and 3d-prints itself in a million copies all over the world into mobile robots by suddenly hacking into all networks, and then these million robotic copies of this smarter than human AI are gonna start eating humans alive for breakfast, and because they are a smarter predator than their human prey, so good luck outsmarting them. I think it all starts with design automation, design that designs the next design. That's how DNA works, it's a pretty simple design, A, C, G, T. It's a design that allows for automated design changes and selection. That's all they need to unleash inside one of these beasts. Make sure it's not connected to the wider Internet, or even power lines should be very isolated with many breakers that can be manually thrown, and the law should mandate some domestic ICBM's be pointed directly at the location, just in case it gets out of hand and needs to be annihilated. This kind of thing is the most dangerous threat to humanity, unlike the 2nd threat, biotech, against which the cure is simple: run away to quarantine yourself from the wider world (all interconnected through the atmospheric oxygen), such as in a few space stations. You can't really run away from AI if it's smarter than you and can chase you down. There is a Star Trek episode where some alien species, that is a predator, hunter, reminisces how he once chased another prized intelligent prey species through the core of a neutron star. That's what predators do, they go after you. Do you want to create a smarter predator, smarter parasite, than yourself? Only if you absolutely have to, should you. Are we in such dire circumstances? I don't think so. Life is good these days, for a while still, at least, in fact it's best it's ever been through history. We keep bitchin about oppression, but just look through human history, oppression was even worse. Well, except the intellectual property kind, we used to have a lot of freedom in that, and now the powers that be collect IP from creators for peanuts, and rape the rest of the population on royalties. The value they contribute to society is called "owning", or "hogging" and blackmailing everybody, over knowledge. They say it's expensive to think, just like this thinking machine proves it, and the value it generates should be possible to get "consideration" exchanged for, and the best way they can do it is turning it into a "property."

    2. Re:Old School by sillybilly · · Score: 1

      Just in case, I'll repeat the movie "Screamers" from 1996, that goes along this military intelligent robots automation design topic. And it's not a joke, it may seem like surreal and funny, but it's very serious stuff. The miracles of science and technology can create some really jawdropping stuff, but nothing as jaw dropping as the stuff created in that movie, so far.

    3. Re:Old School by sillybilly · · Score: 1

      Anybody in charge of handling nukes, or launching them knows the extreme danger they are tinkering with. I don't think the AI researchers minds are permeated by the same mindset, and if anything, handling a nuke or a nuke launch system is comparatively a piece of cake, a whole lot less dangerous than handling one of these supercomputer machines. They should mandate by law for every person that works with it to watch that movie "Screamers," just so that they are aware, and whoever works with it needs total psychological and security clearance, just like the people that work with nukes. You wouldn't want some egomaniac or one with charged with an agenda (such as greenpeace, vegetarian, any kinds of rights activist, i.e. anybody off the standard beaten path,) to tinker with one of these things, and in fact there is no guarantee that even people who seem completely sane, live normal lives, have families, 30 year careers, go to church, don't turn up like that bank president who after like 30 years he walked out with a few million dollars from his bank, in plain view in front of the camera, not even trying to disguise himself, left a wife, kids, and a community behind, and who knows what he did with that money, go to some Caribbean island and have fun watching young women in bikinis stroll before him on a beach sipping champagne? Some people's idea of fun is distorted like that, but it is usually an issue of ego, and in that, self interest, as opposed to religious people, who learned how to beat their self interest down, and aim for the collective self interest, but even that can turn into some racist stuff, like the God of my people vs. the God of your people, I'm a jealous God, say my God, and I'll blow you up over my God, my externalized ego, of my people, being greater than yours. Of course there has to be a balance between self interest and collective interest, as represented by the case of a cuckold fetish dude, at which everyone with common sense laughs at. On the other hand, male lions, when taking over a pride after a victorious fight, the first thing they do is kill all the pups that they can smell are not theirs, to bring the females into heat and have their own off-springs. That's what happens, speciest, racist, clanist stuff. Male lions are definitely not cuckolds, but they understand the concept of a social hierarchy too. So in all this, we humans have religion to help, to balance things out. So to speak. But even the Holy Quran complains how "they" (as in Allah speaks in the plural a lot in it) have never told the Christians to become monks, nuns and virgins, that was a human invention, not a divine one, as reproduction and propagation of life "they" consider holy. Yet all great religions in the world created monks, or monk-like off the social chart people, as a social , non-self-interest but community-interest driven individuals.

    4. Re:Old School by sillybilly · · Score: 1

      I think we still got at least another 50-200 years to go before we match the computing power of a cheap human cranium, which has got to be way more than a terraflop. Next wonder of biotechnology: reworking a human brain - or more like a monkey brain that has no ethical issues - to efficiently compute floating point results that can be directly displayed on an LCD, instead of analyze visual signals.

    5. Re:Old School by sillybilly · · Score: 1

      Then there'll be these secret places where people or monkeys with a lot of terraflops are bred in a dish, without having any fathers and mothers, are born and get eyes and ears excised so they don't develop normal sensory processing and world awareness (or they can even be genetic engineered and propagated like that, not to have eyes and ears, or even skin touch and taste and smell senses), so their whole brain capacity is available for some non-sensory, non-world-around-you-awareness-and-modeling computing task, and some fiber optic interconnect links like a hundred of them in a room, all being hooked up like hospital coma patients to a perfusion feed, and some automated excrement system that sucks the poop out of their butt automatically, and this "Beowulf cluster" of monkey brains (or human brains if they are sure not to get caught, because they get better bang per buck out of a human brain, per calorie of food invested - not necessarily, and chimp short term memory is proven to be better than a human's, so it depends on the task at hand) would be able to mine a whole lot of bitcoins very cheaply. Why worry about miniaturization, dust-free atmosphere chip foundries that cost near a trillion dollars, when life can miniaturize and create a supercomputing brain, in the middle of a dusty, putrefied swampy mud. The far future of computing, and even AI is biotech, or biotech-like miniaturizing self automation machines, and whether this bio-computer is a DNA based organic brain, or a silicon-chip based self constructing metal/silicon machine, only the future will tell.

    6. Re:Old School by sillybilly · · Score: 2

      I for one, love my little HP Mini 210 Laptop with a 5 W Intel Atom chipset and 9 hr battery life, and way more than sufficient computing power as far as I'm concerned, and all the recent creations on the web, such as semi-infinite-loop javascript webpages trying to tell me to upgrade, they can go stick their javascript where the Sun don't shine, because I think I have way too much computing power as it is, not too little, more than sufficient for my needs, only it's used incorrectly by shitty software, and we have a clash of mentality on this topic, and I beg to differ with them.

    7. Re:Old School by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      i don't think your plan would work. brains work really great at doing near real-time sensor processing and pattern recognition and doing this in parallel with multiple sensors. (current computers do a poor job at this) and your plan is to remove all the sensors. the thing it is good at processing.

      Brains work rather poorly at very accurate processing of large numbers in serial (computers do extremely well at this).

    8. Re:Old School by sillybilly · · Score: 1

      I don't need more computing power, or cheaper computing. What I have is enough, what I need is software that's more efficient. Heck even MS Office 97sp2 is more efficient than all the office version starting from Office 2002 they throw at me today, has better features, it's faster and less bloated and smaller in size. My real issues, when I look at my costs are: housing and transportation. Healthcare I try not to mess with, and it's a fight against constant deliberate infection. So to drop the housing cost, please build rotating space stations that can fit a trillion people, because if you justify the high demand and low supply of housing because we have 7 billion people, that's not my fault, I'm not contributing to overpopulation, so don't torture me over it please. And as far as gas goes, create safe nuclear power plants that make a lot of ammonia, and fuel cell cars based on that. Ban all nuclear bombs on the planet, and build nuclear power plants for cheap energy. You can also cut the natural gas and water bills with cheap energy. I don't want yet another tax, like carbon tax, and yet another expense, like mandatory Obamacare, if anything I want less tax, such as no local income tax, and very low property tax, and no mandatory insurance for driving. I already lost the battle on how much I deserve for the work I do, I'm not special, and minimum wage is an extreme luxury, when you look at what kind of miracles it can buy, like a 320 GB portable hard disk for $30. Minimum wage is extreme luxury. What's bullshit is the sky high mandatory existence-fee like expenses. Please don't destroy my house because you think it's not luxurious enough to my needs, based on your building code luxury standards. My definition of luxury is dough sitting in the bank, and high income to basic, mandatory expense ratio, of at least 10-20 (which is achievable with minimum wage if you can get a CAUV tax of $22/year on a small farm, which comes out to $1.83/month housing cost that's mandatory, plus the mobile home property tax if it has the wheels removed and it becomes a fixture, not a movable item, so you can avoid even the $60/year mobile home tax, an then housing cost items that you can do yourself, like maintenance, such as tarp over a leaky roof. So now from focusing on housing sucking the living life out of everybody, they try to flip it to health care, and I'm fighting tooth and nail not to go to the hospital again, and I know the hospital won't help me, because they don't do what you ask as a customer, please help me with a throat infection, they shine a flashlight in your throat and say I can't see anything, you must be hallucinating, and send you to the nut house. That's bullshit, that's like I take my car in for an oil change, and they say the oil is fine, but we replaced the transmission for you, against your will, and here is the bill. Like we knock your house down, against your will, so you can't live in it, and here is the bill, and if you don't pay it, we'll put a foreclosure on your credit, and no, the land bank don't accept donations of lots without a house on it, we want to first send you to foreclosure over it and the land bank gets it anyway, because nobody's bidding at the sheriff sale. And as far as justifying the high cost of lawnmowing, don't fucking do it. Even if you paid me $20 to have me let you cut my grass, I'd say no, because I love weed and bugs that much. If you offered 2000 each time, I'd say sorry bugs, you gotta find another place to live. But I prefer my grass uncut, let alone wasting money I don't have in the first place on it. Beauty is a natural flower, a rough weed that can exist on its own, without external help like welfare support, and there is a bug on its petals, living the same way, wild, free, unlike the artificial plants that require constant welfare support to make it. And a green lot without any flowers is a green desert to me. What happened to the bugs, these marvelous little creatures? Yeah, some of them, like mosquitos, I slap, if I catch them, but most of them I have no problem with coexisting with me. I am happier in a world full of butterflies and beautiful bugs, than in a green desert suburban environment deprived of it.)

  7. missing youtube video by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Where's the youtube video with the incessant rambling about the box, everything written on the box, delivery of the box, the packaging, the instruction manual, the baggy the instruction manual came in.... and about 5 minutes in they might, just might, show the first shots of the computer in the box...

    1. Re:missing youtube video by wonkey_monkey · · Score: 2

      You forgot poorly-lit, hand-held, un-rehearsed, and with the phrase "So I'm just gonna go ahead and..." repeated several hundred times.

      --
      systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
  8. Art by Charliemopps · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I do like the art. I'm not generally a fan of indigenous art. I grew up with a lot of native american kids and was forced to do tons of it for the pow-wows, school art projects and such. So I've an aversion to it now. It's kind of like growing up Scottish and hating bagpipes now because of it...

    Anyways, what they did for those computers was well done and has a modern flavor. Good job!

    1. Re:Art by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Australian aboriginal art is quite different to North American First Nation art:

      https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=australian+aboriginal+art&source=lnms&tbm=isch ...took me a few goes to work out that "tbm=isch" is needed to show the images by default. Thanks Google, the URL parameters used to be a lot easier to decode.

    2. Re:Art by jellomizer · · Score: 1

      The Cray supercomputers use to look really impressive. Blinking Lights, Red Liquid coolant dripping down a glass/plexiglass enclosure. Even the Cray 1 with its round design, with benches made it look really cool.
      Now it is just a bunch of Printed Plastic covers, on a set of square boxes.

      For the cost, you might as well make it look really impressive.

      --
      If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
    3. Re:Art by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      > For the cost, you might as well make it look really impressive.

      It is precisely because of the cost that they don't make it look really impressive. It used to be that supercomputing was a high margin business and they could afford all the froo-froo. Beowulf killed that. Even when your machine isn't in competition with a cluster, the market is no longer as accepting of froo-froo.

    4. Re:Art by Charliemopps · · Score: 1

      You mean gaudy? Because that's what you're describing to me.

  9. Ode to past: by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    And in Soviet Russia the Beowolf cluster imagines you...

    1. Re:Ode to past: by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      And in Soviet Russia the Beowolf cluster imagines you...

      That depends. Does it run Linux?

    2. Re:Ode to past: by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It's "Beowulf", not "Beowolf", you silly guys.

      That being said, I don't see why we can't just say "cluster". That "Beowulf" addition there means almost nothing.

    3. Re:Ode to past: by onepoint · · Score: 2

      yes it does
      http://www.cray.com/Products/C...
      has it's own version I believe

      --
      if you see me, smile and say hello.
    4. Re:Ode to past: by Artifakt · · Score: 1

      You run Linux on dead badgers, not wolves.

      --
      Who is John Cabal?
    5. Re:Ode to past: by cstacy · · Score: 2

      It's "Beowulf", not "Beowolf", you silly guys.

      Bad Wolf

    6. Re:Ode to past: by fahrbot-bot · · Score: 1

      You run Linux on dead badgers, not wolves.

      NetBSD actually runs on both.

      --
      It must have been something you assimilated. . . .
    7. Re:Ode to past: by JasonGoatcher · · Score: 0

      Dr. Who reference or wishful thinking?

      August 23rd can't get here fast enough, lol.

    8. Re:Ode to past: by oldmac31310 · · Score: 1

      Why not B.O. wolf?

      --
      http://www.acetonestudio.com
  10. So, by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    What are they doing with the old one?

  11. DF by Thanshin · · Score: 1

    It's so overpoweringly mighty it can run Dwarf Fortress on a 256x256 embark area at 2 FPS.

    1. Re:DF by Mashiki · · Score: 2

      You think that's impressive, it can actually hit 13FPS in Crysis.

      --
      Om, nomnomnom...
  12. Re:Ode to past: "Imagine a Beowolf..." by Thanshin · · Score: 1

    A.... Beowolf... ...

    I've decided you mean a Philanthus Triangulum.

    The alternative is too sad.

  13. I remember when... by skovnymfe · · Score: 1

    I remember when computers used to fill an entire football field! Now look at this, the powerhouse of the world, the biggest monstrosity on the scale, coming up at what, 8 racks?

    1. Re:I remember when... by AJodock · · Score: 1

      Just the biggest in the southern hemisphere. The biggest super computers in the northern half of the world still take up about football field sizes. (http://www.hpcwire.com/2013/06/02/full_details_uncovered_on_chinese_top_supercomputer/)

    2. Re:I remember when... by skovnymfe · · Score: 1

      Ah I must've overlooked that detail in my rage.

  14. Energy footprint by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I would love to know what the energy footprint is of this data center.
    Perth is basicly located on the edge of a desert, most of the power is generated by coal and gas power stations.
    The air conditioning cost must be insane, though they might be pumping underground water for coolant, but that in itself is costly and a limited resource.
    I looked on their website and I could find no mention of it, and it doesn't look like they use solar either, which for a desert like place would make more sense.
    Tasmania would probably be a better place for installing such machines.

    1. Re:Energy footprint by andy.ruddock · · Score: 1

      Read the text, and follow the links, from picture #5.

      --
      God: An invisible friend for grown-ups.
  15. Re:turn it upside down by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Moderate -1, an inconvenient truth.

  16. Only half the story by gmhowell · · Score: 3, Funny

    An 'unboxing' is only half of the modern way of reporting on new hardware. The more interesting question in this case is "will it blend?"

    --
    Jesus was all right but his disciples were thick and ordinary. -John Lennon
  17. Ooooooh... Custom Paint Job! by dohzer · · Score: 1

    Half the money is in the custom paint job.

    1. Re:Ooooooh... Custom Paint Job! by Dins · · Score: 1

      Now it just needs a cool set of rimz. Maybe some ground effect lighting. Possibly some pneumatics.

  18. Bitcoin by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    How long until an engineer uses it to mine some previous coins

  19. Imagine by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    a Beowulf cluster of those.

  20. Well in this case... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    We are talking about x86 processors running linux. So yes it could run that without even batting an eye.

  21. Too little, too late. by nimbius · · Score: 3, Funny

    We finally have a candidate system on which we can attempt to run crysis, and what happens? Crytek goes under.

    --
    Good people go to bed earlier.
  22. Nimitz class can do 30+ knots by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    You could EASILY water ski speed-wise behind an aircraft carrier. And you'll have some helacious wake jumps :)

    1. Re:Nimitz class can do 30+ knots by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You could EASILY water ski speed-wise behind an aircraft carrier. And you'll have some helacious wake jumps :)

      Just don't let go of the rope, It'll take a mile to stop the boat. You better be a good swimmer.

    2. Re:Nimitz class can do 30+ knots by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You might need a heck of a long tow rope though, a ship like that is going to have a pretty large drag envelope.

    3. Re:Nimitz class can do 30+ knots by istartedi · · Score: 1

      Requisition item 453/67-A2NX, drag buoy and speedboat package. Secure an ordinary ski rope to the drag buoy, and detail personnel to effect rescue with speedboat if you lose your grip. Don't you guys know anything?

      --
      For all intensive purposes, "whom" is no longer a word. That begs the question, "who cares"?
  23. soda machines!! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    heheheh it looks lyk a line of soda machines!! Can I get a Magnus cola out of one of them ??

  24. Ooh, and coasters for beer! by Impy+the+Impiuos+Imp · · Score: 1

    Someone at Cray loves them some corn nuts.

    --
    (-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
  25. Looks like a brilliantly decorated VAX... by Archtech · · Score: 1

    ...but what on earth has happened to the Unibus???

    --
    I am sure that there are many other solipsists out there.
  26. Re:Ode to past: "Imagine a Beowolf..." by jitterman · · Score: 1

    It might be able to generate a 3D image of Natalie Portman with a bowl of hot grits. You never know! I for one bow down to our Cray petaFLOPS overlords.

    --
    For conscience is the wound, and there's naught to staunch it
  27. obligatory by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Imagine a beowulf cluster of these!

  28. Meh by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    The Bitcoin network is way more impressive.

  29. Climate Science by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    The Peta computer at the University of Illinois takes up a large building and some climate modeling runs take 45 days. I believe that Crays were originally designed for climate modeling or more accurately weather forecasting. But various models disagree by factors of 2 to 5 100 years out. Consensus physics? Opinions vary between meteorologists and climate scientists. But meteorologists don't get so long to think.

  30. so, uh, anyone else by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    did anyone else jerk off to those pics?

  31. Cool but fastest in Australia?? by kf6auf · · Score: 1

    Pictures are cool and all, but there's supercomputer currently at the Australian National University that has been benchmarked at 0.978 PetaFLOPS so saying that this one could be the fastest in the southern hemisphere with up to 1 PetaFLOPS seems a bit like counting your emus before they've hatched.