SGI & NASA Build World's Fastest Supercomputer

SGI & NASA Build World's Fastest Supercomputer 417

Posted by timothy on Tuesday October 26, 2004 @10:45PM from the but-does-it-run-windows dept.

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?"

SGI & NASA Build World's Fastest Supercomputer

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hmmmm...... (Score:4, Funny)

by commo1 ( 709770 ) writes: on Tuesday October 26, 2004 @10:46PM (#10638139)

Let's see them predict the weather.....

That's nothing... (Score:5, Funny)

by Anonymous Coward writes: on Tuesday October 26, 2004 @10:47PM (#10638145)

...when they hit the "TURBO" button on the front of the boxes they'll really scream.

20 system cluster?!? (Score:5, Funny)

by Emugamer ( 143719 ) * writes: on Tuesday October 26, 2004 @10:47PM (#10638146) Homepage Journal

I have one of those... in a spare room!

Who cares about a 20 system cluster, I want a one 512 processor machine!

or 20, I'm not that picky

Everyone needs one! (Score:5, Funny)

by Dzimas ( 547818 ) writes: on Tuesday October 26, 2004 @10:47PM (#10638147)

Just what I need to model my next H-bom... uhh... umm.... I mean render my next feature film. I call it "Kaboom."

or (Score:1, Funny)

by The Islamic Fundamen ( 728413 ) writes: <sam_r@shaw.ca> on Tuesday October 26, 2004 @10:47PM (#10638150) Homepage Journal

The World Serires outcome!

Wow---- (Score:5, Funny)

by ZennouRyuu ( 808657 ) writes: on Tuesday October 26, 2004 @10:48PM (#10638159)

I bet gentoo wouldn't be such a b**ch to get running with all of that compiling power behind it :)

And after further cooperation with Redmond... (Score:4, Funny)

by ferrellcat ( 691126 ) writes: on Tuesday October 26, 2004 @10:49PM (#10638165)

...they were *almost* able to get Longhorn to boot.

its not the hardware thats important (Score:5, Funny)

by fender_rock ( 824741 ) writes: on Tuesday October 26, 2004 @10:49PM (#10638168) Homepage

If the same software is used, its not going to make weather predictions more accurate. Its just going to give them the wrong answer, faster.

In other news... (Score:2, Funny)

by thedogcow ( 694111 ) writes: on Tuesday October 26, 2004 @10:49PM (#10638172)

SGI & NASA now have developed a computer that will be able to run Longhorn.

Imagine a... (Score:2, Funny)

by Anonymous Coward writes: on Tuesday October 26, 2004 @10:51PM (#10638185)

...single node of these...

oh wait, sorry, Cray deja-vu :-)

Re:Intent of NASA... (Score:4, Funny)

by SenatorTreason ( 640653 ) writes: <senatortreasonNO@SPAMgmail.com> on Tuesday October 26, 2004 @10:52PM (#10638200)

Seti@Home. They'll be in the Top 10 in no time!

Here's the current list... (Score:5, Funny)

by daveschroeder ( 516195 ) * writes: on Tuesday October 26, 2004 @10:53PM (#10638208)

Prof. Jack Dongarra of UTK is the keeper of the official list in the interim between the twice-yearly Top 500 lists:

http://www.netlib.org/benchmark/performance.pdf [netlib.org] See page 54.

And here's the current top 20 [wisc.edu] as of 10/26/04...

Re:hmmmm...... (Score:5, Funny)

by Anonymous Coward writes: on Tuesday October 26, 2004 @10:58PM (#10638243)

Today we predict a high of +3 Funny, with localised Trolling.
Tomorrow looks like developing a slight rise in Insightful post, but a drop in overall Informative. "First Post" will remain as a constant pattern.

NASA.org? (Score:5, Funny)

by lnoble ( 471291 ) writes: on Tuesday October 26, 2004 @10:58PM (#10638244)

Wow, I didn't know the NewAdvancedSearchAgent had such an interest or budget for super computing. I'd think they'd be able to afford their own web server though instead of being parked at domainspa.com and having to fill their entire page with advertisments.

Try NASA.GOV.

One is a parity bit... (Score:4, Funny)

by NotQuiteReal ( 608241 ) writes: on Tuesday October 26, 2004 @11:06PM (#10638287) Journal

... um never mind.
RAEM (redundant array of expensive machines) just doesn't ring right - to close to REAM.

Re:Ok, what is the point of this? (Score:4, Funny)

by dagur ( 821323 ) writes: on Tuesday October 26, 2004 @11:06PM (#10638293)

Yes what is the point? We all know the resulting answer is going to be 42.

I think you meant to say... (Score:3, Funny)

by spineboy ( 22918 ) writes: on Tuesday October 26, 2004 @11:12PM (#10638335) Journal

A Beowolf cluster of Beowolf clusters....

ARRRGGGHHHH PEOPLE'S HEADS ARE EXPLODING!!!

Now you know that there's some engineer with acces to this thing thinking how he can jump to the front of SETI@HOME.

Re:Ways you are wrong (Score:3, Funny)

by WormholeFiend ( 674934 ) writes: on Tuesday October 26, 2004 @11:13PM (#10638342)

Computer superclusters don't even have O-rings

so it's not water-cooled?

[didn't RTFA]

Ya know... (Score:5, Funny)

by Al Al Cool J ( 234559 ) writes: on Tuesday October 26, 2004 @11:13PM (#10638343)

It's getting to the point where I'm going to have call shenanigans on the whole freakin' planet. Am I really supposed to believe that an OS started by a Finnish university student a decade ago and designed to run on a 386, is now running the most powerful computer ever built? I mean, come on!
Seriously, am I on candid camera?

Re:Everyone needs one! (Score:5, Funny)

by polecat_redux ( 779887 ) writes: <[moc.liamg] [ta] [hciwmaps]> on Tuesday October 26, 2004 @11:13PM (#10638347)

Just what I need to model my next H-bom... uhh... umm.... I mean render my next feature film. I call it "Kaboom."

Not to be pedantic, but the correct term is "Freedom Bomb".

My proposed use of this super computer.... (Score:4, Funny)

by chicagozer ( 585086 ) writes: on Tuesday October 26, 2004 @11:15PM (#10638353)

Emulating a Centris 650 running Mac OS X at 2.5 Ghz.

Re:windows (Score:4, Funny)

by jd ( 1658 ) writes: <imipak@ y a hoo.com> on Tuesday October 26, 2004 @11:31PM (#10638464) Homepage Journal

They tried, but they ran out of blue.

Re:Photos of System (Score:5, Funny)

by RadioheadKid ( 461411 ) writes: on Tuesday October 26, 2004 @11:31PM (#10638466)

You'd think with all that super-computing power they'd be able to figure out the zipping JPEGs is retarted.

But... (Score:2, Funny)

by PrimeWaveZ ( 513534 ) writes: on Tuesday October 26, 2004 @11:34PM (#10638479)

Does it run CherryOS?

Re:Wow---- (Score:1, Funny)

by Anonymous Coward writes: on Tuesday October 26, 2004 @11:34PM (#10638492)

b**ch?

..What? What is it?

Butch?
Batch?
Beach?
Bunch?
Bench?

What's the secret word noone will tell me?

Re:Everyone needs one! (Score:3, Funny)

by fm6 ( 162816 ) writes: on Tuesday October 26, 2004 @11:35PM (#10638496) Homepage Journal

So the French are claiming they invented H-Bombs now? How like them!

I can see a certain person now... (Score:5, Funny)

by Trogre ( 513942 ) writes: on Tuesday October 26, 2004 @11:44PM (#10638545) Homepage

...rubbing his hands whilst sitting in a dark corner amongst an ever-dwindling pile of Microsoft-donated cash, salivating at this.

"512 processors, 20 machines, $699 per processor. All that intellectual property, yes! No free lunch no, Linux mine, MIIIINE, BWAAAAHAHAHAHA!!!"

*dials*

"Hello, NASA? About that $7,157,760 you owe me...
I'm sorry, where do you want me to jump?"

Re:Wow---- (Score:2, Funny)

by Anonymous Coward writes: on Tuesday October 26, 2004 @11:45PM (#10638551)

An asterisk can represent any number of characters, 0..inf (or at least MAX_INT). Therefore, the word is most likely "bch". Or maybe "bean salad crunch".

What?! (Score:4, Funny)

by commodoresloat ( 172735 ) writes: on Tuesday October 26, 2004 @11:48PM (#10638571)

All those teraflops and still no aliens? How many freaking teraflops do we need? Come on, folks, I just want one goddamned spaceman!!

Re:Intent of NASA... (Score:4, Funny)

by a1cypher ( 619776 ) writes: on Tuesday October 26, 2004 @11:54PM (#10638614) Homepage

Maybe they want to run PearPC at a decent speed.

Imagine a Beowolf cluster... (Score:2, Funny)

by Chuck Bucket ( 142633 ) writes: on Wednesday October 27, 2004 @12:08AM (#10638687) Homepage Journal

...oh never mind.

CBV@#$)(*?>M

I had a shell on the machine for day (Score:4, Funny)

by Sabalon ( 1684 ) writes: on Wednesday October 27, 2004 @12:10AM (#10638703)

It was great. I needed to build the kernel so I typed
# make -j 10534 bzImag
and even before I could hit the e and enter, it was done.

I was gonna build X but on this box the possible outcomes of "build World" scared me!

Units? (Score:3, Funny)

by Guppy06 ( 410832 ) writes: on Wednesday October 27, 2004 @12:19AM (#10638758)

"Its performance test (LINPACK) result of 42.7 teraflops easily outclasses the previous mark set by Japan's Earth Simulator of 35.86 teraflops"

Yes, but what is that in bogomips?

Re:Of course not. (Score:2, Funny)

by Chrispy1000000 the 2 ( 624021 ) writes: on Wednesday October 27, 2004 @12:26AM (#10638796)

Well, I think I speak for all of us when I say: Thank &ran(diety;1,100) it isn't running windows.

Re:Everyone needs one! (Score:4, Funny)

by hunterx11 ( 778171 ) writes: <hunterx11@g3.1415926mail.com minus pi> on Wednesday October 27, 2004 @12:37AM (#10638846) Homepage Journal

The French invented the H-Bomb first, but since the H is silent, they thought it was just a regular bomb and forgot about it.

Re:Photos of System (Score:3, Funny)

by raodin ( 708903 ) writes: on Wednesday October 27, 2004 @12:45AM (#10638893)

Wow, I'm glad I'm not the one installing 10240 heatsinks.. [sgi.com]

Re:its not the hardware thats important (Score:5, Funny)

by ozmanjusri ( 601766 ) writes: <aussie_bob@hoMOSCOWtmail.com minus city> on Wednesday October 27, 2004 @01:19AM (#10639089) Journal

Well, if the weather's too chaotic to predict, even with this much computing horsepower, maybe it would be simpler to go to Brazil and just swat the damn butterfly with the owner's manual.

Re:Imagine? (Score:2, Funny)

by arodland ( 127775 ) writes: on Wednesday October 27, 2004 @01:40AM (#10639182)

> What will be in the atmosphere 24 hours from now?

Where?

> Everywhere.

And what sort of things were you interested in?

> Everything.

Mostly a bunch of airplanes and some water.

nothing compared to 500TF per floor at the CIA (Score:4, Funny)

by cheekyboy ( 598084 ) writes: on Wednesday October 27, 2004 @01:41AM (#10639189) Homepage Journal

1. I bet CIA has something in order of 10-100x more powerfull, I mean if you can afford to wire up 5 full office floors of computers, say 20*512 * 5 per floor * 5 , thats a hell lot more. CIA can afford to spend 200m on it, and have 10 super clusters of 1000 tf each.

2. I bet the CIA also can change the weather, go read HARP etc... if the russians can do it in the 80s then the CIA can do anything.

Re:And after further cooperation with Redmond... (Score:3, Funny)

by kzinti ( 9651 ) writes: on Wednesday October 27, 2004 @02:15AM (#10639319) Homepage Journal

Q: What kind of machine does Longhorn run best on?

A: A slide projector.

(Old joke. cat nt-joke-1990.txt | sed -e 's/Windows NT/Longhorn/g')

Pah! 9 weeks? (Score:2, Funny)

by tod_miller ( 792541 ) writes: on Wednesday October 27, 2004 @03:43AM (#10639567) Journal

I installed Windows XP* on my 1ghz p3** in just 2.5*** hours!

And they call it a super computer!

* Just kidding, SuSE 9.0
** Kidding again, 2800+
*** I can't remember the install time.

They'd run Windows XP... (Score:3, Funny)

by gilesjuk ( 604902 ) writes: <<giles.jones> <at> <zen.co.uk>> on Wednesday October 27, 2004 @05:43AM (#10639973)

But it would take to long to:

Run Windows Update for each box.
Remove Windows Messenger.
Cancel the window telling you to take a tour of XP.
Cancel the window telling you to get a passport.
Run the net connection wizard.
Reboot after installing updates.
etc....

(I'm not being totally serious, I know you can deploy ghost images etc..)

Re:nothing compared to 500TF per floor at the CIA (Score:1, Funny)

by Anonymous Coward writes: on Wednesday October 27, 2004 @07:50AM (#10640390)

I for one welcome our CIA overloards.

There may be more comments in this discussion. Without JavaScript enabled, you might want to turn on Classic Discussion System in your preferences instead.

hmmmm...... (Score:4, Funny)

That's nothing... (Score:5, Funny)

20 system cluster?!? (Score:5, Funny)

Everyone needs one! (Score:5, Funny)

or (Score:1, Funny)

Wow---- (Score:5, Funny)

And after further cooperation with Redmond... (Score:4, Funny)

its not the hardware thats important (Score:5, Funny)

In other news... (Score:2, Funny)

Imagine a... (Score:2, Funny)

Re:Intent of NASA... (Score:4, Funny)

Here's the current list... (Score:5, Funny)

Re:hmmmm...... (Score:5, Funny)

NASA.org? (Score:5, Funny)

One is a parity bit... (Score:4, Funny)

Re:Ok, what is the point of this? (Score:4, Funny)

I think you meant to say... (Score:3, Funny)

Re:Ways you are wrong (Score:3, Funny)

Ya know... (Score:5, Funny)

Re:Everyone needs one! (Score:5, Funny)

My proposed use of this super computer.... (Score:4, Funny)

Re:windows (Score:4, Funny)

Re:Photos of System (Score:5, Funny)

But... (Score:2, Funny)

Re:Wow---- (Score:1, Funny)

Re:Everyone needs one! (Score:3, Funny)

I can see a certain person now... (Score:5, Funny)

Re:Wow---- (Score:2, Funny)

What?! (Score:4, Funny)

Re:Intent of NASA... (Score:4, Funny)

Imagine a Beowolf cluster... (Score:2, Funny)

I had a shell on the machine for day (Score:4, Funny)

Units? (Score:3, Funny)

Re:Of course not. (Score:2, Funny)

Re:Everyone needs one! (Score:4, Funny)

Re:Photos of System (Score:3, Funny)

Re:its not the hardware thats important (Score:5, Funny)

Re:Imagine? (Score:2, Funny)

nothing compared to 500TF per floor at the CIA (Score:4, Funny)

Re:And after further cooperation with Redmond... (Score:3, Funny)

Pah! 9 weeks? (Score:2, Funny)

They'd run Windows XP... (Score:3, Funny)

Re:nothing compared to 500TF per floor at the CIA (Score:1, Funny)

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