AMD CPUs Power "Supreme Supercomputer"

[r_manic]

The Jaguar supercomputer at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory was recently upgraded with new AMD processors
that gave it enough performance to move up the top 5 supercomputers list. The Jaguar is a Cray XT5 supercomputer and is now the fastest machine in the world.

Jaguar previously used quad-core AMD processors and was upgraded to 6-core processors. The new upgrade gives the supercomputer a theoretical peak performance of 2.3 petaflops/s. The performance on the Linpack benchmark
was 1.75 petaflops/second.

The second place computer on the list is the Roadrunner using dual CPU AMD power. The processors used in the Jaguar are AMD 6100 series parts.

So why did they go for AMD? Affordability? I can only imagine what the cooling costs are...

Source

 

[GhislainG]

When they built it in 2005, AMD had the best server CPUs for supercomputers (and it might still be true). The Oak Ridge National Laboratory probably isn't that concerned with cooling costs; having the fastest supercomputer was the ultimate goal.

 

[someguy7]

Because it previously used the Quad core AMD's. The new chips are drop in replacements for the old.

They went with AMD because for the purpose of these machines AMD is better. Price is no concern. There are 224162 cpu cores in the supercomputer. 2GB of ram per core. The whole system has 300TB of memory and 10PB of hard disc space.

Afford ability has zilch to do with the world of supercomputers.

 

[jimmysmitty]

I want to see Intels 8 core and AMDs 12 core in super computers.

That will be interesting to see.

 

[cjl]

Because it previously used the Quad core AMD's. The new chips are drop in replacements for the old.

They went with AMD because for the purpose of these machines AMD is better. Price is no concern. There are 224162 cpu cores in the supercomputer. 2GB of ram per core. The whole system has 300TB of memory and 10PB of hard disc space.

Afford ability has zilch to do with the world of supercomputers.

For the purpose of these machines the Nehalem architecture should be better, but they were not available when the computer was first made. As stated above, the 6-core CPUs were a drop in replacement.