Posted on 06/03/2010 4:25:55 PM PDT by bruinbirdman
Jaguar, an American computer that can perform as many calculations in a day as a normal computer can in 100 years, has been crowned as the world's fastest supercomputer.
Jaguar, built by the Cray company and housed at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee, has a top speed of 1.75 petaflops per second, according to a bi-annual top 500 supercomputer survey.
A petaflop is equivalent to 1,000 trillion calculations
The $120 million (£82 million) Jaguar has been used by scientists to simulate the explosion of stars, the flow of uranium into the Columbia river from ageing underground storage facilities, and the effects of climate change.
The United States is home to around half the supercomputers on the top 500 list, which was published at the International Supercomputing Conference in Hamburg, Germany.
However, China, which has unabashed ambitions to build the world's fastest computer, now has 24 of the world's fastest machines.
China's Nebulae machine at the National Supercomputing centre in the southern city of Shenzhen ranked second overall, with a speed of 1.271 petaflops per second. The Tianhe-1 supercomputer in Tianjin ranked seventh.
The Chinese state media said the machines were being used for sequencing genes and other scientific projects.
The fastest machine in the UK which has 38 supercomputers on the list is housed at the University of Edinburgh. It has a top speed of 0.27 petaflops per second.
Scientists said the supercomputers are increasingly being used commercially, especially in the aerospace and defence sectors. Giant retailers, such as Walmart, also have powerful systems in order to track their supply chain.
Experts also said that while the top 500 list represented the fastest known computers, there were also a number of secret machines, owned by governments around the world, whose speed may be even greater.
(Excerpt) Read more at telegraph.co.uk ...
Big deal. I can mate with a tall blond!
Petaflops - love that word.
Does it come in a laptop version?
Number two on the list was a macbook pro.........< /sarcasm>
A petaflop...
And here I thought it was one more premise by Peta that failed to be widely accepted.
The Jaguar, a thousand trillion calculations per second, and they still can’t quantify the thinking process of the female of the species. (Go ahead ladies, I deserve it, but I couldn’t resist.) ;^)
/johnny
“Jaguar, built by the Cray company and housed at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee, has a top speed of 1.75 petaflops per second, according to a bi-annual top 500 supercomputer survey. “
That there is pretty damn fast, I don’t care who you are.
I have a 56k modem....whats your point?
Don’t be too dazzled. I’ve spent years in that business (couple of years ago, “I” had nearly 160 of those Top 500 on the list). There’s one hell of a lot of gamesmanship by vendors, and Linpack tests are not the best way to determine a computer’s true capabilities.
Fastest?
Is that the same as the most powerful?
Maybe in 1993
Doesn't matter how fast it is, Microsoft will still come up with an OS that takes six minutes to start up.
Let's not forget the acronym "MIPS" when used to test performance... "Meaningless Indicator of Performance" (as opposed to "Millions of Instructions Per Second.)
Mark
Me too, wonder what the next higher will be named? lol
God never intended for you to understand us, that is what makes us so special and appealing, and you guys so interested. You guys just keep chasing us, until we catch you. Now that's the female mind right there. ROFL
Ha! I object your honor! ;^)
Okay...
I agree. Harumph!
“Doesn’t matter how fast it is, Microsoft will still come up with an OS that takes six minutes to start up.”
Amen. Of course this is a mainframe and they take a lot longer.
My buddy had one of those.
Pretty cool for it’s time.
He sold it to buy a 3DO.
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